We at Now-Again unearthed so much information about the bands
that recorded the definitive disco and modern soul contained in our
recently launched Soul Cal anthology that we decided we had no
choice but to release an album and a book at the same time. Well,
following that line, the music contained on Loving On The Flip Side
music is too damn good to be anonymously relaunched, decades
after musical visionaries blended the best of heavy funk and sweet
soul into a unified whole. And simply telling the stories of these
vocalists and bands without allowing their lovelorn pleas to be heard
again wasn’t an option. Thus, Loving On The Flip Side again offers
the enthused a chance to listen to, read about and reflect on another
great burst of black American creativity: the creation of the sublime
genre we like to call “sweet funk.”
It seems laughable to skip past Thomas East’s “Slipping Around” 7”
for the cheesy funk of ‘Just A Trip,” or to listen obsessively to Lou
Ragland’s instrumental funk on the Hot Chocolate LP and ignore his
indolent-yet-stirring “We Had True Love.” Yet we did just that, until
we first heard the Darling Dears and Funky Heavy’s beautiful
two-sider nearly ten years back. This was the record that set Loving
On The Flip Side in motion, as the Darling Dears and Funky Heavy’s
two songs precipitated the sweet funk genre: the dichotomy of Funky
Heavy’s skull snapping rhythm section and the teenage Dears’
angelic harmonies didn’t sound like anything we’d heard before. That
discovery set off a decade long search for the band and culminated in
their discovery, the documenting of their stories, the emergence
of their master tapes and the inclusion of their songs on Loving On
The Flip Side.
The excitement we felt while listening to the Darling Dears and Funky
Heavy’s masterworks forced us back into the field, in search of other
sweet funk swooners and beat-heavy ballads to round out this
anthology. The opportunity to present anew such wondrous soul
music made the exhaustive process that produced Loving On The
Flip Side worthwhile, and allowed us to collect one-offs that escaped
prior investigations into the deep funk and sweet soul genres.