1976 The Real Thing: You To Me Are Everything

Ironically, despite their name, The Real Thing weren't. Weren't a genuine Philadelphia soul vocal group that is, which is the genre that 'You To Me Are Everything' models it's sound on. The band were actually home-grown in Liverpool, and whilst this isn't necessarily a headshot to any ambitions in this field, employing the song's writer (Ken Gold) as producer probably was. Because while Gold had chops enough to create a tune that was more than a mere pastiche of Gamble and Huff, the end recording sounds far too brittle and plastic to scrape the sky the way G&H's finest did. Which is just as well really seeing as the vocals from the Amoo brothers are more flat earth than celestial.

But I'm being too harsh now -'You To Me Are Everything' is undoubtedly a memorable tune, largely because its workaday disco strut multitasks like crazy to allow the song a ubiquity of context that a more specialised example of the genre perhaps wouldn't have. Put simply, it's an upbeat everyman song with an upbeat everyman message. You can take 'You To Me Are Everything' anywhere and it will always sound right at home. It knows which knife to use at the posh do's and it will add a veneer of class to even the tackiest of gatherings. Seems like a fair enough legacy to me.