MEMORIALE - A tribute to Barry White

Not many wrote about him. Posthumous awards are as rare as mentions on his music by reviewers. Yet he's still alive, on our minds. He stays in our memory, although the United States has never appreciated him as Europe.
Disco came into existence at the beginning of the seventies, as a star-spangled sky shedding light on a landscape no more enlivened by the pure acid-rockers of the sixties. Even sumptuous bands like ELP and Yes saw a declining graph in the phase culminating in a subgenre that gently sent teenagers to bed instead of swaying them (1973-74). The first prince of bedroom raps was a vocalist born in Texas on September 12, 1944 but raised in Los Angeles. He had found in the Mass Tech era an abundant supply of musical material from his own inspiration (he wrote, produced, arranged and often sung it all). Where did he come from? Why was his name being ruled out in the most important catalogues of pop music? Today we'd find it easy to say that the shallow premises (no hard background as in 1967-68; no great source of social prominence; no kind of Hendrix-like addiction for drugs and alternative culture) were likely to lead us to the Void era after just a few years.

Yet, the dawn of disco music appeared as a a well-timed start, when Manu Dibango (Soul Makossa), Tavares (Check it Out) and Barry White himself (I'm Gonna Love Ya Just a Little More Baby) scored the first hits. 1973, yes, just the roughest one (killing a great many people in business and producing something brand-new). Everything seemed to be coming out in the right way, at that time.

Barry White had a too soft-hearted soul to join the rock bands shaking the guitar strings with screaming voices. Take a look on his path. Pay attention to the years, once again. He had taken the plunge in 1969 (just the wonderful one) after meeting the Croonettes, a female trio made up of Diane Taylor, Glodean James and her sister Linda that he began to produce and was to become Love Unlimited in a couple of years. No one could imagine it would be later turned into a 40-piece ensemble called 'Love Unlimited Orchestra'. The formula burst out all of a sudden. Those of my age (16 in 1973) found catchy melodies underlined both by orchestral arrangements (pompous introductions, violins swaying amid voices) and his gravelly voice echoing love words and sweet chords that the female trio reprised several times until the end. Of course, it wasn't material involving social problems. It was all about mere entertainment. The members of his orchestra had fun at every performance. No serious attempt to write out serious lyrics was ever made. This is why not many took his music into consideration and kept seeing it as an easy listening for harmless night-clubs.

Hit albums in the Mass Tech era

1974 - Stone Gon'

1974 - Rhapsody in White

1974 - Can't Get Enough

1975 - Just Another Way to Say I Love You

1976 - Let the Music Play

He made it all by himself. 'Love's Theme', in the charts between 1973 and 1974, was a high-explosive single of enduring interest that makes an everyday soundtrack even today. Above all, 'Love's Theme' was the foundation-stone of the best sequels in the genre. I remember stopping reading my schoolbooks on a sunny day in the spring of 1974, when I happened to listen to it for the first time. 'Alto Gradimento', on the radio, launched in Italy the then fashionable singles. I rewound the tape several times and got drunk with that haunting melody. Sometimes, it walked me home from school. Danceable rhythms with strings, here's the most successful mix rising early in the Disco era. Who ever had managed to combine so many things in the fine style that could be enjoyed from his singles? Barry's idea for symphonic soul was only a late result of his long-lived career that had remained unknown until 1972. According to the most reliable biographies, one day he tried recording the chords without vocal accompaniment and unexpectedly found his mine. He realized his music could be played by an orchestra, although it wouldn't be - so they said - musically correct. It wasn't suitable to a smoky club stage set, as a matter of fact. It was a pleasant rhythm mostly addressed to teen-agers full of energy and willing to keep with the spirit of the times.

It wasn't finished yet. The formula gave even more enjoyable results in 'Can't Get Enough of Your Love, Babe', between 1974 and 1975. This song was really powerful, in a way that none of the previous hits had ever equaled. Later, from the early 1980s, the youngest generations didn't have problems in dancing the most diverse rhythms. Today, none of the Web-readers born in the 1980s could imagine how powerful this formula was at its highest point, in 1975.

Can't Get Enough of Your Love, Babe was a real breakthrough in the commercial music. Two years later, unfortunately, a swarm of false if ambitious girls (often mechanically dressed) and trios bedeviled the genre. By 1978, White had already lost his successful formula, although Billy Joel's Just the Way You Are worked as a lifeboat after his leaving 20th Century Records, the label that had served his period of greatest popularity. As many other people (see how many we've seen disappear between 1977 and 1979) he underwent an eclipse, coming from the genre itself. A cruel fadeout, really. He didn't provide other hits, after 1979. Further you won't find anything else. Yet most of his greatest hits kept resounding for years both on the radio and at many dancing parties. Pieces such as 'Satin Soul', 'Forever in Love', 'My Sweet Summer Suite', 'Can't You See', remained for a long time on our turntables and taperecorders.
Over the years, many anthologies were released under various labels. Not all his pieces were duly collected up. Claiming a place among the best musicians of the last 50 years, his figure would be certainly overshadowed by those creating solider foundations in pop music. He didn't really make great impression on his live performances, but he remains however among the most prolific ones in the studio. One year ago, he suffered a stroke and died from kidney failure. He left us a great quantity of music and the strongest memory of an era (the Mass Tech) that won't be back. A souvenir of the happy days.		The cover of 'Can't Get Enough of Your Love', a typical Philips distribution for the European charts. It's interesting to notice that this original version didn't remain just the same in the following compilations or anthologies in which a false piano touch was added to the opening notes.