Boogie Fever

"Boogie Fever"
Single by The Sylvers
from the album Showcase
B-side	"Free Style"
Released	February 1976
Format	7" single
Recorded	1975
Genre	Disco/Soul
Length	3:29
Label	Capitol
Writer(s)	Freddie Perren, Kenneth St. Lewis
Producer(s)	Freddie Perren
Certification	Gold (RIAA)
The Sylvers singles chronology
"Stay Away From Me" (1973) "Boogie Fever" (1976) "Cotton Candy" (1976)

"Boogie Fever" is a song recorded by Los Angeles, California-based R&B group The Sylvers, from their 1975 album Showcase. Their most lucrative single, it reached number one in the US on both the Billboard Hot 100 and Hot Soul Singles charts as well as reaching number one in Canada on the RPM national singles chart in 1976.^[1] It was their third of nine Top 20 R&B hits and first top 40 pop single.^[2] Billboard ranked it as the No. 20 song for 1976. "Boogie Fever" is one of two gold records by the Sylvers, the other being "Hot Line".

Content

The narrator of the song notes a change that seems to have come over his girlfriend. At the drive-in movie, she turns down the speaker volume and turns up the radio to hear her favorite disco songs, and "boogies" to the disco beat while eating her meal at the pizza parlor. He concludes that his girl must have caught the "boogie fever" which seems to be "goin' around." In the final verse, he consults his doctor and realizes that he himself has caught the "boogie fever" as a result of dancing all night "doin' the bump, bump, bump" with his girlfriend.

History

After being signed to Capitol Records in 1975, Larkin Arnold, then vice president, hired Motown Records veteran Freddie Perren to produce the group. Kenneth St. Lewis, a long-time collaborator with Arnold, suggested that they write a song for them using one of the popular words of the day, "boogie." The song featured all nine of the Sylvers siblings, including the youngest sisters Angelia and Pat. The lead vocal was by Edmund Sylvers; Foster Sylvers was prominently featured in the bridge singing the line: "We kept it going strong". Released in February 1976, "Boogie Fever" took 13 weeks to climb to number-one on the pop charts.

The bass line for the song, performed by legendary Motown bassist James Jamerson, was based upon that of "Day Tripper" by the Beatles.

The song was featured in the Stephen King miniseries The Stand (1994) and the feature film Roll Bounce (2005). In 2010, "Boogie Fever" was used prominently in the movie Despicable Me, and in 2012 it was used in its theme park attraction adaptation, Despicable Me: Minion Mayhem. The song has also appeared in TV ads for Old Navy and Little Caesars Pizza.

Chart performance

Weekly singles charts Chart (1976) Peak position Australia KMR 7 Canadian RPM Top Singles 1 New Zealand Singles Chart 4 U.S. Billboard Hot 100 1 U.S. Billboard Hot Soul Singles 1

Year-end charts Chart (1976) Rank Australia [3] 42 Canada 32 New Zealand [4] 10 U.S. Billboard Hot 100 [5] 20

References

1. "Item Display - RPM - Library and Archives Canada". Collectionscanada.gc.ca. Retrieved 2016-10-11.
2. Whitburn, Joel (2004). Top R&B/Hip-Hop Singles: 1942-2004. Record Research. p. 563.
3. Steffen Hung. "Forum - 1970 (ARIA Charts: Special Occasion Charts)". Australian-charts.com. Archived from the original on 2016-06-02. Retrieved 2016-10-11.
4. "Top Selling Singles of 1976 | The Official New Zealand Music Chart". Nztop40.co.nz. 1963-12-08. Retrieved 2016-10-11.
5. "Top 100 Hits of 1976/Top 100 Songs of 1976". Musicoutfitters.com. Retrieved 2016-10-11.

External links

• Song review
• Lyrics of this song at MetroLyrics