Heatwave - Central Heating 1977

 

Central Heating is the second studio album by funk-disco band Heatwave.^[4] It was released in 1977 on the GTO label in the UK and in 1978 on the Epic label in the US. It was produced by Barry Blue. Central Heating sold more than a million copies in its first two years of release.^[5]

It was the last Heatwave album to feature bassist Mario Mantese and guitarist Eric Johns, as well as the first to feature new member Roy Carter on guitar. The album was also the final performance of Rod Temperton as an official member of Heatwave, although he would continue to write songs for the band after his departure until 1982.

The song "Star of a Story" appeared on George Benson's album Give Me the Night, a song written by Temperton, which was produced by Quincy Jones.

The album was remastered and reissued with bonus tracks in 2015 by Big Break Records.

The two singles taken from the album were both hits. "The Groove Line" reached No 7 in the US and No 12 in the UK, while "Mind Blowing Decisions" also made No 12 in the UK. 

 If you could use only one adjective to describe Heatwave's sound, it would be "smooth." The band's romantic ballads and slow jams were the epitome of smooth, and that adjective also describes many of their up-tempo funk grooves. This isn't to say that Heatwave's funk lacked grit -- it had plenty of grit, but even so, it was an undeniably smoother style of funk than Parliament/Funkadelic, James Brown, Tower of Power, Rick James, or the Bar-Kays. In fact, when Kool & the Gang switched to a smoother, sleeker approach in 1979 and hired J.T. Taylor as its new lead vocalist, Heatwave was a big influence. The Kool & the Gang that emerged on 1979's Ladies' Night is certainly a lot more Heatwave-like than the gutbucket, down-and-dirty Kool & the Gang of "Jungle Boogie" and "Hollywood Swinging." And it isn't hard to hear the parallels between Taylor and Heatwave's Johnnie Wilder. It's safe to assume that when Kool & the Gang was reinventing itself, its members had Too Hot to Handle and Central Heating in their collections. With this excellent sophomore effort, Heatwave lived up to the promise it showed on Too Hot to Handle. The invigorating funk smash "The Groove Line" became a disco-era anthem, and the album's other big hit, "Mind Blowing Decisions," is a quiet-storm classic. From up-tempo funk grooves like "Party Poops" and "Put the Word Out" to the romantic Northern soul of "Happiness Togetherness" and "Leaving for a Dream," Central Heating is among Heatwave's strongest releases.