After the tremendous hype with Change
other studio concepts emerged from the Little Macho Music factory such
as The B.B.&Q. Band. Their debut album The Brooklyn, Bronx &
Queens Band continued in the tradition of Change, and not surprisingly,
often
sounded like a Change album. Most of the songs were composed, arranged
and conducted by Change co-producer Mauro Malavasi and many of the
players and background singers also appeared on Change albums. And like
Change, the B.B.& Q. Band made dance music that captivated in a
forcible, unaffected manner.
The
band was a standard faceless aggregation of Little Macho Music staff
musicians and American sessioneers. The informal groupmembers depicted
on the first album were the American studio musicians Kevin Nance (keyboards), Dwayne Perdue (drums) (see photo right below), Paris 'PeeWee' Ford (bass) (see photo left below), Abdul Wali Mohammed (guitar) and lead singer Ike Floyd. Guitarist William ‘Doc’ Powell turned bassist Paris Ford on to producer Petrus who was looking 
for
musicians for a new project. In November 1980 a live band was put
together by Paris Ford on Petrus’ request and got signed to Capitol
Records a little later. The acronym B.B.&Q. stands for the New York
suburbs Brooklyn, Bronx and Queens, which were the areas where the
original members of the group came from. The truth is that the band on
the cover polaroid of the debut record was just a facade used to fool
the executives of Capitol records into thinking that there was actually a
marketable band; and not a studio production project like many acts
during that period in music history. None of them had really played on
the record since all the music had been taped in Italy with an American
musician crew. All great musicians nevertheless! A trick by Jacques Fred
Petrus to meet record company demands. Just the vocal parts of singer
Ike Floyd and the background choruses were added to the mix in NYC. So,
besides the photo shoot with photographer Brian Hagiwara, some press and
radio promotion, and a few gigs as a supporting act, there wasn’t much
happening with the B.B.&Q. Band. And this is the reason why the
initial ghost band rapidly dissolved. They all comprehensibly opted for
secure session work and lucrative touring engagements with well-known
R&B artists.
Paris Ford for instance took his place as one of the most enduring 
and
groundbreaking session-bassists during the 80s and 90s, playing for
lots of R&B stars as Rick James, Glenn Jones, Johnny Gill, Stacy
Lattisaw, Evelyn ‘Champagne’ King, Marcus Miller, Norman Connors and
Lenny White.
As
of 1982 the B.B.&Q. Band “stabilized” into a self-contained group
for two subsequent albums. Only Kevin Nance of the original line-up
would remain. At this stage the musicians in the band became the actual
musicians and writers performing on the band’s recordings. The new
B.B.& Q. Band studio entity comprised frontman Kevin Robinson (guitarist), Kevin Nance (keyboards), Bernard Davis (drums), Tony Bridges (bass) and Chieli Minucci (guitarist). Kevin Robinson met Fred Petrus in 1980 when he was in the band Kinky Fox together with bassist Timmy Allen.
Petrus wanted to manage Kinky Fox, but the band didn't feel that he
possessed the required management skill-set. In 1981 Kevin Robinson and
Timmy Allen left Kinky Fox. It was at that time that Fred asked Kevin to
join the B.B.&Q. Band and Timmy to join Change. The link between
Robinson and bassist Tony Bridges is another friendship that goes back
to their school days when they both attended the Fiorello H. LaGuardia
High School of Music & Art in Manhattan, colloquially known as "The
Castle on the Hill". Some of their classmates were: Marcus Miller, Omar
Hakim, Steve Jordan and Zane Mark to name but a few. [In 1984 this
school merged with the High School of Performing Arts (on which the TV
series Fame was based) to become the Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School
of Music & Art and Performing Arts.] The album sleeves don't show
all of the five members, which indicates that the band was a rather
loose formation of rotating sessioneers, typical for most of the
projects of Little Macho Music. Unlike Change, the B.B.& Q. Band
actually never got to the stage of a real enduring band. They even
didn't do any live gigs or promotional tours to support their 2nd and
third album because it seems the group was stopped dead by a glitch in
the touring budget.
and
co-produced their rare electro-funk album I Need You in 1984. He was
likewise producer for Freddie Jackson, B.T. Express, Melba Moore, Patti
LaBelle, Sarah Dash, Sweet Obession and the Bar-Kays. In 1984, together
with Howard King, he produced the Macho III single “Kalimba De Luna” for
Jacques Fred Petrus. Robinson is also known as the recording artist
Chad on the RCA label (album Fast Music, Love & Promises, 1987). Chieli Minucci formed the well-known fusion group Special EFX in 1982 and has since been a major force in the world of smooth jazz. Besides Special EFX, he has seven solo albums to his credit and has played, recorded with, or produced a number of artists including Dave Grusin, Lionel Richie, Anastacia, Mark Anthony, Jewel, Roberta Flack, Celine Dion, Jennifer Lopez, Noel Pointer, Angela Bofill and Chuck Loeb. He also writes music for TV.
The Brooklyn, Bronx & Queens Band
The B.B.& Q. Band are best remembered for Malavasi’s hypnotic floorfiller “On The Beat” (#3 Billboard’s Disco/Dance Chart; #8 Billboard’s R&B Singles Chart), a joyous dance groove driven by funky rhythm guitars and slick percussion, and utilizing multi-vocal overlays. It was the opening track on the spectacularly good debut release The
Brooklyn, Bronx & Queens Band, released
in August of 1981. Though critically acclaimed by disco freaks, their
first album never exploded in the US. In 1982 the B.B.& Band toured
in the US in support of their debut album. The touring band comprised 9
members including Kevin Nance (keyboards), Wali Ali Muhammad a.k.a.
Abdul Wali (guitar), Ethel Beatty (background vocals), Skip Anderson
(keyboards), Ike Floyd (lead vocals), Meli'sa Morgan (background
vocals), Paris Ford a.k.a. Peewee Ford (bass), Kevin Robinson (guitar,
vocals) and Dwayne Perdue (drums) (see photo below). The band were
opening act for Teddy Pendergrass, The Commodores and many other R&B
artists.
B.B.&Q. Band 1981
The unpretentious excitement of “On The Beat” made the song the best dance anthem of 1981 and a Top Ten R&B hit. The magic of this street-party song is that the beat is never heard –it is felt– so that listeners’ feet are kept moving while their ears are free to concentrate on other parts of the song. A punctuated, Chicesque melody leads into a call-and-response pattern in which the lead singer answers the background vocalists, much like the bridge on Temperton’s “Boogie Nights”. And the lyric, like Temperton’s “Give Me The Night”, celebrates the virtues of music and dancing: “Nobody has a care/’Cause there’s music in the air/It’s nothing like you’ve ever seen before”. There is no yearning for strobe lights or gold chains here. Instead, when the vocalists sing “Are you ready or not/It’s only up the street/Everybody’s dancing/And everybody’s on the beat”, they seem to be talking about an all-night party going on under the
nearest
lamppost. To support the single an inevitable video clip was shot but
oddly enough rejected by the label executives at Capitol Records.This album also included “Starlette” which carries the common “treasure the ordinary things in life” theme too, but sounds fresh thanks to some dazzling vocal interplay. The song has two choruses with the vocals perky on one and aggressive on the other, and they converge at the end of the song to create overwhelming exhilaration.
Engaging vocals also makes the swift and elegant “Mistakes” hard to resist. The chorus carries an ABA rhyme scheme, but it is so catchy and the singers so inseparable from each note that the second line sounds like it rhymes with the first and third anyway. The melody changes at the end of the song and the chorus turns into a rap, but the song is so cohesively crafted that when the original chorus returns, it never seems to have left.
In
contrast to the immediate appeal of the former three songs, the
subtleness of the classy mid-tempo “Time For Love” (#72 Billboard’s
R&B Singles Chart) takes several listens to become accustomed to.
The title is sung and followed by another spare guitar riff, and then
not much seems to happen. But like Change’s “Hold Tight”, “Time For
Love” weaves its way in listeners’ minds so that by the fifth or sixth
listen, the song becomes permanently embedded.The whole set of The Brooklyn, Bronx & Queens Band is filled with lots of hard-stepping guitar, bass, and keyboard bits that propel the tunes with snappingly catchy rhythms throughout.
The tempo slows on the graceful ballads “Don’t Say Goodbye” and “Lovin’s What We Should Do”, all composed by Petrus' Italian musicians Malavasi, Romani, Tansini and Trevisi. Especially “Don’t Say Goodbye” is not a token ballad thrown in just to give dancers a chance to catch their breath. A foreboding piano permeates the song, and when lead singer Ike Floyd (see photo) sings “And I don’t know what
I’m
gonna do/Next time I see you”, the listener can feel the fear and
confusion. A synthesizer break melts into a pleading saxophone solo,
which further succeeds in the almost impossible task of bringing the
listener down from the incredible high of “On The Beat”. There’s even a
reggae tune, “I’ll Cut You Loose”, which is a change of pace
and pleasant surprise.The compelling and clever lyrics written by Tanyayette Willoughby and Paul Slade raised the music to the highest level of disco songcraft. A host of American top session singers handled backup, among them: Luther Vandross, Gordon Grody, Fonzi Thornton, Bobby Douglas, Diva Gray and Robin Clark. Petrus, Malavasi and
company
came up with another wonderful album, targeted both for the dancefloor
and pop and R&B radio, devoid of mechanized garishness and bursting
with vigor, proving once again that music for the feet and music for the
mind do not have to be separate entities.B.B.& Q. Band's immortal dance anthem "On The Beat" generated a second moment of radio and club interest in 1987 when the subtle remix "On The Beat - 87 Bronx Mix" was released on the Streetheat label. An updated version that stayed very close to the original.
B.B.&Q. Band 1981
All Night Long
Brennan is still confused about this today and has no explanation why
Petrus wouldn't let Kevin Robinson sing lead on this track. Stated to
become the new voice of B.B.&Q. Band, Brennan was initially informed
by Petrus that the original band line-up was being replaced for the
upcoming sophomore album sessions. However upon arriving at the studio,
Brennan was greeted with a surprise. "When I got to New York and walked
in the studio, Kevin Robinson was also there", recalled the Philadelphia
native. "Of course it threw Kevin off because he was looking at me
like, 'I'm the lead singer, who is this guy??'". Rick Brennan was asked
to go to the studio to sing the song "Imagination". There he met
musician and Philly acquaintance Kae Williams who was amazed to see him.
Kae took Rick over to the piano and showed him the melody of his
composition “Imagination”. Of course Brennan nailed it, being a
versatile singer able to mimick any vocal R&B style or funk act.
Timmy Allen, Toby Johnson, Fred Petrus and Mic Murphy were also present
and approved the qualities of Brennan on the spot. After the recording
session for "Imagination" with Brennan's "guest vocals", it was
ultimately decided that his talents would be best utilized in one of
Petrus' other musical incarnations [By the fall of 1982 Rick Brennan
would join Change and become the new lead singer of the Little Macho
Music company's main act]. Yet they were still far from a runaway hit,
their following was strictly club, and their sound wasn’t spreading
west, but primarily east, to the European dance floors.Other very enjoyable tunes were “Hanging Out”, "Hard To Get Around", Malavasi's edgy “Children Of The Night”, the gentle “(I Could Never Say) It’s Over” and the punchy, Kevin Robinson-written single “All Night Long (She’s Got The Moves I Like)”.
Malavasi composed half of the album's songs together with Johnny Kemp Jr.. The other half was written by the American musicians Kae Williams, Kevin Robinson and Timmy Allen (bass player with Change). Johnny Kemp, Chieli Minucci (see photo) and Timmy Allen all played with the New York funk outfit Der Kinky Foxx previously.
Davide Romani only contributed as a bass player and this could be the reason why the record somewhat lacked the contagious 'Italian disco chemistry' of the first album which holded songs of a more cheerful and light-footed "dancefloor" impact. Just like on the third Change album, the overall sound on All Night Long revealed a change of course. "It was a conscious change," admits Kevin Robinson, "It's just growth on the whole, I think it's better. It's produced again by Jacques Fred Petrus and Mauro Malavasi. Freddie is the overseer of the whole picture, but we had quite a bit of control, which surprised me." Essential contributions by the American musicians and composers Johnny Kemp Jr., Timmy Allen, Kae Williams and Kevin Robinson steered the B.B.&Q. Band ship deeper into Contemporary R&B waters. It's a different disco/funk sound to the first album, released twelve months earlier, but one that's just as strong. Electrofunk-influenced outings like "Desire" and the hit song "Imagination" clearly illustrate that evolution. Kevin Robinson said: "Please keep in mind that although we had a great deal of respect for Davide and Mauro as producers and musicians, we were not in awe of them. In fact, the prospective was that they were doing music by Chic, which was popular five years before we came along. We were more influenced by the sounds of Leon Sylvers, Prince, Parliament/Funkadelic, The Time, Rick James, etc.. That would be like studying Rod Stewart instead of Wilson Pickett or Keith Richards instead of B.B. King and Robert Johnson. Elvis instead of Jackie Wilson, Otis Redding, Sam Cooke and James Brown."
Again Petrus spoilt his production with the rich tones of New York's most prestigious background singers. Credited session vocalists were Leroy Burgess, Tawatha Agee, Fonzi Thornton, Gordon Grody, Bobby Douglas, Eric McClinton, Johnny Kemp and Alyson Williams.
Chieli Minucci and the late Johnny Kemp Jr.
Six Million Times
After two enjoyable albums, it seemed as if the producers had run out of ideas and inspiration. To Petrus & Malavasi standards Six Million Times was a disappointing shot. This project, co-produced by groupmember Kevin Robinson, obviously lacked decent songmaterial and creative direction. Did Petrus & Malavasi hold back the quality songs for their other projects? The reality was that Petrus' Italian musicians stopped supplying successfull compositions as the good understanding with their boss was completely missing. As soon as Fred Petrus started using a lot of songs by outside writers, the quality of the music really suffered.
Petrus faced serious economical problems in 1983 and Six Million Times was produced with a tiny budget during five weeks at the Umbi-Maison Blanche studios in the countryside of Modena. The quartet of B.B.&Q. Band (photo right) incuded Chieli Minucci, Kevin Robinson, Tony Bridges and Bernard Davis who was absent during the photoshoot of the former album. Most of the album's songs came from the American groupmember Kevin Robinson, who co-wrote several tracks with NYC top musician Howard King (D-Train, Stephanie Mills, Mtume, The Strangers, Candy Bowman, Karin Jones, Network). Both Robinson and King played in the band of Mtume. They would also join forces to produce the Network project in 1984. Fred gave Kevin Robinson a great deal of freedom to experiment with his creativity and bring up new contemporary ideas.
The long-player didn't yield any real highlights though. "Keep It Hot" and the totally redundant Beatles tune “She’s A Woman” were the only singles off the album. “Keep It Hot” was composed by Malavasi and reminisced the techno-funk floorfiller "Let It Whip" by the Dazz Band. In its tight electronic rhythm track and choppy vocals it beared the stylistic approach of their 1982 hit "Imagination". Also "Six Million Times" was influenced by the electro-funk of Dazz Band and Midnight Star. “Stay” represented
yet
another enjoyable moment on a weak album otherwise. Cuts like "We've
Got To Do It" or “Downtowne” offered an upbeat contemporary R&B
sound with lots of bass and synths in the instrumentation, but they
couldn’t excite. "She's A Passionate Lover" heavily flirted with the
Minneapolis funk of Prince and The Time. The boys of the B.B.&Q.
Band were wild about this hybrid sound that combined funk, rock, pop,
synthpop and New Wave. Producing an R&B/funk hit seemed not
achievable however.Whereas the initial B.B.& Q. productions benefited of strong disco compositions and irresistible melodies, Six Million Times suffered of average songs dipped in the heavier kind of electro-funk arrangements that marked many of the dancefloor productions of 1983 and after. But unlike their contemporaries Midnight Star, The Time, D-Train, S.O.S. Band, The System or Kashif, the B.B.&Q. Band scored no hits in 1983 and the group was subsequently dropped from the Capitol roster.
B.B.&Q. Band 1982
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