Instruments of Seduction

335. KOOL & THE GANG, "Misled"
Produced by Jim Bonnefond and Kool & the Gang; written by Kool & the Gang
DeLite 880431 1984 Billboard: # 10

For me, this is one of those singles that slipped through the cracks. You won't find it on virtually any early 80s compilation, and I freely admit that there are so many reasons to disregard it: by this point, Kool & the Gang was past its prime; the instruments here sound more pre-programmed than on their 1970s classics; it's neither a dance song nor a rocker; when they laid down this track, the couplet She's as heavy/As a Chevy was at least a quarter of a century past its shelflife . . .

But sometimes it's just a groove, in this case the dialogue between the bass and the rhythm guitar line. Yeah, I know it's far from spontaneous and way overproduced. Yet it seduces me enough, leads me on, that every time I hear the song I keep listening, even though I find the narrative depicted in the lyrics too preposterous for a silent film starring Theda Bara. This is another one of those songs where the words ultimately don't matter. No, I simply want to live where the power chords meet the funk and never die into the fadeout, where vocalist J. T. Taylor is so ensorcelled by their fused sound that he just shrugs his vocals from the resistant verses into the hypnotically enlivened choruses. When genius seduces you, it's no marvel, but when mere competence does, it sometimes seems even more like magic.

Plus Kool & the Gang were from Jersey City, birthplace of Flip Wilson, Richard Conte, and Will Durant and rightful hometown of the Statue of Liberty. That's got to count for something.