Song Of The Day 1/6/2014: Meco - "Other Galactic Funk"

B-Sides Week: In 1977 there were two popular versions of John Williams' theme to the road movie Star Wars. One was the official version as played by the London Symphony Orchestra, and the other was a disco version. Back then everything had to have a disco version or Walgreen's would have to shut down for a couple hours until someone made one.

The disco version of the theme from Star Wars was produced by Meco Menardo, which sounds like the name of one of those exotic European disco practitioners of the '70s, but he was from Pennsylvania. Meco released an album called Star Wars and Other Galactic Funk. The first side contained his complete Star Wars disco mini-symphony, including the "Cantina Band" segment that was edited into the single version. The second side had all the Other Galactic Funk, spread across three tracks called "Other," "Galactic" and "Funk." Mr. Menardo had little time for mundane functions like coming up with song titles.

"Funk" was extracted from this piece and placed on the B-Side of Meco's "Star Wars/Cantina Band" single, which went straight to #1. Since the three tracks played as one whole long suite, I thought I'd include all three here. It's actually a pretty tight little number, circled around New Orleans drum line rhythms. Because once the Death Star was blown up the next thing the Rebel Alliance did was catch the Nevilles at Tipitina's.