Mercury 1013
Producer: Ohio Players
Track listing: Fire / Together / Runnin’ from the Devil / I Want to Be Free / Smoke / It’s All Over / What the Hell / Together / Feelings
February 8, 1975
1 week
In 1974, the veteran R&B group the Ohio Players signed to Mercury Records and scored their greatest commercial triumph up to that time with Skin Tight. The album reached number 11, thanks in part to the title track, which was a number two hit on the Hot R&B Singles chart.
Skin Tight wasn’t the Ohio Players’ first taste of success. In 1973, the band had scored a Number One R&B hit with “Funky Worm” on the Westbound label. Yet the group’s albums on that imprint had failed to break the top 50. Prior to Skin Tight, their high-water mark on the album chart had been 1973’s Pleasure, which had peaked at number 63.
The history of the Ohio Players dates back to 1959, when the group was known as the Ohio Untouchables and served as a backing band for the Falcons, a group led by Wilson Pickett. Back then the group included guitarist Robert Ward, who would later be “rediscovered” as a notable blues artist in the early 1990s.
The band, led by singer/guitarist Leroy “Sugarfoot” Bonner, had gone through numerous lineup changes by 1974, but was primed for success. Skin Tight was recorded in a mere nine days and had to be sandwiched into the band’s touring schedule, says bassist Marshall Jones: “We would be playing nights in Buffalo and then we would get up in the morning and fly to Chicago to record.”
For Fire, the band opted to spend an entire month recording. “We wanted to do Fire right, so we took off from the road,” he says. The seven-member band recorded the album at Paragon Studios in Chicago. “It kind of reminded us of the basement we used to practice in,” says Jones, “and it had a real good sound. We recorded at several studios, but for some reason Paragon was the most comfortable.”
Fire, like most of the group’s previous LPs, featured a racy album cover — something of an Ohio Players trademark by this time. The woman featured on the album cover was photographed naked, save for a fire helmet and a clear fire hose, which was strategically wound around her body. “It’s like the media says, ‘Sex sells,”‘ says Jones.
Musically, the funky title track incorporated fire engine sirens and other sound effects. On January 25, 1975, the track became the Players’ second Number One R&B single, and was racing up the pop charts as well.
By February 8, both the album and the single had reached the summit. The “No. 1” featured on the cover model’s fire helmet had turned out to be prophetic.
Yet Fire wasn’t just about fun and games. On “I Want to Be Free,” the Players offered some social commentary. “There was a lot of racial oppression at the time,” says Jones. That track made number six on the Hot R&B Singles chart, amplifying the triumph the Players had scored with Fire. Says Jones, “We were pumped up. Having a Number One album and single was like getting a Super Bowl ring to us.”
THE TOP FIVE
Week of February 8, 1975
1. Fire, Ohio Players
2. Miles of Aisles, Joni Mitchell
3. Heart Like a Wheel, Linda Ronstadt
4. Average White Band, Average White Band
5. Greatest Hits, Elton John