Universal Togetherness Band

Born in Chicago in 1956, Andre Gibson established and directed the Universal Togetherness Band, a local ensemble whose wide-ranging approach drew from funk, soul, disco, jazz, rock, and new wave while pairing those textures with thoughtful and inventive songwriting. Decades after the musicians disbanded, their catalog finally reached the public through an unforeseen sequence of events. Gibson’s earliest exposure to live performance came at the Regal Theater, where he saw R&B figures including Jackie Wilson, the Temptations, and Little Stevie Wonder. During junior high, his instructor Artie “Duke” Payne, who also worked as a session horn player for Cadet Records, urged the student to pursue music more seriously. Gibson took up keyboards and assembled a small group for a school talent show. At Chicago Vocational School, whose faculty included jazz musicians Joe Miller and Harold Bray, he performed in the marching band, jazz band, and concert band while adding cello, flute, and percussion to his instrumental range. Outside school hours he played with the local outfit Blue Flame alongside his brother Arnold Gibson on drums. After graduation Gibson enrolled at Illinois State University to study Music Therapy and performed with the band Foreal. In 1976 he returned to Chicago, secured employment at CBS Musical Instruments—the parent company of Fender at the time—assembled Colorvision from alumni of Blue Flame and Foreal, and married Cynthia Tibbs. Two years later he resumed college studies on a part-time basis; as Colorvision wound down he launched a fresh project with Arnold Gibson on drums and bass, former Colorvision member Fred Misher on bass and backing vocals, Fred’s brother Leslie Misher on lead guitar, and himself handling keyboards, vibraphone, and lead vocals. Seeking a name that captured the collective’s artistic scope, Gibson settled on Universal Togetherness Band. While enrolled at Columbia College he learned that the institution ran audio-engineering courses and recruited ensembles to record for the benefit of students; participants retained the tapes provided they covered the cost of the stock. Gibson promptly offered Universal Togetherness Band for the program. Over five semesters spanning 1979 to 1982 the musicians completed dozens of studio sessions that preserved Gibson’s broad compositional outlook. The group maintained a steady presence on Chicago’s club circuit and once opened for Peter Gabriel, yet wider recognition for their refined R&B synthesis remained elusive. During Gibson’s time at Columbia the lineup expanded to a sextet when Paul Hanover joined on harmonica and piano and Louis Sanford added percussion. Gibson’s wife Cynthia produced a video for the song “More Than Enough” as part of a film-production assignment, and late in 1982 the band appeared on the short-lived television program The Chicago Party, lip-synching to their recording of “Pull Up.” Several months afterward Arnold Gibson departed to pursue a solo path and Paul Hanover stepped away from performing to work as a recording engineer. Gibson continued with a subsequent configuration featuring Frank Alexander on drums, Allen Burroughs on guitar, Art Love on bass, and Michael Young on saxophone. Balancing these efforts against steadier employment as a market reporter at the Chicago Commodities Exchange proved difficult, and the band eventually dissolved, though Gibson kept writing and later issued several solo albums independently through CD Baby. In 2014, researchers at the reissue label Numero Group, while examining material from the Chicago Party archives, encountered the Universal Togetherness Band performance of “Pull Up.” After locating Gibson and learning he still held the Columbia College master tapes, the label arranged to issue a representative selection; the resulting album, titled Universal Togetherness Band, appeared in January 2015.