Skip to main content

Slo-Mo Speed Dating: “Float On” by The Floaters

By Marcello Carlin


“Aquarius…And my name is Ralph…Now I like a woman who loves her freedom…And I like a woman who can hold her own…”

It sounds like Studio 54’s in-house video dating agency. It teeters dangerously on the tightrope of tackiness, but its modes persist into contemporary R&B, even though its dual camp and experimental factors enable it to fly far beyond those particular boundaries.

“Libra…And my name is Charles…Now I like a woman that’s quite…A woman who carries herself like…Miss Universe…”

The Floaters were lucky to get their one moment. A Detroit soul group formed by James Mitchell, formerly of The Emeralds of “Feel The Need In Me” (again, in Britain they had to be called the “Detroit Emeralds”) and featuring his brother Paul as well as Larry Cunningham, Charles Clark and Ralph Mitchell (no relation), their full-length album version of “Float On” lasts for over eleven minutes, and “Papa Was A Rollin’ Stone” it is not – although what it could be is a belated sequel to the sensual quietude of the Four Tops’ great 1970 hit “Still Waters” (as with the latter, the album version of “Float On” is essentially divided into two parts, instrumental then vocal). A New York DJ picked up on the track, and the heavily-edited single was an unexpectedly huge transatlantic hit; but note the gender divide making itself apparent – where Donna Summer is satisfied and in full control, the Floaters parade themselves so shamelessly they might as well have bells hanging around their necks.

"Leo…And my name is Paul…You see I like…all…women of the world…”

Over a quite compelling slow-motion psychedelic soul backdrop – like Barry White hijacking a Thom Bell session but with the eerie whine of a Korg string synthesiser replacing strings – each Floater (with the exception of the group’s leader and the song’s co-writer James Mitchell, from whom we do not hear at all) takes it in turn to give their star sign, name and ovular preferences before swooping into dreamy soul tenors or falsettos, maintaining the is-it-still-’67 mood (“Come with me baby to Love Land”). You are daring their faces to remain straight…and then the camp bucket tips over a little too steeply…

"CAYN-CER! AND MA NAME IS LA-RRRR-Y!! HA! AN’ I LIKE A WOMAN THAT LURVES EVERY-THANG AND EVERY-BAWDY!!”

Even so, you continue to tag along for the ride with the swirling Zawinul electric piano and distant Paul Horn flutes as they echo “Float, float, float on” before the whole thing dissolves quite marvellously into atonal atomisation – the last 30 seconds or so of the record sound like early Penderecki. “Float On” is camper than the Ayrshire coast during Glasgow Fair Fortnight, and it should rightly lie beyond the pale of irretrievable naffness; and yet there is a rather admirable tug on its sleeve towards the melting paradises of early Stylistics and Love Unlimited which makes me warm to the record, virtually in spite of itself.

Date Record Made Number Two: 17 September 1977
Number Of Weeks At Number Two: 2
Records At Number One: “I Just Want To Be Your Everything” by Andy Gibb and “Best Of My Love” by The Emotions
UK Chart Position: 1

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Threads Of Alligator Lizards In The Air: “Purple Rain” by Prince and The Revolution

By Marcello Carlin
The original idea was for a country-style collaboration with Stevie Nicks, to whom Prince sent a ten-minute instrumental backing track, asking her to come up with some lyrics. However, Nicks was overwhelmed by what she heard and feared that the task was too much for her to take on, so the song was reworked in rehearsal with The Revolution, utilising Wendy Melvoin’s guitar phrasing as a new guideline. The song appears to have existed before the film; Purple Rain the movie is best described as lucid hokum, but its soundtrack changed the atoms which constituted “pop,” far more so than much ostensibly radical music of the period. For many of that decade’s generation, Purple Rain the soundtrack was “our” Ziggy Stardust – better conceived, performed and produced in every way – and the title song, which closes the album, was “our” “Rock ‘N’ Roll Suicide.” It is such a patient epic, the song, and about a lot of things, and people – each of the verses addresses a different su...
Post a Comment
Read more

“I Would Have Thought In The Middle Of The Atlantic In The Middle Of The Night That Rockets Must Mean Trouble”: “I’m Not In Love” by 10cc

By Marcello Carlin
"watching for night, with absinthe eye cocked on the lone, late, passer-by." (Sylvia Plath, "Prospect," 1956) This story begins in 1954, before most people had really recognised anything called rock, and a pop record which is half-perfect. That record, which stayed at number one in our charts for ten weeks, was “Cara Mia” by David Whitfield with Mantovani and his Orchestra and Chorus. Now, Whitfield was never the most subtle of singers and his in-your-face bellowing is somewhat distracting – it is significant that he was the first British reality media star (not from television, because at that time Opportunity Knocks was only broadcast on Radio Luxembourg) since his climactic high C at the end of “Cara Mia” is like a display of gymnastics, or an athletic field event; can he do that triple loop or throw that javelin beyond the stadium? It proves that technical prowess can often render itself unlistenable. But the magic here lies in the extraordinary ...
2 comments
Read more

A Pre-Emptive, Though Hopefully Temporary, Bowing Out: “Don’t Let The Sun Go Down On Me” by Elton John

By Marcello Carlin
This isn’t quite the last piece of music I’ll be writing about before taking a long break from writing this blog (and most other things) – there’s one more song tomorrow that I’ve been persuaded to write up before I disappear – but the situation is this; I am imminently due to go into hospital for major surgery to treat a long-standing and hugely-annoying hernia. This should have been sorted out years ago but for reasons too tedious to document it’s only being sorted out now. It is going to be a long, fairly complex and in places possibly pioneering procedure. I am being operated on by world-class surgeons whom I trust implicitly and there has been much liaison between my local hospital (where I’ll be going) and the hospital where I myself work to enable this to happen. However, I have to warn you that the procedure carries a fairly high risk of what medical people call “morbidities,” mainly to do with breathing and cardiac issues, for which I will be closely monitored in I...
4 comments
Read more