Day 5: Amii Stewart – Knock on Wood/Amii Stewart

Today’s disc is Amii Stewart’s 1979 album which was released under the title Knock on Wood in most places but for some reason was just called Amii Stewart in the UK. I didn’t buy the album at the time (hence the 50p sticker on the front), I probably bought it in a charity shop some time in the 1990s. I had very fond memories of her two huge 1970s disco singles (Knock on Wood and Light My Fire/137 Disco Heaven) and when I was DJing, as part of the duo Daisy & Havoc in the ‘90s, I think I bought this album to play those tracks when we were booked for back rooms, bars and parties. Playing back rooms was often more fun than playing the ‘big rooms’ where tastes for harder and harder trance as the ’90s progressed weren’t really in sync with our own pretty eclectic preferences. Playing big rooms paid more though. 

 

Although Amii Stewart’s two big singles were released in 1978 and 1979 respectively I first knew them from listening to the 7-inch singles a couple of years after their release in my next brother up, David’s, bedroom in the early 1980s on the edge of Middlesbrough. Four years older than me, David had LOADS of records (singles and albums: rock, pop, disco, funk) and he went out a lot so I spent hours listening to his music (on his record player). I don’t think I ever even asked permission but luckily he’s a pretty laid-back guy and didn’t seem to mind. At this point my own record collection wasn’t very extensive (what money I had went on Embassy Regal cigarettes, Littlewoods own brand vodka and Toyah Willcox eye shadow). With male friends I mainly listened to old heavy metal and rock (Black Sabbath, Led Zep, the same tracks over and over) and with female friends I listened to old Motown and some pop of the time like Adam and the Ants (the same tracks over and over). On my own in my room I listened (yes, over and over) to albums like Michael Jackson’s 1979 Off the Wall, randomly Neil Young’s 1972 Harvest (though it was already a good few years old by then, not really sure how I got into that, possibly via the other brother) and the few singles I had (Spandau Ballet, Motorhead, Commodores’ Three Times a Lady – all the essentials). David had so many more records though – piles and piles of them – and he put all his singles in special little cardboard covers with the titles written on in flouncy biro. He had albums like Funkadelic’s One Nation Under a Groove (which blew my mind), he had quite a lot of Thin Lizzy, he had both Amii Stewart singles (and I loved them!).

 

Her big singles were both covers – old tracks given the disco treatment. The first, Knock on Wood, was originally performed and co-written by Eddie Floyd. It was put out by the soul label Stax in 1966 and written, apparently, in the famous Lorraine Motel in Memphis, Tennessee where Martin Luther King was shot and killed. We went there, as it happens, when we visited the US in 2011 (read about that here if you like) – it is now part of the Civil Rights Museum. Stewart’s 1978 disco version, originally for a German label, went to number 1 in the US. It is great but I probably prefer her next less successful hit Light my Fire/137 Disco Heaven (a cover of the Doors song in a medley of a sort). Back then I always sang 127 instead of 137 (no idea why, I was just high on disco perhaps) and I never really thought about the number. Listening to it over our evening meal this week it was suggested to me that maybe it’s about BPM. I haven’t tested the theory but it sounds plausible – anyone feel like checking?  

 

Here’s the official video for that single – quite the outfit on Amii here:

Originally a trained dancer and turning 68 later this month, Amii Stewart has continued releasing music and moved to Italy in the mid 1980s where she has been a TV star and is much loved – she even works as a goodwill ambassador for Unicef Italia. So if you’d been wondering where this 1970s icon was, now you know. 

Back with something much less cheerful tomorrow. 

For the first intro post to this series go here.