LP Review: Rarearth, Grand Slam, and Band Together
As you may tell, cramming together three albums into one review doesn’t bode well for the albums in question.
RAREARTH
Released: 1977
LP Charts: #187 pop
Rarearth (yes, I’m spelling the title correctly) saw the return of Peter Hoorelbeke and Michael Urso and the final break from their funk-rock days. At least their good funk-rock days. This album is pretty rough as they clumsily incorporated more of the late ‘70s funk sound. The synthesizers particularly mostly miss the mark and just sound cheesy.
“Foot Loose And Fancy Free” (6/10) is a nod to the disco movement, but still stays on the side of funk. The ballad “When I Write” (6/10) actually does seem like a leftover cut from their bygone days. And wouldn’t you know it, it’s a co-write between Hoorelbeke and the recently deceased Tom Baird.
“I Really Love You” (5/10) really doesn’t fit this band’s vibe. It coulda worked on an R&B vocal quintet since it’s drenched in strings and borrows heavily from Philly soul, but it’s wasted on Rare Earth. Well, at least “Crazy Love” (5.5/10) is some vapid fun to finish up the album. I didn’t say good fun, though. Just vapid.
You can do without listening to anything here, except perhaps “Share My Love” (6.5/10), which is the most successful marriage here of their musical forte with the changing music scene.
ALBUM GRADE: D+
GRAND SLAM
Released: 1978
LP Charts: n/a
I don’t have much good to say about Grand Slam. But “not much” isn’t nothing!
I don’t believe it, but Rare Earth did a fine job on “My Eyes Only” (6.5/10), which is a mashing of Philly soul, lite disco, and yacht music. Not a hint of funk or rock to be found on this song. The other song I can call a success is “Mighty Good Love” (6/10). It manages to cross disco and funk.
The rest of this album will give you whiplash. There’s a hard rock cover of “I Heard It Through the Grapevine” immediately followed by a drab, calculating pop duet (“You Got My Love”). I’m all for artistic and stylistic variety, but this sounds like more like a grab bag than a savant seamlessly crossing musical boundaries.
I don’t need or want Rare Earth to be savants. But it would be nice to have some coherency. Clunky as Rarearth may have been it had some flow. Grand Slam is a choppy mess.
ALBUM GRADE: D
BAND TOGETHER
Released: 1979
LP Charts: #156 pop
Thanks to the Brothers Gibb (aka the Bee Gees), Rare Earth scored one final hit on Band Together, their final album for Motown. Like most Gibb tracks, “Warm Ride” (#38 pop) is catchy, but this track is wasted on Rare Earth. At least in its final form here. I can see an avenue where Rare Earth could have funked it up a little, but they retain the trademark Gibb falsetto vocals on the chorus and that ain’t fittin’ together at all with Rare Earth. A 5/10 at best.
Sadly, that song is a contender for best on the album. The Motown cover is run-of-the-mill (Marvin Gaye’s 1968 hit “You”). There’s a yacht song based on a throwback ‘50s doo wop sound “Love Is What You Get (If Love Is What You Give Me)” that also feels like filler.
At least “Love Do Me Right” and “Love Music” each have two-minute instrumental excursions that sound interesting. Too bad the vocal portions of each song are terrible.
Maybe Rare Earth shoulda just ditched the vocals at this point and done an instrumental album?