Kool And The Gang-Open Sesame (1976)


 

Artist: Kool And The Gang

Title Open Sesame

Label: De-Lite   

Format: LP

Cat: DEP-2023

Year of Release:1976

Country and Year of Edition: US 1976 fold out cover

Sell Price: $9.99 12/20/22  VG+/VG

Discogs Last Sold: 12/1/22 G+/G+ $2.00

Low:$2.00 VG+/VG+

Median: $9.92

Average: $9.63

High: $26.60 NM/NM

Current low price: $3.99 VG/G+

Current Number on Sale at Discogs: 35

Have/Want: 1497/533

Where Sold: Sacramento, CA

Time it took to sell:  8 years

Where and When Purchased:  1978 Caldors in Norwich, CT grandmother bought for me after I got from the discount bin

Gwiz-gau Letter Grade: B

Sad To See It Go: No

Shortly after Saturday Night Fever had the title track, my grandmother pointed me to the bargain bin at her local Caldor's department store.  Well I could find a record I wanted anywhere and this one was it.  I knew "Open Sesame" because multiple people had the Saturday Night Fever soundtrack including myself maybe even before I had this.  Strange that this album didn't make gold or crack the top Billboard top hundred after Wild and Peaceful and Light of Worlds did earlier in the 70's.  Ladies Night didn't start their Platinum era run of hits until a few years later in 1979.

"Open Sesame" is a top line funk song along the lines of "Jungle Boogie" for the best song K&TG ever did.   The album version is the short one, the 12" and CD reissue have the epic one.   "Little Children" was a song I remember truly disliking.  What child, black or white likes something that corny and sentimental?  A friend sang along while I was playing the record in elementary school on a rainy recess day paraphrasing the little children laughing, playing, learning and loving to make them 'little Nazi's" that instead were laughing, burning, killing, destroying.  Kids can be cruel!

Since I knew the first two songs I mentioned so well, I was surprised at how little I remembered the rest of the record.  It's mostly solid mid-70's Disco Funk, particularly the side one closer "All Night Long" and "Super Band" with some cool surprise tremolo

Back to the title track.  As usual my childish ears paraphrased the lyrics to say "I was an Arabian knight!  Everybody get down! Oh!"  The real lyrics were "I am the genie of sound.  Everybody get down. Huah!"

The coolest thing about this album, after the title track and the end of "Super Band," is the amazing cover.  There is a center fold out that reveals the entire group in turbans.

Everybody get down! 




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