{"id":3517,"date":"2013-01-22T16:13:42","date_gmt":"2013-01-22T21:13:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/funky16corners.com\/?p=3517"},"modified":"2013-02-14T11:48:21","modified_gmt":"2013-02-14T16:48:21","slug":"rubin-mitchell-loosen-up","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/funky16corners.com\/?p=3517","title":{"rendered":"Rubin Mitchell – Loosen Up"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Rubin Mitchell<\/strong><\/p>\n

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Listen\/Download Rubin Mitchell – Loosen Up<\/em><\/strong><\/strong><\/strong><\/del><\/p>\n

Greetings all<\/strong><\/strong><\/strong><\/p>\n

The middle of the week is here, and so is our second groovy instro.<\/p>\n

This is another one of those 45s that I happened upon when perusing a friend\u2019s sale list.<\/p>\n

Never heard if it before, but as soon as I played the clip, knew I wanted a copy.<\/p>\n

The tune \u2013 \u2018Loosen Up\u2019 \u2013 is a titular, if not sonic response to Archie Bell and the Drells<\/strong> and the sounds within are every interesting indeed.<\/p>\n

A close look at the label and a little digging provide some perspective as to why.<\/p>\n

The first thing I noticed \u2013 after listening, of course \u2013 was the name \u2018Curtis Ousley\u2019<\/strong> on the label. This was of course, the mighty King Curtis<\/strong>, whose publishing company Kilynn is given production credit. King Curtis co-wrote \u2018Loosen Up\u2019 and gets full credit for the flipside \u2018Summer Dreams\u2019.<\/p>\n

The artist, Rubin Mitchell<\/strong> was an Albany, NY-area based lounge pianist who was described in a local paper at the time as having a repertoire that included \u201cfunky jazz, showcase numbers like \u2018Sabre Dance\u2019 and straight classical\u2019<\/em>. Once you give \u2018Loosen Up\u2019 a listen you begin to realize how telling that description is.<\/p>\n

Mitchell \u2013 who recorded at least one private issue LP and two more for Capitol (I think this is a non-LP 45) sounds like a guy in the vein of Liberace<\/strong>, who made putting on a show of skill a crucial part of his act, with lots of speed and flourish.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s what you get here, sprinkled in liberally atop a soulful sounding rhythm section (dig that drum break at the beginning!) that may or may not include some Kingpins.<\/strong><\/p>\n

It\u2019s not the kind of thing I\u2019d spin for dancers, but it certainly is interesting to slip into your ears.<\/p>\n

The flipside is a much mellower, bluesier number that sounds (unsurprisingly) like a cousin of \u2018Soul Serenade\u2019.<\/p>\n

From what I\u2019ve been able to discover about the rest of his catalog, my suspicion is that this single is a stylistic outlier.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m not sure what happened to Rubin Mitchell after his tenure with Capitol, but my suspicion is that it included a hotel lounge or two.<\/p>\n

I hope you dig the cut, and I\u2019ll see you all on Friday.<\/p>\n

Keep the faith<\/strong><\/p>\n

Larry<\/strong><\/strong><\/strong><\/p>\n

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\"Example\"<\/strong><\/strong><\/strong>
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Also, the brand new Funky16Corners ‘Keep Calm and Stay Funky’ stickers have arrived!<\/strong><\/p>\n

The stickers are 4″ x 3″ and printed on high quality, glossy stock.<\/strong><\/p>\n

They are $2.00 each, with free shipping in the US ($2.00 per order shipping outside of the US).<\/strong><\/p>\n

Click here to go to the ordering page.<\/strong><\/a>
\nAlso, make sure that you check out the links below to the Be The Match Foundation and POAC (click on the logos for more info).
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\"Example\"<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

\"Example\"<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

PS Head over to Iron Leg too.<\/a><\/strong><\/strong><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Rubin Mitchell Listen\/Download Rubin Mitchell – Loosen Up Greetings all The middle of the week is here, and so is our second groovy instro. This is another one of those 45s that I happened upon when perusing a friend\u2019s sale list. Never heard if it before, but as soon as I played the clip, knew […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[124,14,66,19,85,18,13],"tags":[166,164,165],"class_list":["post-3517","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-drums","category-funky16corners","category-instrumental","category-jazz","category-piano","category-soul-45","category-soul-jazz","tag-funky16corners","tag-soul","tag-soul-jazz"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pMKgo-UJ","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/funky16corners.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3517","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/funky16corners.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/funky16corners.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/funky16corners.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/funky16corners.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3517"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/funky16corners.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3517\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3622,"href":"https:\/\/funky16corners.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3517\/revisions\/3622"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/funky16corners.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3517"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/funky16corners.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3517"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/funky16corners.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3517"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}