(0:00) Cover
(0:30) A Little Love A Little Wine
(6:27) Ask The Boss
(12:32) R.U. Single
(17:14) Nothin’ Beats Lonely
(22:01) A Little Love A Little Wine (D.J. Version)
(29:19) I Saw Him Make Eyes Atchoo
(33:50) Have I Done Wrong
(38:45) Ask The Boss (Remix)
*Track 8 is printed as “Ask The Boss (Orchestra Version)”, but features Ask The Boss (Remix).
If you think about the linkage between Italy and America in terms of Disco, then you’d probably think the genre of Italo-Disco! By 1983, it already had its foothold in American nightclubs with projects like Kano and Klein & M.B.O. among others. However, this Italo-Funk release takes a bit of a turn. Enter the group, Flowchart.
The band Flowchart stems from Italy with producers like Flow Giorda and Fio Zanotti, but also features American recording artists, including Fonzi Thornton, and Mic Murphy on vocals (yes, the vocalist from The System). The project was heavily influenced from the iconic duo of Mauro Malavasi and Jacques Fred Petrus, known for acts like Change and the B.B. & Q. Band. They would go on to release the album, “The New Harlem Funk”, released on Maximus Records in Italy. The album was recorded both in New York City (Blank Tape Studios), and in Italy (Maison Blance UMBI Studio). The main single “Ask The Boss” went on to be released on a 12” single outside of Italy, including Germany, France, and the UK. Even then, it did little to push sales of the New Harlem Funk, especially when very few copies were printed.
But that’s not the end of the story yet. A rich Italian winemaker, Giacobazzi, found out about the band from his musically interested son, and wanted to give the New Harlem Funk a fresh coat of paint, and to add an extra track, appropriately titled “A Little Love A Little Wine”. The repress also went for an entirely new simplistic cover, as well as adding a can of Giacobazzi, as if it was sponsored. It was also printed in 1983, this time by City Records in Italy.
Nowadays, both The New Harlem Funk and A Little Love A Little Wine are sought after by collectors, especially the reprint with that extra track. It blends in with the other Italo-Funk projects of the early 80’s like Firefly and The Armed Gang.
COPIES SHOWN:
Flowchart – A Little Love A Little Wine
City Records – C 1100
12″ LP / 1983 / Italy
Copyright 1983 City Records, Maximus Records
