P.Y.T.'s a Bad Mama Jama

[arXter]

after Mike and Greg Philliganes conceived the general blueprint for Pretty Young Thing (demo), James Ingram (with Quincy) completely rebooted the song as the uptempo boogie jam we know and love today:

P.Y.T.






​

Ingram was chiefly responsible for the funk-laced groove, keys, and bass synth work on the track, and during the same period (1981 - less than a year before recording with MJ), he contributed very similar elements to another well-known pop funk track of the decade:

Carl Carlton
She's A Bad
Mama Jama






​

sounds to me like Ingram pretty much mixed together what Mike handed him in the demo with what he did with Carl Carlton and Leon Haywood for Mama Jama.

and in both, the synth licks are directly influenced by the creative P-Funk grooves of the time, especially the keyboarding wizardry of the great Bernie Worrell (1979):

Funkadelic
Knee Deep






​

 

[Jabz]

Nice call. I think its the same case with Boogie Nights by Heatwave and Off the Wall.



Edit: Both written by Rod Temperton for those of you that don't know.

 

[Superstition]

I mentioned it in other threads, but Temperton definitely had something similar going on with "Spice Of Life" by Manhattan Transfer and "Baby Be Mine" by MJ:

Spice Of Life:



Baby Be Mine:

 

[Jabz]

Oh defo.

 

[DuranDuran]

James started out in a funk band, but can't think of the name of it right now. His brother Phillip was in Switch which Jermaine brought to Motown and produced some of their earlier stuff.