Greenflow - Solutions LP (Imara, 2021)
"Originally released in 1977, American soul-funk-R&B group Greenflow’s Solutions is one of those rare marvels – a privately pressed soul-funk record that lives up to its mystique, an album whose magic is matched by its seemingly unknown provenance – where did this gem appear from, and how did it magic itself into being?
There isn’t too much to know about Solutions. Greenflow was the Californian vision of Art Greene, a trombone player and singer who formed the group sometime in the mid 1970s with his sister, vocalist Eleanora. They dutifully played the circuit, blasting out R&B numbers and originals in clubs. The group also took part in United Services Organizations (USO) tours to perform for US military deployed over the world – one tour, in 1976, took them to Japan. One of the members of Greenflow for that tour was bass player Rick Bozzo, who also worked with Meatloaf in his early years, when the latter was the young Marvin Lee Aday, in the group Popcorn Blizzard.
Bozzo doesn’t appear on Solutions, which was recorded after Greenflow’s Japanese tour, but for the album session the line-up does feature Allan Talbert on sax and Joe Banks on trumpet, both of whom, it appears, had connections with jazz organ player, Wattstax musical director and Inner City and Parlour Records owner, George Semper; Talbert, it seems, was also in one of Arthur Lee’s early bands, before the Lee formed legendary psych-pop gang Love. So, there are some heavyweight players here – but the real test is what’s hiding deep in the grooves." - Imara