Great Rock Albums of 1981: Mother's Finest- Iron Age

Back in 1981, I remember hearing of the band Mother's Finest. I remember listening to some of their music and I remember liking it but that's all I can remember. Like quite a lot of things with me, the band Mother's Finest was filed away into some dark cabinet inside my mind only to be pulled out thanks to Laina Dawes in her book "What Are You Doing Here?" The band gets quite a lot of mention in the book and rightly so because they were a brilliant hard rocking band. Why did they slip my mind? Well, I will say that it would not have been intentional nor would it have anything to do with the fact that several members of the band were African American. However, for some reason, I didn't listen to them like I should have and that was a major loss for me.

After listening to "Iron Age" I have refamiliarised myself on the hard rock yet funky and melodic band Mother's Finest are. The guitars groove in a very unique way but are no less harder. "Movin' On" is as good an album opener as any opening songs on what history has considered the more classic albums. "Rock And Roll 2 Nite," "Time" and "Evolution" are all great memorable tracks and former the foundation on which this album is built and you can't fault any of the other tracks either. But what makes "Iron Age" or Mother's Finest themselves for that matter stand out for me is the vocals of Joyce 'Baby Jean' Kennedy. Her vocals mixed with the music sound just like Aretha Franklin goes metal and that's a wonderful thing. Her vocals are right up there with the Queen of Soul in power and tune. I can't think of any other way to describe them, I'm at a loss here.

[caption id="attachment_1731" align="aligncenter" width="276"] Blues Brothers with Aretha Franklin[/caption]

Track Listing:

1. Movin' On

2. Luv Drug

3. Rock And Roll 2 Nite

4. U Turn Me On

5. All The Way

6. Evolution

7. Illusion (C'Mon Over to My House)

8. Time

9. There Goes Th' Rain

10. Earthling

[caption id="attachment_2169" align="aligncenter" width="300"] Mother's Finest[/caption]

Joyce 'Baby Jean' Kennedy- vocals

Glenn Murdock- vocals, guitar

Wizzard- bass

Moses- guitar

B.B.- drums

Note: I know there are seven people in the photo but the album on lists these five

 My theory (and that's all it is) as to why Mother's Finest didn't get the recognition they so richly deserved was down to the attitudes of the time. Even in 1981, I began seeing music dividing up along several lines and unfortunately one of those lines was racial. I remember both black and white marines referring to music as ours and yours. The problem was that because of the mixed racial make up of Mother's Finest, some people didn't know where to put them and consequently they got pushed out. Damn shame because people need to hear what a great band they are. On a happier note, one of my objectives for this blog and for writing "Rock And Roll Children" in the first place was for people to get out their old music and listen to it all over again. It gives me great delight to discover that like me, many of you have never stopped. Saying that, I think we should all give Mother's Finest a good listen.

Next Post: Johnny Van Zant- Round Two

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