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The Best of the Soul Train Gang

Released on 16 September 2002

Of all the Solar releases coming out on this series I must say I was not looking forward to this one too much. My recollection was that this was a manufactured group of principally dancers and second rate singers to brighten up and enhance the TV show, which to be fair broke an awful lot of artists. Whilst this may be partly true what I had forgotten was the production ability of Cornelius and Griffey and, more importantly, that the second Soul Train Gang album was produced and made in Philly by Norman Harris and the mainstays of the Sigma Sound Studio.

Whilst there are some twee, discofied, and TV show- esque cuts like the Theme tunes, Cherie Amour, and Soul Train '75, there are some tracks that are really....well good.

'Garbage Can' for example is well funky and a great example of mid 70's funk (as opposed to disco) and the frantic 'I can do it all night'.

At the other end of the scale there are some downbeat tracks such as 'Searchin for another love' with it's shared leads and 'Fairy Tales' and the pseudo message of 'Spectrum'. The Philly cuts, being instantly recognisable, comprise the best offerings and the vocals also seem to improve on top of that musicianship and production, a good example being 'How much longer', my favourite track on the album.

Of the slower Philly cuts we have 'That certain way', 'All my life', 'If it takes all night', the latter track is particularly nice. Comparisons? I suppose Blue Magic would be as near as anything.

'Country Girl' is another great uptempo track.

Not a mindblowing album and a bit show-y but not a bad album for all that, in particular the Norman Harris productions.

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