Community/Public Interest - Obituary
Joni Sledge Has Died By Adam Sweeting
J
oni Sledge, who has died aged 60 of unknown causes, was one of four siblings who banded together to create the music group Sister Sledge. Formed in Philadelphia in 1971, their career really lifted off after they were put together with the writer-producers Nile Rodgers and Bernard Edwards (the masterminds of Chic). With the sisters, the prolific pair set about creating We Are Family (1979): it became one of their most memorable achievements, and the group’s definitive album. The women had been touring regularly on the US east coast in the early 1970s and, after releasing their first album, Circle of Love, in 1975, had begun to build a following
in Europe too. Yet they had no idea what Rodgers and Edwards had in mind until they arrived at the recording studio that day. As Rodgers recalled in his book Le Freak: “The first time we met Sister Sledge was also the first time they heard the song We Are Family. When they walked into the studio, we were still writing the song as it was blasting over the loudspeakers … Once we had finished, we gave it to them and basically said: ‘Here it is and here’s how it goes!’” Though Joni commented in the Guardian last year that “recording We Are Family was like a one-take party”, Rodgers and Edwards had a specific way of working that did not leave much space for different
ideas from the artists. However nobody could argue with the results. The first single, He’s The Greatest Dancer, was a No 9 pop hit in the US and No 1 on the R&B chart. We Are Family went to No 2 on the pop chart and again topped the R&B listing, with both tracks entering the British Top 10. A third single, Lost in Music, fared poorly on the US charts (though it made the UK Top 20), despite being a haunting, trance-like piece of work. Joni sang the lead vocal on it and, as her sister Debbie commented, “the words are about determination, not giving up, so they kind of fitted where we were at the time”. The We Are Family album went to No 3 on the Billboard Hot
90 April 2017 Black Business News www.blackbbusinessnews.net 1-323-291-7819