The Bottom Of the Father MC Barrel

We've finally hit it, folks!  Today's post will probably have most vinyl heads, even those with deep Father MC collections, saying, "hmm, I don't have that."  And then, "hmm, I don't want that."  But, in all fairness, it's not because the people who made the music are necessarily terrible, so much as it's just not what we want here at Werner's: a proper Hip-Hop record.  Or even a Hip-Hop record at all.  Yes, today we'll be examining "Alright" by Jazzed Up, co-written by Father.

Don't worry, I'm not going to string out the suspense here.  "Alright" is a 1996 remix of Father MC's 1992 hit single, "Everything's Gonna Be Alright" featuring Jodeci.  It's a UK club dance thing, and none of Father's rapping is included, so he's got a writing credit but his voice isn't on here at all.  Prince Markie Dee and The Soul Convention's and other Mark are also credited as "originally produced by," but this uses virtually (entirely?) none of their instrumental either.  All it takes is Jodeci's hook.  They play different pieces of it at different times, laying it down over a very bouncy, late 90s house kinda track.  The vocals aren't quite "chipmunk soul," but they're pitched up enough that you might mistake them for female vocalists if you didn't recognize the source.

Jazzed Up is a one-off alias for a guy named Mark Truman, who's produced a whole ton of clubby dance records I'd never listen to under different alias and with different groups over the years.  I guess he's best known for being a part of Hybrid, who've put out a bunch of albums and been featured on the soundtracks for several movies and video games.

It comes in a picture cover from a small label called Final Phase Records, but it has connections going all the way up to Warner Bros, who probably had to pay a decent amount to clear Father's record, so this was presumably a decent payday for him, or at least Puffy and Uptown Records.  Father would've been off Uptown for several years by this point.

There are three mixes of the song, but they're all pretty similar stuff and use roughly the same amount of Jodeci, and none of Father.  One's credited to Hybrid and another is credited to The Solid Collective, which is another one of Truman's side groups.  They're both extended a bit.  The Hybrid version is a bit moodier with deeper bass notes while the Solid Collective mix has more of an electro flavor and has a tonal keyboard riff midway through that doesn't really jel with the rest of the music.

It's the kind of record I wouldn't ordinarily bother to write about if I weren't bent on ultimately covering every Father MC record ever.  So we may be scrapping the bottom, but it's it's an interesting bit of trivia for the Father MC fan who thinks he has everything.