Caribbean Queen by Billy Ocean - One Track Mind

I'm dating myself, but the easiest way to get me to make a fool of myself is to play Caribbean Queen by Billy Ocean. It's like kryptonite to me. By the time the chorus comes around, I'm no longer acting, I have become an actual fool.

I mean Michael Jackson and Prince especially made major moves that year but Billy Ocean essentially won 1984 with just that song. The rest of the album was a bonus.

I just can't resist the groove, it makes me happy, I want to dance, I want to sing (loudly), and act the fool. They say Dionysus was a Greek god but the scribes out of discretion didn't disclose his infatuation with the siren song of a Caribbean queen.

I'm pretty sure Liberian Girl was MJ's belated response to homie for stealing his thunder, despite what the biographers may say. The gloved one with the golden voice always knew a winner (see lifting the synths from 1999).

Incidentally, many sincere apologies to the women I've stepped to while singing that song or variations of it - I'm an equal opportunity prospective lover, and, as I've said, I'm a fool.

The song is so versatile that, not to disclose too much, I've sang of African queens, Nigerian girls, Ghanaian ladies, various European duchesses and American queens and more, not to mention many a real life Caribbean queen.

Musical flirtation must be an occupational hazard of womanhood and it's all for the good. I've found that on occasion, some do get caught up in the rapture of a song so infectious. And even when deflected, the song breaks it down gently.

Now of course there's a long tradition of such celebratory songs. Frankie Beverly and Maze gave us Southern Girl. Earlier, Lou Perez gave us Caribbean Woman, his charanga ode to that fine Caribbean woman. They know what's up.

But to return to the song, give me the extended version. At the very least, you need the seven minute version, a radio edit wouldn't do with something so exuberant.

Even after the insistent anouncement of the opening bars (you have to signal your intentions in these things), the song takes its time to get the the point and lets the saxophone lay down the law to start things off.

There's something quite unhurried yet insistent about the groove, propelled by the synth basslines. It's a pulsing pace yet it still manages to be langorous, as if to savor the dance. Caribbean Queen is a dancefloor anthem, feelgood in four on the floor rhythms.

Start with the voice. The warmth in Billy Ocean's singing just invites you into the conversation. To my ears, there's a lilting hint of Gregory Isaacs and the velvet touch of Dennis Edwards in the voicing.

The honesty also disarms:

"I was in search of a good time
Just running my game
Love was the furthest,
Furthest from my mind"

The kicker comes from the parentheses in the title: No more love on the run. This is about being captured.

With spare lyrics, the scene sets up the drama of the relationship but he makes you wait by doing two verses and bridges, so building up the tension that the chorus is a release. But, just as soon as we're released, the groove settles back down to enjoy the dance.

The drop in the middle, and the build up, also play their part making you savor each element. The bass gets it due, the drum beats and then the synths do their bit. It's like the Soul Makossa breakdown in Wanna Be Startin' Something. By the time the chorus comes back around you want to start singing it again.

The guitar riffs. the sound effects, Keith Diamond's keyboard, synthesizer and production are inspired and really shine here but it's the saxophone solo by Jeff Smith just puts things over the top.

Infectious thy name is Caribbean Queen.

The initial release in Europe was titled European Queen but didn't get traction. Canny marketing forced a new title and Caribbean Queen struck a nerve. I've also heard an African Queen version.

Surveying the 1984 music scene, most would hand it to Prince, you can hardly argue with When Doves Cry and the Purple Rain album and movie, let alone The Time, Sheila E and Appolonia 6. It was his year in music and pop culture.

But there were others too. I mean Cherrelle (courtesy of Jam and Lewis) dropped I Didn't Mean To Turn You On, Dennis Edwards and Seidah Garret had the almighty duet Don't Look any Further.

The S.O.S. Band's Just the Way You Like It album heated up the dancefloor. And even in the midst of all this, Sade's Diamond Life had been released and Smooth Operators were moving

A digression: Billy Ocean would win the 1985 Grammy award for Best Male R&B Vocal Performance for Caribbean Queen. But the other nominees that year were quite mistaken. Namely, let's be frank, The Woman In Red is hardly prime Stevie Wonder.

And to pick on the thread, the Grammys have never really rewarded the soul music that moved the masses. Unforgiveably, James Brown didn't get anything after Papa's Got a Brand New Bag until Living in America in 1987.

Sexual Healing is an all-time jam but the Academy barely acknowledged Marvin Gaye's transcendent 1970s run of albums that changed music.

Teddy Riley's only Grammy was for engineering Dangerous in 1993. How are such things possible?

Anyway, the point is that Stevie Wonder kept getting sentimental votes in honor of his Seventies's streak.

It was even harder to square Stevie winning the next year 1986 for In Square Circle when Alexander O'Neal wasn't even nominated.

The same thing goes for 1996 when there was Brown Sugar by D'Angelo or say I Hate U by Prince. For Your Love is a effortless ballad from Stevie but come on, really?

In any case, the fact remains that Caribbean Queen stopped both Prince and Stevie Wonder in the charts that year which is saying something about what it means to black culture.

The song affects me the way its almost contemporaneous Somebody Else's Guy by Joycelyn Brown does - shower song fodder. I Can't Wait by Nu Shooz would disconcert me in a similar manner a couple of years later.

So anyway, catch me singing along with Billy Ocean: Caribbean Queen (No More Love on the Run). Meet me on the dancefloor.

Queens, a playlist

A few more songs in the vein of Billy Ocean's opus. (spotify version)

• Caribbean Queen (No More Love on the Run) by Billy Ocean
  The masterpiece
• Southern Girl by Rahzel and Erykah Badu
  Beat box meats Dallas princess
• Soul Sista by Bilal
  Raphael Saadiq's slinky production never fails
• Brotha by Angie Stone
• Southern Girl by Maze featuring Frankie Beverly
• Liberian Girl by Michael Jackson
• Soul Sister by Dexter Gordon
• The Girl from Ipanema by Stan Getz & João & Astrud Gilberto
  
• Taurus Woman by The Subterraneans
  Mystical acid jazz that never gets old
• Black Magic Woman by Dennis Brown
  Rather than Santana's involved electricity of the same title, I prefer the crown prince of reggae's musings on his muse
• Caribbean Woman by Lou Perez
  The blueprint
• Caribbean Queen (Extended Mix) by Billy Ocean
  Forgive me if I'm dancing

See previously: Janet Jackson and the importance of bubblegum and Baby me by Chaka Khan

This note is part of a series: One Track Mind

File under: music, soul, nostalgia, review, appreciation, culture, virtuosity, youth, dance, voice, groove, observation, perception, One Track Mind, toli

Writing log: April 28, 2024

Baby Me by Chaka Khan - One Track Mind

More musings on music have been requested (apparently weekly playlists and poems are not enough) so I'm inaugurating an occasional series I'm calling One Track Mind. I'll pick a song, nothing too obvious, and see where the discussion leads.

Baby me by Chaka Khan is my first pick.

Chaka Khan announces herself. May God preserve her. Her musical chops are undeniable, she's every singer's favorite singer (Ask Joni). She was recently (finally! belatedly!) inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. She doesn't need more flowers and yet I come to sing her praises.

Beyond that voice, that immaculate voice, that awesome weapon, there's that unerring sense of funk. You've seen those videos of her drumming, right?

Chaka Khan also has impeccable taste. The story goes that she told Stevie Wonder that she wasn't feeling the song he'd written for her and that he should go back and try better. (This was 1974-vintage Stevie, the greatest songwriter in his prime period)

Of course he then wrote Tell me Something Good

The point being that Chaka Khan has exceedingly high standards.

By this stage in her career - 1988, she had nothing to prove to anyone. Every project she took on was an all-star affair, akin to a Minnie Riperton album - an event, and everyone scrambles to get in on it. The voice and talent are so compelling that you want to throw your hand in.

The sessions for the C.K. album were no different. The A-side is an embarrasment of riches.

First, a cover of Stevie Wonder's Signed Sealed Delivered featuring the man himself on harmonica reprising his guest appearance on I Feel For You

Soul Talkin' is next, written by the peerless Brenda Russell who also supplies background vocals. Bobby McFerrin joins in the fun, channeling the sound of a saxophone with his own vocals.

It's my Party brings the joyous sounds of Womack & Womack to the table. This was the first single of the album.

And then Prince supplies Sticky Wicked (featuring Miles Davis, Eric Leeds and Atlanta Bliss) a nouveau funk affair, and then offers Eternity one of his effortless ballads (Chaka and David Frank produce the latter)

On the B-side, she continues her jazz explorations paying homage to Billie Holiday with The End of a Love Affair and I'll Be Around again bringing in inspired collaborators: George Benson, Marcus Miller, Dave Grusin, Steve Ferrone and Miles Davis again.

Chris Jasper of the Isley Brothers also crafts a tune, Make it Last. Frankly we are spoilt for choice.

And yet Baby Me, the third single, is what we should focus on. Let's have a listen (also on spotify)



A few preliminaries to save you to trip to Wikipedia or Discogs. The legendary Russ Titelman is the producer, Rob Mounsey arranges and plays keyboards. Holly Knight, Billy Steinberg are the songwriters. Chaka Khan, of course, does all the vocal arrangements

Russ Titelman was trying to capture the magic he'd witnessed when he had her and Rufus in the studio during the sessions for the Stompin' at the Savoy album in 1983, especially the performance on Ain't Nobody. You can read some of his memories of the time

Baby me is a deceptively simple love song. The lyrics are of longing, tenderness and vulnerability. After all, who doesn't want to be babied and treated with care? "The world is crazy and sometimes cruel / So baby me and I'll baby you"

(Incidentally, I fully believe in the power of misheard lyrics so I'm serving notice that I'll ignore any stickler who might bring up that "sometimes cruel" is probably not how the line goes. That's what I heard and I'm sticking to it)

It's a keyboard driven song, much like Ain't Nobody, the hit that capped her reunion with Rufus in 1983, and which serves as a kind of blueprint.

It's a fairly restrained affair to start with, bouncing between the keyboards and her voice, and punctuated by Paul Pesco's guitar fills. The lyric in the refrain goes "When you touch me, I come undone", and then carries on asking "Do you do this to every one?"

Then the excitement builds. "Take me in your arms / Rock me tonight"

Observe the way she sells the "Rock me tonight" line.

Then the chorus changes as if to emphasize the mounting infatuation:

"When you touch me I come undone / You better not do that to everyone".

Is this the pleasure principle speaking or resignation at being lost in love?

Then to the bridge, the bridge that un-mans me. For she goes in flight with a little scatting - her voice is an instrument, and then the saxophone comes in. The scatting is cathartic, duelling almost with the saxophone. You realize just how striking her voice is.

"Touch me" she sings. And then she makes you wait - a model of restraint, it's fully 3 minutes 10 seconds in before when she finally winds up and starts wailing. It's a release of the built-up tension. And you, the listener, want to join in.

The genius of this part is that she doesn't keep going, she stays in the pocket. Sure she lets loose, there's a release, but then she retreats. This part confounds me because once you start, you always want to keep it up.

I know that once I've started on my own wailing on Baby Me (in the shower or, as my household have caught me on many occasions), I can't help but adding my adlibs. I just want to sing at the top of my voice. And keep singing.

Patti Labelle or Aretha Franklin would have decimated the end of the song. I fully envision histrionics if Patti were let loose on this song, and perhaps if Chaka ever performed this live, she would go wild. But it works here; she's almost inviting the listener to fill things in.

Chaka Khan, known for her vocal pyrotechnics, is well aware that she could belt this out; but she chooses to be restrained in the arrangement, restrained even when she lets loose. She stays in the cut, in the pocket, in service of the song. And that is her knowing artistry at work.

There are a few remixes that highlight the craft and thought that went into finalizing the song. Rob Mounsey's arrangements were on the mark.

The Big Baby Extended mix emphasizes the keyboards showing how tight the mix is in the released version and the importance of the guitar licks and Warren Hill's saxophone

Compare also to Come 2 my House a decade later, the title track of her album length collaboration with Prince.

The 3cks and a baby remix highlights the scatting and adds a few more improvisations and wailing at the end, hinting at the kind of arrangements that could have been used in the final mix

Soul Talkin' follows a similar formula with Bobby McFerrin supplying the vocal solo in lieu of the saxophone. (My long overdue Brenda Russell appreciation piece will be forthcoming).

Here's some more Chaka Khan drumming (you're welcome). Again, she stays in the pocket instead of being flashy

The Babysitting mix of Baby me is a more stripped down affair, a little too sparse to my ears

I'll also throw in Eternity which bears the fingerprints of Prince.

Spotify doesn't have the remixes but the essential is there

I suppose this is fodder for my contention that 1988 was one of the greatest years in recorded music. But I'll flesh out that provocation another time...

What can I say, the song moves me, the arrangements, the voice - everything about it. I'll leave you with 4:06 minutes of soul perfection:

Baby me by Chaka Khan

Let me know what you think.

See also: Janet Jackson and the importance of bubblegum and Tony Toni Tone - Weary Sons of Soul which I retrospectively nominate for this series

File under: music, appreciation, soul, voice, review, Chaka Khan, virtuosity, obsession, One Track Mind, toli

Writing log: May 3, 2024

Ghost Transcripts

Brief messages left behind by the dearly departed
Ephemera in times past, letters and scraps of paper
Of late, these new artifacts of the digital era
Faint traces, bylines, icons and avatars
Photos and videos, the color of memory
But also emails, logs, and chat transcripts
Voice mails that we remind ourselves to never delete

No, I want to hear that voice periodically
My brother imploring me to return his call
The chuckle, the slight hesitation
As if pondering the best approach
Before jumping in with the juicy morsel
That would whet your curiosity and impel you to respond
Then, without fail, the obligatory closing joke,
The lesson we learned early, always leave them wanting more

The voice is what I hold on to, its teasing inflection
And so I save the message every sixty days
And so I stay with this phone company
Despite the gaps in their coverage, and usurious rates
That customer satisfaction survey didn't have the option
For me to enter the real reason for my brand loyalty
Contra the telecom operator's retention policy
The textures of a life underwritten
The comfort of the ghost transcripts

Soundtrack for this note

Mostly the Voice by Gang Starr

See also: The Laws of Grief

This note is part of a series: In a covidious time.

File under: memory, voice, culture, observation, perception, technology, personal, grief, poetry, covidious, toli

Writing log. December 18, 2021