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Step Up (Tower Of Power Album)
''Step Up'' is a studio album by Tower of Power on Mack Avenue Records. It was recorded over the course of the 2010s, and was released on March 20, 2020. This album is the last Tower of Power album to feature lead vocalists Ray Greene and Marcus Scott, and is also the last album to feature legendary bassist Francis Rocco Prestia before his death a few months later. Track listing # "East Bay, All the Way!" (Garibaldi, Prestia, Smith, Cortez) - 0:54 # "Step Up" (Castillo, Smith) - 5:10 # "The Story of You and I" (Castillo, Kupka) - 4:48 # "Who Would Have Thought" (Kupka, Nick Lane, Lamont Van Hook) - 3:58 # "Addicted to You" (Castillo, Sydney Justin) - 4:45 # "Look in My Eyes" (Prestia, Thomas William Schuman, Kevin Henry Whalum) - 3:45 # "You da One" (Prestia, Thomas William Schuman, Sennie Rudolph Martin) - 4:23 # "Sleeping with You Baby" (Castillo, Kupka) - 5:43 # "If It's Tea Give Me Coffee" (Kupka, William Ross) - 3:16 # "Beyond My Wildest Dreams" (Bruce Conte) - 3:22 # "Any E ...
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Tower Of Power
Tower of Power is an American R&B and funk based band and horn section, originating in Oakland, California, that has been performing since 1968. There have been a number of lead vocalists, the best-known being Lenny Williams, who fronted the band between early 1973 and late 1974, the period of their greatest commercial success. They have had eight songs on the Billboard Hot 100, ''Billboard'' Hot 100; their highest-charting songs include "You're Still a Young Man", "So Very Hard to Go", "What Is Hip?", and "Don't Change Horses (in the Middle of a Stream)". History In the summer of 1968, tenor saxophonist/vocalist Emilio Castillo met Stephen "Doc" Kupka, who played baritone sax. Castillo had played in several bands, but Castillo's father told his son to "hire that guy" after a home audition. Within months the group, then known as The Motowns, began playing various gigs around Oakland, California, Oakland and Berkeley, California, Berkeley, their soul sound appealing to both mino ...
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Los Angeles
Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the largest city in the state of California and the second most populous city in the United States after New York City, as well as one of the world's most populous megacities. Los Angeles is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Southern California. With a population of roughly 3.9 million residents within the city limits , Los Angeles is known for its Mediterranean climate, ethnic and cultural diversity, being the home of the Hollywood film industry, and its sprawling metropolitan area. The city of Los Angeles lies in a basin in Southern California adjacent to the Pacific Ocean in the west and extending through the Santa Monica Mountains and north into the San Fernando Valley, with the city bordering the San Gabriel Valley to it's east. It covers about , and is the county seat of Los Angeles County, which is the most populous county in the United States with an estim ...
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Sacramento, California
) , image_map = Sacramento County California Incorporated and Unincorporated areas Sacramento Highlighted.svg , mapsize = 250x200px , map_caption = Location within Sacramento County in California , pushpin_map = California#USA , pushpin_label = Sacramento , pushpin_map_caption = Location within California##Location in the United States , pushpin_relief = yes , coordinates = , coordinates_footnotes = , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name = United States , subdivision_type1 = U.S. state, State , subdivision_name1 = California , subdivision_type2 = List of counties in California, County , subdivision_name2 = Sacramento County, California, Sacramento ---- , subdivision_type3 = List of regions of California, Region ...
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Funk
Funk is a music genre that originated in African American communities in the mid-1960s when musicians created a rhythmic, danceable new form of music through a mixture of various music genres that were popular among African Americans in the mid-20th century. It de-emphasizes melody and chord progressions and focuses on a strong rhythmic groove of a bassline played by an electric bassist and a drum part played by a percussionist, often at slower tempos than other popular music. Funk typically consists of a complex percussive groove with rhythm instruments playing interlocking grooves that create a "hypnotic" and "danceable" feel. Funk uses the same richly colored extended chords found in bebop jazz, such as minor chords with added sevenths and elevenths, or dominant seventh chords with altered ninths and thirteenths. Funk originated in the mid-1960s, with James Brown's development of a signature groove that emphasized the downbeat—with a heavy emphasis on the first bea ...
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Soul Music
Soul music is a popular music genre that originated in the African American community throughout the United States in the late 1950s and early 1960s. It has its roots in African-American gospel music and rhythm and blues. Soul music became popular for dancing and listening, where U.S. record labels such as Motown, Atlantic and Stax were influential during the Civil Rights Movement. Soul also became popular around the world, directly influencing rock music and the music of Africa. It also had a resurgence with artists like Erykah Badu under the genre neo-soul. Catchy rhythms, stressed by handclaps and extemporaneous body moves, are an important feature of soul music. Other characteristics are a call and response between the lead vocalist and the chorus and an especially tense vocal sound. The style also occasionally uses improvisational additions, twirls, and auxiliary sounds. Soul music reflects the African-American identity, and it stresses the importance of an African-Ameri ...
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Mack Avenue Records
Mack Avenue Records is an independent record label in Grosse Pointe Farms, Michigan. Background Mack Avenue was founded in 1999 by Gretchen Carhartt Valade, a jazz fan and Chairperson, chair of the American apparel company Carhartt. The company is a sponsor of the Detroit International Jazz Festival, Detroit Jazz Festival, to which Gretchen Valade donated $15 million in 2006. Early Mack recording artists included Terry Gibbs, Oscar Castro-Neves, and George Shearing. Over time Mack Avenue signed veteran jazz musicians such as Gary Burton, Kevin Eubanks, Stanley Jordan, Christian McBride, Gerald Wilson, and the Yellowjackets (band), Yellowjackets. Acquisitions made in 2008 expanded the label's catalogue into additional genres, such as the blues, Gospel music, gospel, and rhythm and blues (rhythm and blues, R&B), with Jonathan Butler, Brian Bromberg, Rick Braun, Richard Elliot, and Kenny Rankin. Mack Avenue's recording artists have earned multiple Grammy Award, Grammy awards and nom ...
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Joe Vannelli
Joe Vannelli (born 28 December 1950) is a Canadian musician, composer and record producer. He was credited on most records of his brother, Gino Vannelli, and in collaboration with youngest brother Ross Vannelli, the three have won many awards. Vannelli studied music theory in Montreal, and learned to play piano. He was influenced by artists like Bill Evans, Oscar Peterson, Dave Brubeck and Erroll Garner. During the seventies he developed an interest in electronic instruments; he was one of the early synthesizer players. He contributed to most of Gino's albums as a composer, producer, arranger, programmer and engineer. Apart from his work with Gino and Ross, he has been credited by many artists like Chaka Khan, Eartha Kitt, Gary Morris, David Meece, Kudasai, Marilyn Scott, Jimmy Haslip, REO Speedwagon, Brenda Russell, Pat Thomi, Don Sebesky, Kit Chan, Bill Meyers, Gianni Bella and Glenn Jones. Musical career Gino and Joe moved to Los Angeles in 1972. Desperate and broke, they ...
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Emilio Castillo
Emilio Castillo (born September 24, 1950) is an American saxophone player and composer, best known as the founder of the band Tower of Power. Background In 1965, Emilio Castillo took to music after he and his brother Jack were caught stealing by his father who told him he could stay in his room until he thought of something to 'Keep him off the street'. Castillo and his brother chose music. Emilio chose saxophone and Jack chose drums. He took lessons in saxophone, piano, and guitar, and also took lessons in music theory from one-time Dave Brubeck bass player Norman Bates (musician), Norman Bates. His first musical endeavor was in Extension Five which later became The Gotham City Crime Fighters due to the Batman craze at the time. He played both organ and sax. The group also consisted of his brother Jack on drums, Jody Lopez on guitar Frank “Rocco’ Houghton on bass (later going by the name of Rocco Prestia, Francis Rocco Prestia), and Dave Genthner on vocals. In March, 1966 ...
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Francis Rocco Prestia
Francis Rocco Prestia Jr. (March 7, 1951 – September 29, 2020) was an American bassist, best known for his work with the funk band Tower of Power. Biography Born in Sonora, California, Prestia started playing electric guitar as an adolescent. When he auditioned for Emilio Castillo's band, Tower of Power, Castillo persuaded him to switch to electric bass. Prestia worked with the band for the next three decades, before he became seriously ill in 2001. His fans and friends created a foundation in order to help pay the artist's medical costs. On December 5, 2014, Prestia underwent successful liver transplant surgery. Rocco is survived by the loves of his life, Julian Francis Rocco Prestia and Alicia-Lyn JoAnn Prestia. Technique and influences Prestia was a master of ''fingerstyle funk'', a technique in which he lightly muted the strings with his left hand to get a percussive sound, with the pitch remaining clear and accurate. That characteristic sound, in combination with a high ...
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Sydney Justin
Sidney Arthur Justin, sometimes spelled Sydney Justin (born August 14, 1954), is an American former gridiron football defensive back, singer and songwriter. He played professionally for the Los Angeles Rams, Winnipeg Blue Bombers, and Baltimore Colts after playing college football at Los Angeles Southwest and Long Beach State. He also played for the minor league Southern California Rhinos and was briefly with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, Buffalo Bills and Kansas City Chiefs, as well as the Los Angeles Express of the United States Football League (USFL). Following his football career, Justin was a member of several vocal groups, including Shalamar and The Miracles. Early life and education Justin was born on August 14, 1954, in New Orleans, Louisiana. He attended Crenshaw High School in Los Angeles, California, being a gymnast rather than a football player. Justin started attending Los Angeles Southwest College in 1973 after his graduation from Crenshaw and was convinced by his ...
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Tower Of Power Albums
A tower is a tall structure, taller than it is wide, often by a significant factor. Towers are distinguished from masts by their lack of guy-wires and are therefore, along with tall buildings, self-supporting structures. Towers are specifically distinguished from buildings in that they are built not to be habitable but to serve other functions using the height of the tower. For example, the height of a clock tower improves the visibility of the clock, and the height of a tower in a fortified building such as a castle increases the visibility of the surroundings for defensive purposes. Towers may also be built for observation, leisure, or telecommunication purposes. A tower can stand alone or be supported by adjacent buildings, or it may be a feature on top of a larger structure or building. Etymology Old English ''torr'' is from Latin ''turris'' via Old French ''tor''. The Latin term together with Greek τύρσις was loaned from a pre-Indo-European Mediterranean langua ...
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