Timmy Thomas (November 13, 1944 – March 11, 2022) – Love For The People (1977)
The late great singer/songwriter's fourth studio LP included this lyrically powerful unity jam, featuring Betty Wright on backing vocals.
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Timmy Thomas was a singer/songwriter, keyboardist and producer best known for his anti-war anthem “Why Can’t We Live Together,” which became a major hit record in 1973.
Born in Indiana, Timothy Earle Thomas was one of twelve children. He worked as a session musician in Memphis, and released his first singles on the city’s Goldwax Records label, home to the great Southern soul singer James Carr.
He moved to Miami in the early seventies and began playing sessions for Henry Stone’s T.K. Records group of labels. Stone signed him to Glades, and in August, 1972 he released his debut single, an anti-war song he wrote called “Why Can’t We Live Together.” In a 2015 interview, Thomas explained how its inspiration came while he was watching Walter Cronkite on the CBS Evening News reporting on that day’s U.S. casualties in Vietnam:
“I said “WHAT?! You mean that many mothers’ children died today? In a war that we can’t come to the table and sit down and talk about this, without so many families losing their loved ones?” I said, “Why can’t we live together?” Bing! That light went off. And I started writing it then. “No more wars, we want peace in this world, and no matter what color, you’re still my brother.” And then after that, put it on this little tape, and went to WEBF, which was a local radio station. And they played local artists then… they played it, and the phones lit up. They said “Man, who is that?” And I did it as a one-man band! That was my foot playing bass, that was my left-hand playing guitar… Could never believe that as a one-man band, something like that would’ve been played that much. But I do believe that the world was ready to start changing a little bit. And that song made the change.”
Thomas was the sole performer on the demo, which took fifteen minutes to record at the Bobby Dukoff Recording Studios in North Miami. He played a Lowrey electronic organ with one hand, and with the other created percussion on the organ via pre-programmed rhythms, simultaneously using his feet to play bass with its pedals. When he took it to producer Steve Alaimo at TK Records, Alaimo was going to re-cut it with a full backing band, then changed his mind and decided to release the demo version instead, charmed by its haunting, sparse, and unforgettable sound.
The single climbed up the charts all that fall, and by early 1973 peaked at #1 R&B and #3 on the Billboard Hot 100, going platinum and selling over two million copies.
It became the title track to his debut LP, which was the first record in music history that replaced live drummers entirely with drum machines. Critics panned the album for its repetitive-sounding songs, but it hit #10 on the R&B charts.
Thomas followed up “Why Can’t We Live Together” with another funky pair of message songs, “People Are Changing” b/w one of the album’s most socially conscious cuts, “Rainbow Power.”
For his third studio album The Magician (1976), Thomas wrote or co-wrote all but one of its nine tracks, including the phenomenal upbeat funky closing cut “Running Out Of Time,” which he solely wrote. The album was produced by Willie Clarke, with horn and string arrangements by Mike Lewis.
The following year in 1977, Thomas collaborated with Jamaican DJ and producer Noel Williams aka King Sporty on his fourth LP Touch To Touch. Williams wrote and produced most of it, including the disco-funk title track, which was a dancefloor hit.
Mike Lewis again arranged the album’s strings with Williams, and TK Records star Betty Wright was featured on backing vocals. The album’s other highlights included the funky jam “Africano” and the upbeat unity anthem “Love For The People.”
Happy Heavenly Birthday to Timmy Thomas.
Further info:
“Q&A: Timmy Thomas On Drake Sampling His ’70s Soul Hit For ‘Hotline Bling’,” interview by Andrew Unterberger, Spin, October 5, 2015.
“Timmy Thomas, R&B singer of Why Can't We Live Together dies aged 77,” The Guardian, March 14, 2022.
“Timmy Thomas, 77, Dies; Singer's Big Hit Was an Antiwar Anthem,” obituary, The New York Times, March 18, 2022.
#soul #funk #disco #TKRecords #TimmyThomas