Skip to main content

Maverick Ad

Home

Main navigation

  • Home
  • Cover Stories
  • Features
  • News
  • Reviews
  • Cashbox Legacy Awards
  • Past Covers
  • Weekly Archive
Orpheus Ascending: Old-School Funkateer John Orpheus Reaches New Heights On “Get Right!”

Breadcrumb

  • Home
  • Orpheus Ascending: Old-School Funkateer John Orpheus Reaches New Heights On “Get Right!”
John Orpheus
Fri Apr 12, 2024
Cashbox Canada

Break out your velvet couches, champagne flutes, and Soul Train swagger: Performance artist, musician and author John Orpheus brings back the golden age of get-down on his mood fixer of a new single, “Get Right!” Watch on YouTube here:

Like an urgent, time-traveling bulletin from an era when funk, punk and pop coexisted happily on the dancefloor, the new record finds the Trinidad-born, Toronto-based Orpheus applying his talent for musical shapeshifting to deliver a motivational sermon that's nostalgically succinct:

If it feel right, jump on it
If it ain’t right, we don’t want it

If it ain’t right, we don’t get your money

Now what could be fairer than that? The rhythm section maintains a breezy bounce as Orpheus raps out his exhortations with a trebly delivery that harkens back to both 90s west-coast rap and the Funkadelic records they sampled. Meanwhile, the song’s melodic flow is kept at the forefront by the indispensable purring of female guest vocalist Elise LeGrew.

“‘Get Right!’ is about finding your swag, securing the bag and eating well,” Orpheus says. “It’s a party vibe with an old-school funk energy reminding you to get up, get down and get right. The goal is to dance and shake off whatever is holding you back from your best and baddest self.”

Listen on Spotify here: open.spotify.com/track/3iBCMe9fZI0Q8my82kRPxM

Asked to name the biggest influences on the song, Orpheus has a shortlist handy: “Rick James, Prince, Sly and the Family Stone, soul music, cognac and daddy issues.”

Come again?

“My brothers and I grew up mostly without my dad around, and we would go into the basement and play all his old music. That’s where we first heard funk and disco, and it was kinda our way of kicking it with our dad.”

The retro aesthetic is on full display in the accompanying music video by ace production house Moon Reel Media, which combines house-party antics with onscreen titles straight out of a circa-’73 grindhouse flick. That’s not to mention the canny wardrobe choices of Orpheus himself, who’s bound to receive some sort of Best Costuming award for his judicious use of a snorkel.

“Get Right!” is the title track to Orpheus’ forthcoming EP, due in June of this year. It’s the follow-up to his 2021 album Saga King, and like the single that’s preceded it, it revels in the decor of vintage R&B—specifically the oeuvre of George Clinton as filtered through a litany of ’90s homages – we mean you Dr. Dre. But its “whole-school” approach embraces the entire musical diaspora, holding space for everything from dancehall to Afrobeats.

Recorded over the course of just nine days at Copper Sound in Guelph, in collaboration with musical director Adam Bowman and producer Mike Schlosser, the record shows Orpheus’ affection for the past by emphasizing live instrumentation and real-time performance. “Making records the old-school way—playing instruments, vibing off each other in the same room, sharing the moment—is still a magical way to make music!” he enthuses.

With that attitude, it’s no surprise he's in such demand as a live act. Whether appearing at festivals across Canada and the U.S. or opening for Liam Gallagher on a UK tour, he’s become known for rabble-rousing shows filled with audience participation, chanting and impromptu dance-offs that make his time on stage feel more like a Caribana road party than a simple concert.

When he isn’t tearing up studios and stages as John Orpheus, this tireless and multifaceted artist is giving vent to his literary alter ego, Antonio Michael Downing. Under that moniker, he’s published a well-received memoir, Saga Boy: My Life of Blackness and Becoming (Penguin Random House), written two children's books and is hard at work on his debut novel, Black Cherokee (Simon and Schuster). But whatever the medium and whichever name he’s going by at any given moment, he’s comin’ at ya with the same sense of playful reclamation and joy. And that, at its core, is what “Get Right!” really means.

“My life right now is about being whole and happy and having a blast,” he says, “and this song says all those things to a beat.”

johnorpheus.com

Reviews
Album
John Orpheus
Month: Jan 2022
Victoria Alex Canadian Alt. Pop-Punk Artist Victoria Alex is "Screaming" to…
Blues Matriarch Dalannah Celebrates Releases Song of Sorrow  with New Single“Blues Keep Knockin’” Blues Matriarch Dalannah Celebrates Releases Song of Sorrow with New…
AUS!Funkt Electro Post-Punkers AUS!Funkt Get You To Dance with New Single & Video…
Month: Feb 2022
Doug Schmude Orange County Troubadour Doug Schmude Gives a Reason To Believe With “It…
Francine Honey Francine Honey Offers a Solution for Couples Needing to Reconnect with the…
The Duke Robillard Band The Duke Robillard Band Set to Release New CD, They Called It Rhythm and Blues
The Manic Boys And Girls Club The Manic Boys And Girls Club’s High-Voltage Distress Call “Blacked Out” –…
Bryan Bravo Bryan Bravo Invites Audiences to “Feel Lucky” with Release of His New Single
jsin Power-Rock Artist jsin Unleashes High-Voltage New Single, “You Can’t Stop Me”
Alexis Lynn Artist Alexis Lynn Addresses the Struggle With Addiction in New Single “House On Fire…
 Jano Alek Montreal-Based Syrian Pop-Rocker Jano Alek Unleashes Powerful New Single…
Bree Whitworth Bree Whitworth Searches for the “Real Thing” in Emotionally Charged New Single
HOT MONDY Halifax Country Rockers HOT MONDY Raise the Roof on Self-Reflection with “Tell…
DJ Views Australian Hip Hop Producer DJ VIEWS Taps Technical Wizardry of Speech &…
HOROJO Trio Award-Winning Soul-Rockers HOROJO Trio Featuring JW-Jones Release Debut Album…

Pagination

  • First page « First
  • Previous page ‹ Previous
  • …
  • Page 58
  • Page 59
  • Page 60
  • Page 61
  • Current page 62
  • Page 63
  • Page 64
  • Page 65
  • Page 66
  • …
  • Next page Next ›
  • Last page Last »

CEO/PUBLISHER/EDITOR IN CHIEF
SANDY GRAHAM

email:sandygrahamemg@gmail.com 

Canadian Journalists:

Contributing Journalist - Canada and Global
Don Graham
email: dongrahamwriter@gmail.com

Contributing Journalist - Canada and Global
Lisa Hartt
email: lisahartt87@hotmail.com

Contributing Journalist - Canada 
Michael Williams
email: greydread@gmail.com

 

 

 

 

International Journalists:

Contributing Journalist - Sweden
Malin Osth
email: malin@musicdays.se

Contributing Journalist - Sweden
Jonas Tancred
email: jonas@musicdays.se

Contributing Journalist - USA
Rob Durkee 
email: rockster2746@gmail.com

 

 

 

 

 

 

Web Developer/Technical Support
Chris Wardman

email: info@chriswardman.com
website: chriswardman.com

Cashbox Cover Design and Graphic Artist
Jain McMillan

email: jainmcmillan@gmail.com

Contributing Photographer 
Tracey Savein - South Paw Productions
southpawproductions@rogers.com

 

 

 

Footer menu

  • Home
  • Features
  • News
  • Reviews
  • Cashbox Archive
  • Issue Archive
  • Past Covers