As requested, here some GRAND FUNK RAILROAD material and what better than feature of their best LP’s: “We’re An American Band“. You cannot talk about rock in the 1970s without talking about Grand Funk Railroad.
Grand Funk laid the groundwork for such bands as Foreigner, Journey, Van Halen and Bon Jovi with its signature hard driving sound, soulful vocals, muscular instrumentation and forceful pop melodies. The fact that Grand Funk’s legacy still reigns over the Classic Rock landscape fifty years after its 1969 birth in Flint, Michigan is a testament to the group’s influence and staying power.
Mega-hits We’re An American Band, I’m Your Captain/Closer To Home, Locomotion, and Some Kind Of Wonderful still receive continuous airplay on Classic Rock radio. ”We’re An American Band” has received notoriety in recent years being used in movie sound tracks and in television/radio advertising.
“We’re An American Band” was released with ‘Grand Funk’ only as band name on the cover.
This reissue features 4 bonus tracks including a new mix of the iconic title track, and has been remastered preserving the ‘analog’ feel of the original LP.
This is a milestone in American Rock history, and need a place in your collection.
They really were an American band. They may have been the most American band. And still they are, touring 2022 (with Bruce Kulick as lead guitarist)
Grand Funk Railroad came bursting out of Flint, Michigan in 1969 — a dumb-rock headbanger power trio made up of guys who’d been in garage bands during that genre’s mid-’60s boom times.
In quick succession, Grand Funk cranked out six albums, all of which went gold. They became a touring monster, famously selling out Shea Stadium quicker than the Beatles had managed. They did all this with no critical help — Rolling Stone absolutely hated them — and without a whole lot of radio airplay or singles-chart success.
When they did manage to score a #1 hit, they did it with a song about drinking and partying and groupies. (Other bands were doing those things, but they generally weren’t singing about them.)
Frontman Terry Knight was the one who named the band Grand Funk Railroad. (This was a pun on the Midwest’s Grand Trunk Western Railroad, and it was funnier when you consider that there was very little funk in Grand Funk Railroad.) Knight got the band booked at the Atlanta Pop Festival in 1969; they played for free and evidently kicked enough ass that they immediately got signed.
When Grand Funk blew up — something that happened very quickly — Knight paid a whole lot of money for a Times Square billboard that basically just gloated over all they’d done. And Knight also made a whole lot of money off of the band — enough that they fired him as both manager and producer in 1972.
There was never any subtext to what Grand Funk did. They didn’t attempt to cultivate mystique, the way their contemporaries did. Instead, they kicked out big, fun, kick ass hooks; even their most contemplative moments are fists-up singalongs.
They followed the Cream power-trio blueprint, but without the mythic aspirations, instead making blues-rock so big and loud that it became proto-metal. The hate that Grand Funk got from critics became a selling point; it turned them into anti-elitist proletarian heroes.
And when Grand Funk finally cut ties with Knight and won creative control over their own band, they didn’t pull a Marvin Gaye or a Stevie Wonder.
With Frost and Todd Rundgren on board producing, they thickened and cleaned up their sound. But they didn’t try to make some big, far-reaching artistic statement. Instead, they doubled down on everything awesomely stupid about what they were already doing.
That’s where “We’re An American Band” comes from.
There’s a story that drummer Don Brewer wrote “We’re An American Band” after getting into a drunken late-night argument with hard-rock tourmates Humble Pie, the two of them arguing over whether British or American rock was superior. Brewer says it isn’t true.
But there’s still a hint of defiance to “We’re An American Band.” It’s a proudly literal song, a riff-stomper about what it’s like to play to drunk and horny and fired-up kids in every town, to bring the party with you. It’s a statement of intent if ever there was one: “We’re coming to your town, we’ll help you party it down.”
“We’re An American Band” is also a canny piece of popcraft. In the early days, when Grand Funk did get radio play, it was on the freeform FM stations where the DJs didn’t mind playing an eight-minute choogle epic. But Brewer, who was writing and singing more of the band’s songs, was noticing that FM radio was cleaning up its act, getting more commercialized.
So Brewer did everything he could to condense the band’s power into a quick and immediate three-and-a-half-minute singles. The song’s riffs are big and fun and obvious, and it pounds its hook into your head with the sheer force of repetition. Brewer’s vocal is a giddy howl, hedonistic and proud. And his drums are driving but dance-worthy; there’s at least a far-off echo of disco in all that cowbell.
For this album, the key was hiring Todd Rundgren to produce the album. Rundgren, a pop/rock artist in his own right, was also known for his producing abilities, and he gave Grand Funk exactly what they were looking for: ”We’re an American Band” sounded nothing like its muddy, plodding predecessors.
Sonically, the record was sharp and detailed and the band’s playing was far tighter and more accomplished. Most important, someone, whether the band or Rundgren, decided that gruff-voiced drummer Don Brewer should be employed as a lead singer as often as guitarist Mark Farner.
Brewer also contributed more as a songwriter, and the results were immediate. Elsewhere on the album, Farner contributed his usual wailing vocals and guitar, singing of his heartfelt, if simpleminded, political concerns.
But ”We’re an American Band” really belonged to Brewer and Rundgren, and its success constituted a redefinition of Grand Funk that came just in time.
A classic. Highly Recommended
01 – We’re an American Band
02 – Stop Lookin’ Back
03 – Creepin’
04 – Black Licorice
05 – The Railroad
06 – Ain’t Got Nobody
07 – Walk Like a Man
08 – Loneliest Rider
09 – Hooray [Bonus Track]
10 – The End [Bonus Track]
11 – Stop Lookin’ Back (acoustic mix) [Bonus Track]
12 – We’re an American Band (2002 remix) [Bonus Track]
Mark Farner – vocals, guitars, electric piano
Don Brewer – vocals, drums, percussion
Mel Schacher – bass
Craig Frost – organ, clavinet, electric piano, Moog
Produced by Todd Rundgren
MP3 FLAC