ISSUE #39 ISSUE #39MMUSICMAG.COM MMUSICMAG.COM

ISSUE #39 M MUSIC & MUSICIANS MAGAZINE

ASK EMILIO CASTILLO—WHO CO-FOUNDED TOWER OF Power in 1968—how his band has survived, and he offers a simple answer. “It’s because we make the music exactly the way we want it to sound,” he says. “We noticed years ago that if we try to deviate from what we do, it doesn’t work—we still sound like us, only a bastardized version. So we’re going to make sure we sound like the best us we can be.”

Castillo, who plays saxophone with the iconic Oakland, California-based horn-driven soul-funk collective, is one of four original members still on board, alongside baritone saxophonist Stephen

TOWER OF POWERHip for nearly 50 years, the soul vets prove you just can’t stop the funk

BRIAN KELLEY AND TYLER HUBBARD—the party-starting dudes behind the country juggernaut Florida Georgia Line—are taking a breather to look back on the monster year they’ve had. Their new album Anything Goes topped the charts—and their latest No.1 hit “Sun Daze” caps a series of chart-scorching hits. What’s more, their new tour landed a Top 3 spot on Billboard’s Hot Tours.

It’s proof that “bro-country”—their Jack-and-Coke combo of poppy hard rock and Nashville twang—is no passing fad. The two fi rst met at Nashville’s Belmont University in 2008, but they didn’t release their fi rst EP Anything Like Me until 2010. In the next couple of years they landed a publishing deal and a recording contract, then released another EP, followed by their debut record, Here’s to the Good Times.

From the beginning, Kelley and Hubbard presented themselves as gracious

and easygoing—regular guys making feel-good music for folks just like them. Although some critics scoff at their lyrics about beer, Bacardi and pickups, the duo makes no apologies. As their massive popularity attests, the formula ain’t broke, so while recording Anything Goes, they didn’t necessarily try to fi x anything.

“The thing for us, most importantly, was putting out music that’s exactly who we are, where we are and where we want to be,” says Kelley. “We spent the last couple of years writing and living out the songs that were on our last record, and we met a lot of amazing people and amazing fans. We heard a lot of their stories. We got to live out on the road and experience things not many people experience.”

That perspective found its way onto the new album, about half of which Florida native Kelley and Georgia native Hubbard co-wrote.

Citing tunes like “Confession” and the heart-tugging hit “Dirt,” Kelley insists the band has matured. “Almost half the record is a little different for us,” he says. “It’s sonically in that groove of Florida Georgia Line, but lyrically it’s deeper, and the storytelling is a little better.”

One notable difference is the absence of special guests. The deluxe edition of Here’s to the Good Times featured a remix of the single “Cruise” that, thanks to a guest verse from rapper Nelly, reached the Top 5 on the Billboard Hot 100. As easy as it would have been to grab another hip-hop artist and edge even closer to the mainstream, FGL won’t be following Taylor Swift into the straight-up pop realm.

“We’re right in the middle of country,” says Kelley. “That’s who we are. The thing for us is to make great music—music that’s real to us, real to other people.”

—Kenneth Partridge

TOWER OF POWERHip for nearly 50 years, the soul vets prove

Brian Kelley, Tyler Hubbard

FLORIDA GEORGIA LINE Bro-country’s premier duo fi nds their musical sweet spot naturally

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SPOTLIGHT

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EVEN IF YOU DON’T RECOGNIZE HER name, you’d likely recognize Betty Who’s breakout hit “Somebody Loves You,” which played as the backdrop of a 2013 viral video of a man proposing to his boyfriend in Home Depot while dancing with a fl ash mob. “Even today, people are falling in love with that

song for the fi rst time,” says the Australian singer-songwriter of the amateur clip that amassed nearly 13 million YouTube views.

Who–born Jessica Newham—was one of the fi rst to watch the uplifting video. “Before it went up, they emailed it to my manager asking if they could use the song. That night,

after we gave our OK and it went public, it had almost a million views.” The song was initially released in 2012 via an independent EP, but Who signed with RCA just four days after the proposal was uploaded. The sudden success led the classically trained cellist to drop out of Boston’s Berklee College of Music just weeks before graduation to move to New York.

In 2014, nearly a year and a half after its release, “Somebody Loves You” went to No. 1 on Billboard’s Dance Club Songs chart. The slow build allowed Who to focus on her major-label debut, Take Me When You Go. “If the song had been a huge, out-of-the-gate hit, I would have had nothing to follow it up with,” says the 6-foot-1 singer. “I was challenged by the people I worked with. I wasn’t allowed to settle—if a line wasn’t perfect, I wouldn’t rest until it was. I enjoyed that process.”

With a sound evoking dance-pop of the 1980s and ’90s, Who name-checks such artists as Michael Jackson, Madonna and Whitney Houston as influences, peppering the list with singer-songwriters Joni Mitchell and Bob Dylan. But she’s most often compared to Swedish pop star Robyn because of her retro-dance hooks and platinum-blond poof of hair.

“I’m a huge fan, but I didn’t go in saying we should make this sound like Robyn, says Who, 23. “If anything, I said we should make it sound like Mariah Carey meets Phil Collins.”

But how exactly does a classically trained cellist turn into a dance-pop diva? “It may seem like a stretch, but to me they were married. My whole life was about music—not just classical—so genres didn’t mean anything to me.”

–Katy Kroll

“Doc” Kupka, drummer David Garibaldi and bassist Francis “Rocco” Prestia, who recently underwent successful kidney transplant surgery.

Castillo is quick to point out that Tower of Power has always been greater than the sum of its parts. Since the band’s inception, its lineup has changed many times. Some, like Lenny Williams, have gone on to successful solo careers, and others have faded into obscurity. Multi-instrumentalist Lenny Pickett—a member of the heralded Tower of Power horn section from 1972 to 1981—has served as musical director of Saturday Night Live’s house band for two decades.

“Every single facet of the band has changed several times over,” says Castillo. “It’s a conceptual sound, and that concept resides with Doc, Dave, Rocco and myself. But even if one of us were to leave, the new guys, once we give them Tower of Power 101, they know what our thing is. They’re giving their input and their ideas because they know what it takes to make this thing. We’re all in this together.”

Castillo is especially psyched about vocalist Ray Greene, who joined the band in 2013. “I can’t even tell you how comfortable and wonderful this guy is,” Castillo says. But he’s also excited about Hipper Than Hip, a recently released two-CD set that captures a classic live radio broadcast from 1974—after they’d just recorded Back to Oakland, one of the jewels of the group’s discography. “We were defi nitely fi ring on all 10 cylinders that night,” says Castillo.

Though the band is closing in on a half-century of classic funk, Castillo is looking toward the future. Tower of Power recently recorded enough new material for two studio albums. Going in, Castillo says, “I told the others, ‘We’ve made a lot of great records, but now we need to make a major-league statement to the best of our ability.’

“This is really all I know and all I’m good at,” he adds. “Soul music, running a band and writing songs—I know that stuff because I love it.”

–Jeff Tamarkin

“Doc” Kupka, drummer David Garibaldi and bassist Francis “Rocco” Prestia, who recently underwent successful kidney transplant surgery.

BETTY WHOA popular viral video leads to a major-label debut for a dance-pop diva

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