Mother's Finest

Though Mother's Finest, the Georgia funk rock outfit, registers as little more than a footnote in rock annals, countless headliners they upstaged and spectators who attended those shows remember the band quite differently. Echoing the integrated approach of Sly & the Family Stone, the 1976 self-titled debut introduced white guitarist Moses Mo and drummer B.B. "Queen" Borden alongside Black vocalists Joyce Kennedy and Glenn Murdock, bassist Jerry "Wyzard" Seay, and keyboardist Mike Keck. Cuts such as "Rain" and the mildly contentious "Niggazz Can't Sing Rock & Roll" stirred enough local notice to lift the group from Georgia clubs into broader regional work. The next release, Another Mother Further, fulfilled the promise of its name. Its opening number reinterpreted the Holland-Dozier-Holland song "Mickey's Monkey," first popularized by Smokey Robinson, yet the guitar figure openly lifted Jimmy Page's riff from Led Zeppelin's "Custard Pie," which had appeared two years earlier. Whether because the track was a cover or because earlier borrowings from blues sources were involved, Led Zeppelin never pursued litigation, and the song together with "Piece of the Rock" and "Hard Rock Lover" turned the album into the band's true launchpad. For the rest of the 1970s, Mother's Finest earned renown as rock's most disruptive opener, routinely eclipsing Aerosmith, Frank Marino & Mahogany Rush, and Ted Nugent. A lesser third effort, 1978's Mother Factor, left the group's concert impact undiminished, as Murdock and especially the commanding Kennedy held crowds spellbound above the funk-rock foundation supplied by Mo, Wyzard, Borden, and Mike. The 1979 concert album Mother's Finest Live preserved signature pieces including "Watch My Stylin'" and "Give You All the Love," while also showcasing Kennedy's striking version of Jefferson Airplane's "Somebody to Love" and an inventive rearrangement of Steppenwolf's "Magic Carpet Ride." That record signaled the close of their strongest period; the band adapted poorly to the 1980s and never secured the recognition it deserved inside rock's largely white domain. Mo, Mike, and Borden departed, with Borden later joining Southern rockers Molly Hatchet, but Kennedy, Murdock, and Wyzard continued. After exploring dance music with shifting personnel throughout the 1980s, the core trio recruited guitarist John Hayes and drummer Dion Derek to form an all-African-American lineup in the early 1990s. The resulting 1992 release, Black Radio Won't Play This Record, proved as confrontational as its title implied, even while standing as the band's strongest work since the 1979 live set; white radio ignored it as well. The album now lingers in cut-out bins, overlooked or dismissed much like Mother's Finest itself except by a loyal few. A 1997 compilation, Not Yer Mother's Finest: The Very Best of Mother's Finest, collects material drawn chiefly from the first two studio albums.