Henry Love & The No.1 ExplosionFire

Out from the left field agin... a weird, almost dub instrumental version of a 'garage soul' song about the end of the world. A pretty neat example of the symbiotic relationship American funk music had with African music during the early to mid 1970s. This could almost be a Fela Kuti and Africa 70 track with it's hypnotic percussion, female back-up and jazz-influenced brass.

Henry "Love" Vaughn is still is an active R&B musician in Chicago. He began his career as a dancer and conga player for the Darlene Blackburn African-American Dance Troupe. He later became associated with Curtis Mayfield and The Impressions as a dancer-percussionist. He played with many well known artists such as the Impressions, Earth Wind, New Birth - right up to R Kelly (who he sued in 2006 over claims that Kelly beat him). Vaughn also has the distinction of having written a campaign song for Barack Obama when he was running for president.

But this 45 seems to have fallen very much below the radar. According to a solitary eBay listing I found "this is a very rare private press 45 released in the 70s ... very tough to find." That's pretty much all I know about this oddity. That and the "Buy It Now" price was a rather hefty $250.



Artist: Henry Love & The No.1 Explosion
A: Fire (Vocals)
B: Fire (instrumental)
Label: Sussan
Cat#: 1001

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