Schoolly D's Secret Girl Group

How many records did Schoolly D and Luke Skyywalker collaborate on?  Um, I'm pretty sure just this one: Peters Posse, the compilation album of Steve Peters' Peters Records label from 1990.  It features an entire roster of unknowns except for one: Captain Sky.  And yes, Schoolly and Luke worked on it.  This is a real head scratcher of a record, so let's just dive right in.

Let's start with Captain Sky.  Captain Sky was a funk/ disco guy most famous for "Super Sporm."  He wasn't a rapper, though he did rap once on a song called "Station Brake" in 1982, and maybe one other time.  But he was a singer, and known for wearing crazy disco outfits.  However, this right here is his last record after a hiatus of several years, and his return to rapping.  It's called "Thank You," and it's a rap remake of Sly and the Family Stone's classic "Thank You."  It really liberally uses the music from Sly's version and he kicks lyrics like, "I got the beat, to move your feet."  How or why they dragged him out of retirement to be a rapper for this project is anybody's guess.


But here's what we do know.  The liner notes brag about assembling their posse "from the four corners of the land, from NY, LA, Chicago, Miami, Philadelphia, Phoenix and Jacksonville, FL."  Peters Records itself is straight out of Miami, and at least a portion of this album was recorded in Skyywalker Studios with Luther Campbell.

The album starts off with a pretty decent song by Queen D.  I'm pretty sure she's the Jacksonville one, and she's not bad.  I mean, her song "Queen D's World" is definitely on a poppy dance tip, closer to The Real Roxanne than MC Lyte.  It's got a DJ cutting up a bunch of records like "Don't Want To Lose Your Love," James Brown, UTFO's "Bite It" and a liberal dose of "Tell Me Something Good" on the hook.  It's one of the stand out tracks, and it even came out on 12" single with an extended mix and a disappointing B-side called "Rock It To Me Faster."

In fact, a bunch of these songs got 12" singles.  News 4 You's "Good Times," which is actually a crappy R&B song, b/w "She's a Lady," which is more of a catchy new jack swing song at least, but still pretty weak.  Then there was a corny rap duo named 2 La Jit.  Their 12" said it was from the album Having Fun, but that never happened.  Kenny B Devine is the only one to go on to a couple more records on other labels, as well as another Peters Records 12".  He was from Miami, but all his stuff was pretty weak. There's a song by Money D and Wayne, which is a big improvement, although I can't decide if it's actually good, or just feels good by comparison.  Finally a group called GQ Tab that combined R&B and rap had a corny anti-drug song on this album called "Stop the Pusher," and came out with a love song called "Teen Emotion" on a Peters Records 12".

So yeah, most of this album's pretty bad.  A group called Satin does a Hip-Hop version of "The Name Game," which hits a terrible low, with all of the lyrics literally from the children's song.  But there are some interesting moments.  A song by 2-Real is rather listenable, with a couple interesting samples and a harder edge.

And Schoolly D's contribution?  Yeah, he produced a song by a Philly girl group called Northside Alliance.  Actually, it's just one MC, but I guess she had a DJ or someone to justify the "Alliance" name.  Anyway, the song's called "Give My Regards To Broadstreet" and is unquestionably the jewel of the album.  The title's kind of a pun, because Give My Regards To Broadstreet was a famous Paul McCartney film, but Broad Street is also a major urban boulevard in Philly.  It's a hot track with a killer break, sick horn samples and a cut up Krs-One vocal sample for the hook.  It's too bad this never got a 12", because I would definitely recommend it and it's the only song to really deserve it (although I'm actually pretty happy with my Queen D single).

So this album is still kind of a weird mystery.  Someone (I guess Peters) sunk a lot of money into this lost cause.  Not just this album but the whole label.  They put out six 12" singles, five from this album plus another News 4 You single.  But I recommend the compilation just for the Northside Alliance song.  I've searched and have never been able to find out more about this group, which is a shame because an album of this would be fantastic.  But take what you can get; this is hot.

Where'd Schoolly Get That Funk From?

"Where'd You Get That Funk From" is the lead single off of Schoolly D's 1991, How a Black Man Feels. It's possibly his most commercial single ever... which for Schoolly D, means it's really not very commercial at all (only Schoolly would throw the words "junkie," "cocaine," "crackhead" and "8-Ballin" in his bid for MTV airtime... which he got). This was during Schoolly's brief stint at Capital Records, where he also released the singles "Original Gangster" (chosen surely because it was guest produced by Krs-One) and his famous movie tie-in, "King of New York."

It's commercial in the sense that the lyrics are relatively non-confrontational, his flow isn't as free-form as it sometimes is, the scratching's kept pretty soft in the mix (though Code Money is name-checked twice) and the instrumental is entirely indebted to P-funk: a tidal wave that was rising but had yet to turn into the g-funk tsunami that nearly drowned hip-hop a few years later. This is more in the mode of the classic, harder-sounding uses of P-funk (a la X-Clan)... Y'know, the good kind. 8)

Really, the instrumental (produced by Schoolly himself) is essentially a mash-up of two classic P-Funk records, with some tweaking (including an ultra-deep, rolling thunder-style bassline). You've got your basic "Atomic Dog" percussion... a foundation which has been used a thousand times, but you've gotta admit it hits hard. Then you've got the sample that this song really owes the bulk of it's success to, "Funkentelechy." That's where the sung hook comes from, as well as all the funky horn sounds and such. Just isolating that sample and laying it on top of some hip-hop drums practically guaranteed you a fresh song no matter what else you did or didn't do.

Now, this 12" features a bunch of versions, but none of them fuck with the winning formula of "Funkentelechy" + "Atomic Dog." But there are a bunch of differences... Some versions include additional samples (for example, most of the remixes put some "Theme from SWAT" bassline behind the second verse throw and in a little guitar from "I Know You Got Soul" here and there)... Some have extra cuts (the "Funky Funky Dub Mix" adds a nice stutter scratch to the hook, "where-er'd you-g-get that f-funk fr-uh-uh-uh-uhm?")... Some start with Schoolly's opening lines being repeated instead of the traditional P-funk samples, and include extended breakdowns where the beat rides and Schoolly's lines are played back. There's definitely an overload here, hitting us with more versions with more minor distinctions than anybody could really want, but some of the changes do make the remixes worth your time and improve on the original. Spend some time with it, pick a favorite.

The last thing to note about this song is the second verse, since it's not by Schoolly but an uncredited guest MC. Neither the 12" credits or the album liner notes name him, but it's definitely not Schoolly. Lyrically, his verse isn't as compelling (basically he's just saying "this song will make you dance"), but his deeper voice is a nice counter-point to School's. He appeared in the music video, too (along with former Ruthless Records recording artist Tairrie B, vamping around a record store), but I can't call it.

Update! I got in contact with Schoolly himself, and the featured MC is Brew from Mass 187. Thanks for clearing that up - definitely a dope song!