Tenderoni

from the 12” single, Modern Records, 1984



This boogie monster finds Leon Haywood at the end of a rather successful career that spanned two decades and encompassed just about every style of black music that came along; the one common thread in Leon’s music, from his soul cuts to disco to ‘80s boogie like this, is his unabashed embracing of a glossy, slick production, so fresh & so clean clean. Mr. Haywood is probably best remembered, by heads anyways, for his track “I Want’a Do Something Freaky to You”, which has been sampled by throngs of hip-hop producers over the years, most notably on Dr. Dre’s seminal cut “Nuthin’ But a ‘G’ Thang”. This burner is definitely a fitting epitaph to one of soul music’s more unsung heroes; Montreal duo Chromeo had an underground smash with a track of the same name, but it isn’t actually a cover, although it’s equally funky.