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Soul Express CD Review
STEVE BUTLER featuring RON HAYNES – Something for the People (US Pull ‘Em Up Records, 2005)
Windy City – Something For The People – Change – Let’s Go To Work – Giving My All To You – Shakedown – Tonight’s The Night – Bronzeville – Windy City (Extended mix)
This album is so funky it hurts!!! I adore the powerful horn-driven funk of Kool & The Gang, The Dazz Band, Average White Band and the J.B.s, and this CD contains all the best facets of their styles or airy, expansive funk. Also we have a peppering of classy vocals, the best of which is the gorgeously seductive Joaquina Mitchell and her superb “Giving My All To You”. More of that later! These guys ply their trombone, flugelhorn and saxes to devastating effect throughout this album, and the Chicago flavour really comes through nicely. Mind you, there is a healthy, if mere, taste of the Brazilian scene on the opening salvo of “Windy City” which is quite nice to boot. The extended mix is also very welcome I must say.
The J.B.s really spring to mind with the awesome stepper, “Something For The People”, along with funky chant and “Hot Pants Road” styled keyboard riff. Talking of riffs, the chaps link up with excellent vocalist, Mauri Sevier, on the chunky, yet laid back “Change”. The shuffling, heavy beat is easily restrained by a gentle, dreamy Rhodes keyboard and sturdy sax solo. One for any hot days that we may have left this summer! Mauri appears again with the seductive and sexy “Tonight’s The Night” and showcases some superb flugel horns courtesy of Ron Haynes.
“Let’s Go To Work” smacks of the Fred Wesley & The J.B.’s style and really is great. I had this on in the car on the way to work and this did a lot in raising my mood, I can tell you. Thinking about all things moody, I have already mentioned “Giving My All To You”. This is a top-drawer ballad with some sensational musical accompaniment that is both soulful and haunting. The lazy, almost drunken horns are spine tingling and this lady really does have a sexy voice. I love her tender, breathless and passionate approach and she soars like an eagle over this sexy, teasing clapping beat. The aloof horns and Latin guitar help make this one hell of an essential song. I would recommend this album on the strength of this CD alone, to be honest!
This is hotly pursued by my favourite uptempo track, which is “Shakedown”. This is one hell of a rump shaker and can’t help but make you feel so, so good. One word of advice – play it LOUD! The irresistible guitar riff and supportive Wah Wah does nothing to dampen the mood, and adds more ingredients to this very funky assortment of tracks. We are almost inspired to “get down with the Genie” if we are looking towards Kool & The Gang for any inspiration. The sax on this track throws me back to Donald Byrd’s excellent 70s efforts with the Mizell Brothers too, and that ain’t bad either!
Steve Butler and Ron Haynes have really come up trumps in their work here, and I don’t think anyone with any rhythm or soul in their bones will not fail to feel the groove on this CD. I would like to see much more from this collaboration and hope that the sexy Joaquina return to thrill us also. Head over to CD Baby and pick this up – you will not regret it. Music like this is so rare nowadays that it has to be trumpeted (excuse the pun!), promoted and important of all, enjoyed!
-Barry Towler
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Press Release
Steve Butler Feat. Ron Haynes
“Steve Butler Feat. Ron Haynes has “Something for the People”
Here is the ultimate Album…
The long anticipated album by Steve Butler featuring Ron Haynes is called:
“Something for the People”
This is a funky, smooth and soulful tribute to the craftsmanship of classic R&B music. Influenced by such artists as James Brown, Curtis Mayfield, and Earth, Wind and Fire, the duo wanted to produce an album that reached back to the roots of R&B, while allowing one to groove to the smooth rhythm of “Steppin”. A sound that can be considered Chicago’s very own!
“Butler & Haynes” sound is laid back with a contemporary horn sound of soulful grooves that allow one to vibe as if you’re “Steppin” on a cloud.
Their current single “Shake Down” is currently being serviced to V103 and Soul 106.3 in Chicago as well as Urban AC across the country. The following DJ Pool’s have embraced this current single:
Chicago’s Nitelife Record Pool; Sound Wave Record Pool-NY; Soul Disco Record Pool-CA; Pittsburgh DJ Association; Hit Bound Record Pool-NC; Rickett’s Record Pool-NJ; Sound Works Record Pool-CA; Soul City Sound Record Pool-KY; 4 Productions Record Pool-CA; Resource Record Pool-LA CA
Release Date Friday, June 3rd
Henley & Associates Entertainment, Inc
(773.405.9608)
- Henley Assoc. Ent.
STEVE BUTLER feat. RON HAYNES
Web Sites Official Web Site Recommended CDs At first it may seem like an odd combination. Mix a young hip-hop guitarist/producer and an acclaimed jazz trumpeter and what do you get? Well, when they combine their formidable talents and their love of funky 70s Chicago grooves, you get one of the most enjoyable albums of 2005.Steve Butler is a hot hip-hop producer who has made a name for himself working with artists such as Twista and Skee-Lo. Ron Haynes is jazz royalty in Chicago, a noted trumpeter who began working as a teenager backing blues artists ranging from Otis Clay to Tyrone Davis before studying under jazz legend Donald Byrd. More recently Haynes led the horn section on comedian Bernie Mac's HBO show and was a member of the Grammy nominated jazz band Liquid Soul.Butler recruited Haynes to work on a dream project that would try to capture the spirit of classic Chicago soul, from Curtis Mayfield to Earth Wind & Fire. The result of their collaboration is Something for the People, a tasty album that succeeds wonderfully in melding a 70s R&B groove and resurgent steppers' sound with the city's jazz tradition. Beginning with the opening cut, "Windy City," the disc is bright, bold and extremely engaging. Butler maintains a steady, funky groove throughout and lets Haynes and the fantastic horn section (consisting of Haynes, Steve Graeber, Johnny Showtime, Skinny Williams, Johnny Cotton and Milton Ware) run free. It helps that Butler and Haynes have written eight strong tunes, but it is the band's performance that is transcendent, especially on the upbeat instrumentals such as the title cut, "Windy City" and the infectious "Shakedown" (the latter two of which are also included on the disc as extended mixes).Something for the People is the sound of Chicago in the Summer and makes for a great cruising-with-the-windows-down listen, a terrific mix of old school jazz and funk that will be tough to turn off or even turn down. Highly recommended.
- Soul Jazz
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Still working on that hot first release.
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Bio
“Something for the People”, the debut album from Steve Butler featuring Ron Haynes, is a funky, smooth and soulful tribute to the craftsmanship of classic R&B music. Influenced by artists such as James Brown, Curtis Mayfield, and Earth, Wind and Fire, the duo wanted to produce an album that reached back to the roots of R&B and recalled a time when creating great music meant getting musicians together and capturing the magic that arises from the fusion of the individual expression and flavor of each artist.
“Ron would go into the booth and tell the engineer to record not really knowing what was going to come out of his horn, and we just captured some stuff,” Butler recalls of recording sessions in the studio.
Carefully constructed using a live horn section led by Haynes’ trumpet and the rhythms of Butler’s guitar, the mainly instrumental album is, like its creators, at once a study in contrasts, and a melding of classic and contemporary. Butler is a guitarist and producer from Chicago’s South Side whose credits include hip-hop production and performances for Grammy-nominated artist Skee-lo, Twista, Do or Die, major movie soundtracks, and scores of radio and television commercials. Haynes, a Grammy-nominated trumpeter from Chicago’s West Side, has a history that includes writing and backing artist such as George Duke, The Ohio Players, Ramsey Lewis, Lenny Kravitz and Liquid Soul.
With more than twenty years of age between them and careers that seem to flow in different directions, the unlikely duo of Butler and Haynes appear to have little in common. However, a closer look reveals that they share a passion for great music that has allowed them to not only draw on their differences creatively but also seek out new experiences. This willingness to experiment is the driving force behind Something for the People and has proven to be the magic behind the their successful 2004 collaboration “P-1 Groove,” an urban radio hit that blended hip-hop, soul and funk.
“I pushed him into some different directions that he had never been pushed in, and he in turn pushed me in some different directions too, as a player, and I think it’s been a learning process for the both of us,” recalls Butler.
The ten-track album, written, produced and arranged by the Chicago natives, has a nostalgic feel of ’70s R&B, including the syncopated rhythms from that era recognized as the hallmark of Chicago’s great Stepping culture.
“We wanted to be one of the few artists to say we’re doing a project for this town. And we wanted to have that just obvious from the music,” says Butler when talking about the album.
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