The JB Family Party

Lee Austin - I'm In Love

I started the week with James Brown, and I guess it's only appropriate to end the week the same way. JB revue member (and sometimes bodyguard) Lee Austin has been featured several times on the blog, so I'll jump right into discussing today's selection. Lee's cover of the Bobby Womack-penned "I'm In Love" starts off with some sexual moans and groans that don't fit with anything in the song (I know JB's productions at that time were marked by lots of experimenting with sound effects and all, but this makes no sense at all) and JB's longtime emcee Johnny Ray saying "listen to the story." Once that nonsense is out of the way, a nice mid-tempo groove starts and Austin begins a monologue about a quiet evening at home (the line "me and my woman - talkin' about a real woman" made in reference to his cover of Clarence Reid's "Real Woman," which had been released) that turns into a party as James Brown Revue members arrive, one by one. (Austin basically name-checks the entire James Brown Productions roster while the groove warms up.) Once he proclaims that JB has arrived, Lee can get into the song, and his reading of the soul chestnut really works. Like the rest of Austin's output in the '70s, the record didn't take off commercially, but it's one of the better second-tier JB productions out there.