Discord & Rhyme: An Album Podcast

Discord and Rhyme is a podcast where we discuss the albums we love, song by song.

096: Curtis Mayfield - Super Fly (1972)

“I didn't have to leave my neighborhood to be surrounded by the things that Super Fly is about. It was easier than most scripts because it was about an environment that I knew.”

Curtis Mayfield

It somehow took us 96 episodes for Discord & Rhyme’s first movie soundtrack, so we’re rectifying this with possibly the greatest movie soundtrack of all time. In 1972, Curtis Mayfield had just capped off a career writing legendary civil rights anthems with the Impressions and defining the sound of Chicago soul by launching what would prove to be an equally legendary solo career. For his soundtrack to the classic blaxploitation film Super Fly, Mayfield served as both the film’s Greek chorus and its conscience, subtly critiquing the film as a “cocaine infomercial” while acknowledging that this was the only life path available to its protagonists. And it’s a truly musically groundbreaking work, paving the way for both the musical language and verbal iconography of the hip-hop genre. Rich will be your pusherman this week, so join him as our hosts run wild and give a stellar soundtrack all of their love.

Miscellany

  • As of this episode’s release, Super Fly is available for HBO Max subscribers, and available to rent on all of the major streaming platforms, including Apple, Amazon, Google Play, and YouTube.

  • Curtis Mayfield, on the sampling of his music in hip-hop: “It’s not that they can’t create; they’ve made a whole new way of creating by sampling. These are new ways of putting music together, which is fantastic. It’s as if you put together a collage of pictures into a pattern, so you look at it from afar and say ‘Wow look at that,’ and then you come up close, and these are pictures that you are familiar with put together in a different manner.”

  • The two instrumental tracks on this album were also unfortunately the beginning of the end for Mayfield’s partnership with Johnny Pate. Even though Pate was responsible for most of the music on “Junkie Chase” and “Think,” the credit for these songs on the sleeve read “Successfully arranged and orchestrated from the original dictations of Curtis Mayfield by Johnny Pate.” Pate complained about this to a reporter, and Mayfield responded by filing a lawsuit to declare himself the sole author of both songs, and seeking one million dollars’ worth of damages from Pate for defamation of character. The two never worked together again.

  • Another staff songwriter and producer at Curtom Records who worked on the late Impressions and early solo Mayfield albums was the legendary Donny Hathaway, whose all-too-short solo career is amazing and worth hearing in its entirety.

  • The identities of the orchestra members who perform throughout Super Fly unfortunately seem to have been lost to time, as is the case with so many session musicians on classic soul albums.

  • Questlove of the Roots wrote an excellent primer on the blaxploitation genre in his book Music as History, excerpted here by Smithsonian Magazine.

  • The Super Fly soundtrack was added to the National Recording Registry at the Library of Congress in 2018, with an accompanying essay written by Josiah Howard.

  • “Give Me Your Love (Love Song)” was covered in 1998 by the alt-country band Lambchop on their album What Another Man Spills. It’s an extremely faithful cover, and the primary appeal of listening to it is that it sounds absolutely nothing like your typical Lambchop song.

  • Just to be clear, John was suggesting King Crimson might have been influenced by Super Fly, not the other way around.

  • John hasn't actually reviewed Super Fly on his site yet, but it would get a much higher grade than the square root of 11. 

Other links 

Discord & Rhyme Roll Call 

  • Rich Bunnell (host)

  • Mike DeFabio (moderator)

  • Ben Marlin

  • John McFerrin 

Super Fly tracklist 

  1. Little Child Runnin’ Wild

  2. Pusherman

  3. Freddie’s Dead

  4. Junkie Chase

  5. Give Me Your Love (Love Song)

  6. Eddie You Should Know Better

  7. No Thing on Me (Cocaine Song)

  8. Think

  9. Superfly 

Other clips used 

Curtis Mayfield:

  • Future Shock

  • Move on Up

  • Get Down

  • Don’t Worry (If There’s Hell Below We’re All Gonna Go)

  • New World Order

  • The Makings of You (Curtis/Live! version)

  • We Got to Have Peace

The Impressions:

  • For Your Precious Love (with Jerry Butler)

  • Gypsy Woman

  • It’s All Right

  • Keep On Pushing

  • People Get Ready

  • We're a Winner

  • This Is My Country

  • We Must Be in Love 

Others:

  • Sylvester - You Make Me Feel (Mighty Real)

  • Marvin Gaye - Got to Give It Up

  • Al Green - I'm Still in Love with You

  • Tiny Tim - Tiptoe Through the Tulips

  • Prince and the Revolution - Kiss

  • The Temptations - The Way You Do the Things You Do

  • The Doobie Brothers - What a Fool Believes

  • Earth, Wind & Fire - Reasons

  • Daft Punk ft. Pharrell Williams - Lose Yourself to Dance

  • Smokey Robinson and the Miracles - The Tears of a Clown

  • The Moody Blues - Evening Time to Get Away

  • The Isley Brothers - That Lady

  • Disclosure ft. Sam Smith - Latch

  • The Delfonics - La La Means I Love You

  • Eduard Khil - I Am Very Glad, as I'm Finally Returning Back Home

  • Deep Purple - Child in Time (Made in Japan version)

  • Major Lance - The Monkey Time

  • Isaac Hayes - Theme from Shaft

  • Melvin van Peebles - The Man Tries Running His Usual Game but Sweetback's Jones Is So Strong He Wastes the Hounds (Yeah! Yeah! and Besides That He Will Be Comin' Back Takin' Names and Collecting Dues)

  • Marvin Gaye - Inner City Blues (Make Me Wanna Holler)

  • Renegade Soundwave - Probably a Robbery

  • Ludacris - Two Miles an Hour

  • Elzhi - Concrete Eyes

  • 69 - Ladies and Gentlemen

  • King Crimson - Larks' Tongues in Aspic, Part One

  • Steppenwolf - The Pusher

  • Chance the Rapper - Pusha Man

  • Ice-T - I'm Your Pusher

  • Master P - Kenny's Dead

  • Audio Two - Many Styles

  • Erykah Badu - Master Teacher

  • UGK - Cocaine in the Back of the Ride

  • MC Hammer - That's What I Said

  • Big Daddy Kane - Git Bizzy

  • Mary J. Blige - I'm the Only Woman

  • Inspectah Deck - Trouble Man

  • Three 6 Mafia - Lick My Nuts

  • clipping. - Story 2

  • Snoop Dogg - No Thang on Me

  • Da Entourage - Bunny Hop

  • The Jimi Hendrix Experience - (Have You Ever Been To) Electric Ladyland

  • The Beach Boys - Let's Go Away for Awhile

  • Victoria Beckham - Resentment

  • J. Cole - Nobody's Perfect

  • Andre Nickatina - Rise and Fall of a Rap Cat

  • Dickie Goodman - Superfly Meets Shaft

  • Beastie Boys - Egg Man

  • Cookie Crew - Come On and Get Some

  • Geto Boys - Do It Like a G.O.

  • Nelly - Tilt Ya Head Back

  • Aretha Franklin - Jump

  • Isaac Hayes - Chocolate Chip

  • Johnny Pate - Shaft in Africa

Band/album personnel 

  • Curtis Mayfield – vocals, guitar, producer

  • Phil Upchurch – guitar

  • Joseph Lucky Scott – bass

  • Master Henry Gibson – percussion

  • Tyrone McCullen – drums ("Pusherman")

  • Morris Jennings – drums (all tracks except "Pusherman")

  • Craig McMullen – guitar

  • Roger Anfinsen – engineer

  • Johnny Pate – orchestrator, arranger

  • Harry "Slip" Lepp – trombone

Credits 

“Discord & Rhyme (theme),” composed by the Other Leading Brand, contains elements of: 

  • Duran Duran - Hungry Like the Wolf

  • Amon Düül II - Dehypnotized Toothpaste

  • The Dukes of Stratosphear - What in the World?? ...

  • Faith No More - Midlife Crisis

  • Herbie Hancock - Hornets

  • Kraftwerk - Autobahn

  • Talking Heads - Seen and Not Seen

  • Curtis Mayfield - Eddie You Should Know Better (this episode only)

You can buy or stream Super Fly and other albums by Curtis Mayfield at curtismayfield.com, your local record store, or the usual suspects such as Spotify, Apple Music, YouTube, and Amazon. Follow Discord & Rhyme on Twitter @DiscordPod for news, updates, and other random stuff. Editing and production on this episode is by Rich Bunnell, with special thanks to our own Mike DeFabio, the Other Leading Brand, for producing the introduction and theme song. See you next album, and keep as cool as you can.

This website and all episodes' discussion/commentary © 2018—2024 Discord & Rhyme. Excerpts from recordings appearing in episodes are included for purposes of review only, and all rights to such material remain property of their copyright holders. Please note that we make a good-faith effort to ensure all information included in these episodes is accurate, but if we get something wrong, let us know at discordpod@gmail.com and we will print a correction in the show notes. As an Amazon Associate, we earn from qualifying purchases. Website design by Amanda Rodgers. Thank you for visiting, and keep as cool as you can.

Powered by Squarespace