Pleasure
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Album Summary
Recorded and released in 1972 on Westbound Records, 'Pleasure' marked a pivotal moment for the Ohio Players as they were finding their groove and stretching their creative legs in the early part of the decade. Produced by the band themselves, this record captures a group of gifted musicians from Dayton, Ohio pouring everything they had into a raw, unfiltered sound that blended deep funk workouts with smooth soul sensibilities. The album arrived at a time when the Players were hungry to establish their identity on the national scene, and the Westbound imprint gave them the freedom to let that funky spirit run wild from the first note to the last.
Reception
- 'Pleasure' helped build the Ohio Players' grassroots reputation on the funk and soul circuit, earning them loyal fans in the urban markets where Westbound Records had strong distribution and street credibility.
- While the album did not produce massive mainstream chart fireworks upon release, it deepened the band's profile among dedicated funk and soul audiences who recognized the sheer musicianship and energy the Players brought to every track.
- Critics and fans who caught on early noted the album as evidence that Ohio Players were a force to be reckoned with, a group whose live energy translated powerfully onto wax.
Significance
- 'Pleasure' stands as an important early document in the Ohio Players' catalog, showing the world that Dayton, Ohio was brewing something seriously funky long before the band's commercial peak, and helping to establish the Midwest as a genuine hub of funk and soul creativity in the early 1970s.
- The album showcases the Players' ability to move fluidly between grinding, hard-edged funk grooves and tender, soulful balladry, demonstrating a musical range that would influence the broader development of funk and soul throughout the decade.
- Tracks like 'Funky Worm' introduced a playful, irreverent spirit to funk music — complete with that unforgettable synthesizer voice — helping to widen the sonic and cultural vocabulary of the genre and pointing toward the adventurous directions funk would travel as the decade rolled on.
Samples
- Funky Worm — this track's distinctive talking synthesizer hook and infectious groove made it one of the most sampled Ohio Players cuts of the era, with its playful worm character and synth riff showing up across hip-hop and rap productions throughout the late 1980s and 1990s, cementing its status as a cornerstone sample source.
Tracklist
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A1 Pleasure 107
5:28
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A2 Laid It 175
3:00
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A3 Pride And Vanity 86
4:22
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A4 Walt's First Trip 122
3:08
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B1 Varee Is Love 61
2:43
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B2 Walked Away From You 116
2:29
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B3 Paint Me 175
2:02
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B4 Funky Worm 86
2:35
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B5 Our Love Has Died 145
4:45
Artist Details
The Ohio Players — oh, what a band — rose up out of Dayton, Ohio in the late 1960s and rode that funk wave all the way to the top of the charts through the mid-1970s, cooking up a sound so thick and greasy it practically dripped right out of the speakers, blending hard funk, R&B, and soul into stone-cold classics like "Fire," "Love Rollercoaster," and "Skin Tight." They were among the architects of the funk movement alongside Parliament-Funkadelic and Sly Stone, pushing the groove harder and deeper than most dared to go, while their provocative album covers made them as visually daring as they were musically bold. Their influence carved a deep groove into the DNA of funk and hip-hop, with "Love Rollercoaster" alone being sampled and covered across generations, cementing the Ohio Players as true pioneers who never got quite as much credit as they deserved.
