“Art, I’m here when I need to be.”
I let the large metal doors slam behind me. As I drove up the hill on Beverly Glen Boulevard, I reflected on Art’s words. I wanted ARC to succeed for ego and financial reasons, but I didn’t equate those reasons with having to sit behind a desk and deal with the day-to-day operations. It’s not that I didn’t have teachers who taught me how to run a record label, or how not to. I just believed that Marshall and Leonard Chess, Calvin Carter at Vee-Jay, Billy Davis, Clive Davis, Bruce Lundvall, and all the promotion, publicity, and marketing people in between were businesspeople, and I was a musician. I probably had too much of that boy from Memphis in me who found a father and mother in music. My boyhood pride was deeply rooted in being called a musician. Once my young heart had found music, I would be damned if I was going to let go of it. I loved being an artist, producer, writer, and bandleader. Maybe all that was playing itself out in a subconscious way in my not showing up at the office. Maybe it was a little snobbery or a little youthful rebelliousness gone awry. Regardless, ARC was running out of time.
Earth, Wind & Fire, and to a lesser degree Deniece Williams, carried the American Recording Company. In many situations, that would have been enough. But between us starting the label at the beginning of the downturn in the record business and, to a lesser degree, my lack of interest, it may have been doomed from the start. The record executives at all the major labels were blaming it on kids spending their quarters on video arcade machines, and on what they called counterfeiting, or home taping with cassettes. I don’t believe that was the cause, nor was the music itself. It was simply that the overall economy was not doing well. Between the dollar plummeting, unemployment, and bank failure after bank failure, there was no way to predict how deep the record business slump would go. Not to mention the growth of the record business at large had already taken place in the 1970s: sales jumped from 2 billion to 4 billion between 1970 and 1978. Independent of that, I think the entire staff, myself and Bob included, had a false sense of security regarding ARC because the first two EW&F albums on ARC—The Best of Earth, Wind & Fire, Vol. 1 and I Am—were so successful.
Still, the slumping economy was only one side of it. At the roots of ARC’s crumbling fortunes was a lack of musical focus. After Jerry Peters initially turned down my offer to make him head of ARC A&R, I stopped looking, thinking that somehow it would magically work out. That’s what success can do: make you betray the very thing that made you successful in the first place. In my case, this was an attention to detail. I was naive. My neglect and inability to properly delegate was one side of it. There was a lot of black executive and A&R talent available, but I did not seek it out. I needed someone who had R&B/pop music sensibilities and administrative chops, all rolled into one.
We had solid R&B talent on the label. Deniece Williams and the Emotions, of course, and then there was D. J. Rogers, Pockets, Caston & Majors, and others. We released what I thought was a good album that Verdine and Beloyd Taylor produced by a group called Afterbach. I was also openly thrilled when we signed the iconic jazz group Weather Report, a prestigious move for the label, releasing four albums. I had so much musical respect for Joe Zawinul and Wayne Shorter.
But in my naive belief that it would magically all work out, I gave over the A&R reins to my management, essentially giving away the very thing that made Kalimba Productions rise in the first place—an emphasis on R&B/pop music. This decision was at the root of ARC’s demise.
With that lack of musical focus, we released a lot of albums in the rock/pop/AOR genre—artists like Larry John McNally, John Hall, Gerard McMahon, and Peter McIan, who did a good record called Playing Near the Edge—though Valerie Carter’s Wild Child, produced by future prolific film composer James Newton Howard, was the standout of the rock/pop albums released on ARC. There’s no reason that Wild Child should not have been a smash album for Valerie, who was a standout writer and a badass singer. She had all the promise and talent in the world. But the label was bloated with too many artists in divergent genres, who dragged the numbers down.
There were also fits and starts at the label. We did an album with Renn Woods, an actress best known for her role as Fanta in the groundbreaking miniseries Roots. The television miniseries, a riveting depiction of the evil of slavery, was widely successful—a cultural phenomenon that captured America’s attention. We also started but never released an album by Todd Bridges, who played Willis on the hit TV show Diff’rent Strokes (this was before his much-publicized struggle with drugs). By the time his album was finished, the American Recording Company had folded. It was over.
There was so much promise when ARC was launched. All the producers, writers, and artists involved—including some of the band—would have benefited if only the label had generated some big hit records. It also pained me because it was my name on the line. I was president of the label, even if I was an absent one. If ARC had succeeded, I would have gotten the credit for it. Since it failed, I had to take the blame.
It’s strange how your mind associates certain people with certain events. For me, ARC’s end will always be linked with Deniece Williams. I remember her asking me, “Are we okay? What’s happening to our family?” She even flew to New York to ask Walter Yetnikoff what was going on with the label. When ARC started, her career, the Emotions, Pockets, and EW&F were all affiliated. She felt the hope and promise more than anyone because she was a highly visible artist. According to her, “At ARC’s start, it was on the lips of everybody in the music industry.” I told Niecy, “You’ll be fine”—and she was. Her best days were in front of her. Crossover hits with Johnny Mathis would pave the way for “Let’s Hear It for the Boy,” the biggest smash of her career, in 1984.
While I was frustrated with the collapse of ARC, my never-let-them-see-you-sweat mentality was still firmly locked in place. I just kept moving on.
After the demise of ARC, in February of 1983, Powerlight, our twelfth album on Columbia Records, was released. Powerlight had a minor R&B hit, “Fall in Love with Me,” but I felt the album had not been promoted properly. Although it went gold, it was viewed as a commercial disappointment. By the fall of 1983 I was getting bored with R&B. Records like “She Blinded Me with Science” by Thomas Dolby, “Owner of a Lonely Heart” by Yes, and “I Can’t Go for That” by Hall & Oates were turning me on. A year or two later it would be “Things Can Only Get Better” by Howard Jones. All four songs had a European flavor—pared-down, electronic, and yet very song-driven. This was the direction I felt that Earth, Wind & Fire should go. I wanted to take EW&F into a modern era, to capture the new wave sound out of Europe. It was a risk.
Earth, Wind & Fire had had a bunch of hit records and B-sides playing on the radio ever since 1974. I knew the public had decided for itself what the Earth, Wind & Fire sound was. But I could not let our fans, or anyone else, dissuade me from moving into new musical horizons. A part of my motivation as well was that I heard Earth, Wind & Fire’s sound in a lot of songs on the radio. I heard it in songs like “Get Down On It,” “Big Fun,” and “Steppin’ Out” by Kool & the Gang, as well as in the huge hits “Boogie Down” by Al Jarreau, “Turn Your Love Around” by George Benson, and many others. I also heard it in DeBarge and their debut album All This Love, in the title track and “I Like It.” Truth be told I was hearing it as early as 1978 with Con Funk Shun’s “Loveshine” and later the Gap Band’s “Are You Living” and the Brothers Johnson’s “The Real Thing.”
Bottom line, I felt like some artists had copped some of our unique mixture of melodic R&B and pop. The big, jazzy, brassy EW&F horn arrangements became one of the easier ways to imitate our sound. I made a gutsy decision to not use horns on our next album. I wanted to create the power and syncopation of the brass instead with harder-edged synthesizers. To me it was a good idea for a creative shift, and I hoped that radio would respond.
To bring about this transformation, I looked to two young and hungry British guys to help me carve out our next m
usical journey. Martin Page and Brian Fairweather were part of a European group called Q-Feel. The group had had a moderate hit called “Dancing in Heaven,” which I was not crazy about. They got to me through Bob Cavallo, who knew I was looking for a new sound. We met and hit it off. I was into the study of UFOs at the time, which I didn’t share with too many people. I was fascinated with the depth of the universe and the belief that there must be other worlds, galaxies that could produce life like our own on earth. Turns out Martin Page was also into the idea of UFOs, and we bonded over it. Page and Fairweather were good songwriters, musicians, and singers, and they really understood synthesizers and drum machines. And that was a big part of the new revolution in sound coming out of Europe.
Martin and Brian were creative but uptight as hell. I had to constantly rein in their intensity. Since this new direction was different for EW&F, and there was a bit of a culture divide, it took a minute for everyone to adjust. Verdine and Larry, being the gracious cats they were, welcomed the Brits even if it was with some protest. Soon we were all laughing and working together.
Beyond the experimental musical goals of Electric Universe, lyrically the album was a commentary on the limits and pitfalls of technology, which is a core belief of mine. In the early 1980s, Ronald Ray-gun was talking about nuclear Star Wars in the sky. Mechanization was destroying long-held industrial jobs. Personal computing was starting its snowball roll down the mountain, and we began to hear the word genetics. I questioned where instant communication and technological leaps were leading us. My feeling was that if it helps cure cancer, right on—but if it just makes it easier for us to be colder to one another, then it’s not a good thing. Bottom line, with all this technology, we had still not ceased to hate one another.
In November of 1983, with much anticipation, Columbia released the first single from Electric Universe, “Magnetic.” It tanked spectacularly.
Powerlight and Jennifer Holliday’s debut were released in 1983, and were both considered flops. By normal standards, I was still selling good numbers, but I was used to having big hits. Jennifer’s album sold 400,000 copies. Both Powerlight and Electric Universe sold just about 500,000, with Powerlight going gold. But the commercial disappointment of Electric Universe in particular gave music critics, some in the band, a chance to harshly criticize this new supposedly failed direction I had gone in. I had to take it all in stride, because in the climate of the 1980s music business, a miss was damn near like the end of the world.
The 1980s became about having huge record sales—quickly. Along with the advent of blockbuster movies, VCRs, and cable television, instant success and instant glory became the aim of music albums. Conversely, sometimes the aims were linked. Movie sound tracks became cross-promotional vehicles that boosted the sales of both film and the album. The high expectations of the early 1980s had a profound effect on the music business and were diametrically opposed to those of the 1970s, where you were given a chance to build a following and a career. With Electric Universe, I think some people outside my camp understood more of what I was trying to do than people inside the camp. Three years later, in 1986, Larry Blackmon’s Cameo reinvented themselves, achieving what I had attempted to do in ’83. Their own mixture of new wave, R&B, and euro-funk topped the charts with the hits “Word Up” and “Candy.” Amusingly and ironically, Cameo, an African American group, got extensive video airplay on MTV with those two songs.
With the failure of Electric Universe I had to relearn a profound lesson: not to push, not to rush. We had released Electric Universe only eight months after our previous album, Powerlight. By this time in the 1980s, most major artists went two or three years in between album releases. I now believe my haste had a deep and personal motivation. The sting of Faces’ poor reception still hung over me psychologically—a lot. Powerlight had underperformed, ARC had failed, and I felt like I had something to prove. This feeling was spiritually disastrous. I did not trust the Creator. If I had just slowed down and taken time to reflect, I believe I would have waited a year or two, maybe three, to spring a musical change like Electric Universe on the public. I had had so much success, and my so-called failures threw me. I was wrongly clinging to an idea that Earth, Wind & Fire’s outward success had something to do with my inner value. This was a complete breakdown of my spiritual work. I had somehow gotten away from the core ideal that I was enough. It was a strong reminder of something I once heard: that spirituality is like an always-moving dimmer switch. Your light is either getting brighter or darker, moving back or forward. It does not stay static.
28
Something’s Got to Give
As you discover changing times you must have the strength to endure
As you discover a changing world you can’t be guessing, you must be for sure
In these ever changing times you must learn to stand up on your own
—“The Changing Times,” Raise!, 1981
Band psychology is dicey and difficult on its best day. Earth, Wind & Fire was no different. From the beginning, I was very clear on what I was doing, and I didn’t get discouraged. I believe that the guys drew strength from that in the early years. But as time went on, I believe that my clarity about what I wanted to do and how I wanted to do it became a source of some of their frustrations.
I continued my routine of meeting with the guys one-on-one, so they could talk freely. Sometimes they would voice their complaints or frustrations to me; sometime they would voice their frustrations with others within the band. Sometimes they would talk about personal frustrations, and sometimes we’d just go at it toe to toe.
I believe my style of leadership worked for Earth, Wind & Fire. What works in a band is clearness of direction—keeping it simple and straightforward. Simplicity is a beautiful thing when you’re dealing with complicated operations. David Foster called me when he was in the midst of working with the band Chicago and said, “Man, I long for the days of working with EW&F, because I only had you to answer to!” Foster was greatly frustrated trying to make the horn players, the vocalist, and everybody else in Chicago happy, and still he had to please the record company and himself. It was driving him absolutely crazy.
At least I never had those kinds of frustrations. The tight ship I was running gave me comfort. I liked the predictability that organization brings, especially in the unpredictable, unorganized world of rock and roll. And yet I was big on “vibe.” I remember telling the cats on so many different occasions, “Man, you brought the right vibe,” or “Man, you messed up the vibe.”
EW&F was a big band—nine guys, twelve if you include the Phenix Horns, and I do—with big personalities and very strong-willed individuals. Each person had an idea about how things should be run. I’m aware that some bands vote on everything. What songs to record, what outfits to wear, what songs to play live, how a mix should sound, what kind of pictures to take—I could go on forever. Trust me, if EW&F had been a decision-by-committee band, we would not have survived beyond 1975. I was the producer, lead singer, principal writer, and I shared the drum chair. And yet with all that, I was still a part of “the group.”
By 1984, this was all starting to take a toll. I began to feel a heaviness; my mental temperature was starting to rise. I had come to the end of a long road, from 1966 to 1984—fourteen years building EW&F, and four years before that on the road with Ramsey. I was worn out, physically, psychologically, and emotionally. Just flat-out whipped. In early 1984, I called a rare group meeting at the Complex.
When the band arrived, the vibe in the room was normal and cordial. We hadn’t seen each other in a while, and I could sense that they were anxious to find out what was the next adventure for the group. Without much fanfare, I informed them that I was disbanding Earth, Wind & Fire. Some looked shell-shocked, others dismissive. The decision was right for me, but maybe wrong for the band. And truth be told, looking back, I probably was insensitive in how I brought it to the guys. I have some guilt about that. If I had told them a year or two earlier
, maybe they would have saved more money. Even with the two less successful years we had just had, the band felt we were stopping at our peak. To some, this shutdown was a screaming halt, blunt and without warning—and perhaps they were right. Truth was, I didn’t know myself about this stoppage until Christmas of 1983. I just couldn’t take it anymore. Something had to give.
Had I known what lay ahead, I would have taken a break earlier—maybe after the commercially disappointing Faces or the triumph of “Let’s Groove.” The EW&F machine was now a big machine, a small corporate empire with lots of salaries, day-to-day responsibilities, and at this point lots of hot and cold feelings between the band members, management, accountants, staff, and family. The tension was partly what kept me away from ARC, especially in its last two years of operation.
Additionally, the pace and failures of 1983 had left scars. I didn’t go on the road that year, which gave me the opportunity to check out what was going on at the office. I didn’t like what I saw. There was more and more cocaine, even among people I respected. I saw misappropriated funds, and the majority of the faces I saw at the Complex I did not even know. Everyone in that office, in a large or tiny way, was benefiting from the success of EW&F.
Around Christmas, Joe Ruffalo, my co-manager, who didn’t work as closely with me as I did with Bob, was having a party at his new house in Bel-Air. His then wife was showing me the house. As we were walking downstairs I saw that the walls were covered with gold and platinum Earth, Wind & Fire albums. She turned to me: “Keep those platinum records coming, baby—that way we can pay for the courtyard we’re having built!” Her words were in poor taste, in my view. It’s not that I was comparing how they were living with me or the band; whatever money my managers were making, it was a business deal I had agreed to. But I did get a whiff of the Hollywood cesspool of crassness, exploitation, and unfettered rudeness. That night I felt it was swirling around me. After that scene, I must admit I was more cynical and cautious regarding my relationship with Cavallo, Ruffalo, and Fargnoli.
My Life with Earth, Wind & Fire Page 30