The Tom Tom Club peaked early with the name-dropping infectious grooves of this frequently sampled funk mutation. The band began as a diversion for Chris Frantz and Tina Weymouth while on hiatus from Talking Heads. The name of the band comes from the Bahamas dancehall where they first rehearsed. They played with lots of different people, including members of Chris Blackwell's Compass Point All Stars, before settling on the lineup that recorded their eponymous debut album with rhythm section of Chris and Tina joined by percussionist Uziah "Sticky" Thompson, keyboardist Tyrone Downie, Adrian Belew and Monte Browne on guitar, and Tina's sisters Lani, Laura, and Loric Weymouth on helping out on vocals. Frantz and Weymouth co-produced the album with Steven Stanley, who engineered with Benji Armbrister and Kendal Stubbs. James Rizzi did the cover art.
'Genius of Love' reached number two on the US Rap/Hip Hop chart, number twenty-four on the US Modern Rock tracks, number sixty-five in the UK, number thirty-one on the US Billboard Hot 100, and number twenty-eight in New Zealand. "It just has a texture that sounds like magic," says Tina. "It was kind of a different edge. Everything else was about 120 bpm at the time for dance music, and we wanted to slow it down to give it more internal swing, and not have any four on the floor -- maybe give it kind of an island feel as well. I can't remember if it was 112 bpm or something. Maybe it was around 108, but it was really slow for us, because we were used to playing these nervous paces and breakneck speed and stuff, so it was a delightful challenge." The song has been sampled and remade many times. Franz says, "Well, the first case of sampling in our song 'Genius of Love' was actually before samplers. In those days the bands would actually replay the song and it was Grand Master Flash and the Furious Five a song they did called 'It’s Nasty Genius of Love'. And we already knew Grand Master Flash. Tina had done a photo session for New York Rocker there’s a famous photo by Laura Levine of Tina with Grand Master Flash together with their ghetto blasters or boom boxes. We met him and he said to us, 'You know this is a very cool beat. You’re gonna be hearing a lot of this.' I said, 'Oh really?' He said, 'Oh definitely!'"
http://www.tomtomclub.com/
http://www.tomtomclub.com/
-'What you gonna do when you get out of jail?'
"I'm gonna have some fun"
-'What do you consider fun?'
"Fun, Natural Fun."
I'm in heaven
With my boyfriend, my laughing boyfriend.
There's no beginning and there is no end.
Time isn't present in that dimension.
He'll take my arm
When we're walkin', rolling and rocking.
It's one time I'm glad I'm not a man.
Feels like I'm dreaming, but I'm not sleeping.
I'm in heaven
With the maven of funk mutation
Clinton's musicians such as Bootsy Collins
Raise expectations to a new intention
No one can sing
Quite like Smokey, Smokey Robinson
Wailin' and skankin' to Bob Marley
Reggae's expanding with Sly and Robbie
Ipsimama...ipsimama
All the weekend
Boyfriend was missing
I surely miss him
The way he'd hold me in his warm arms
We went insane when we took cocaine.
Bohannon Bohannon Bohannon Bohannon
Bohannon Bohannon Bohannon Bohannon
Stepping in a rhythm to a Kurtis Blow.
Who needs to think when your feet just go?
With a hiditihi and a hipitiho
Who needs to think when your feet just go
Bohannon Bohannon Bohannon Bohannon
Who needs to think when your feet just go
Bohannon Bohannon Bohannon Bohannon
James Brown, James Brown
James Brown, James Brown
If you see him
Please remind him, unhappy boyfriend.
Well he's the genius of love
He's got a greater depth of feeling
Well he's the genius of love
He's so deep.
'Genius of Love' and 'Wordy Rappinghood' were released as a double a-side single that went to number one on the US Hot Dance Play chart. 'Wordy Rappinghood' reached seven in the UK.
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