Although a mainstay of Chicago Soul, Pieces of Peace are one of many talented groups that never quite managed to break though the local scene and make it big on a national or international scale. They began from humble roots and, at their peak, were Syl Johnson’s default studio band and producers (most notably on his incendiary 1970 LP Is It Because I’m Black), as well as composers and producers of their own solo work. A notoriously hard working group, Pieces of Peace had to undergo a long series of personnel changes before they settled on a tight-knit group of blood-brothers, in-laws, and raw young talent. But despite their constant gigging and touring from the mid- 1960′s well into the ’70′s, they never managed to get into the studio of their own accord and solidify their place as Chicago Soul pioneers – save for one session that’s barely survived to this day.
It’s unlucky, really, that Pieces of Peace never saw their moment in the spotlight. Although the band had a large body of original work that they played around the Chicago club scene, the band was never able to record their own music – before the early ’70′s that is. The only tracks they put down on record were, as mentioned above, the 1970 Syl Johnson LP, as well as the 1971 single, “Pass It On Pt. 1 & 2,” that was only given local distribution and never caught on. With the addition of Ben Wright on organ, the group added some punch and depth to their sound and recorded the Chicago classic “Annie Got Hot Pants Power,” a local hit. With a quick switch of drummers – leaving behind mainstay Fred White, who was hired away by Donny Hathaway – the band was finally ready to cut some original tracks.
As the band finished up takes in the studio with their new young drummer, Pieces of Peace agreed to go through with a long-standing offer to tour Southeast Asia. With the final mixes in the bag, the album release was delayed until after the tour as the band packed their suitcases and headed off to Asia. In Singapore the band quickly learned that the tour would be much harder than anticipated. For the first three months, they played seven days a week, three shows a night at a discotheque in the hotel where they also roomed. After the first month, the rookie drummer, Fred Crutchfield, began displaying signs of a mental illness that would ultimately be the band’s downfall. He was afraid to leave his room and was desperate to return home. Despite the incredible publicity the band was recieving around Asia, Crutchfield was quickly deteriorating. Within three months he had a full-fledged psycho-somatic illness, and in the end the band was forced to make do with whatever drummer they could find in Singapore.
It was only downhill from there, as passport trouble kept their booking agent from traveling with the band to Indonesia, and the new agent ripped off the band and stole their passports. It was only through the generosity of a native Indonesian Jazz guitarist that they were able to get by. Returning home with low morale after the loss of their drummer and their passport ordeal, the band went their own seperate ways. Multiple members ended up playing with Earth Wind & Fire, and others arranged strings for Michael Jackson’s hugely successful LP Off the Wall. Michael Davis, the lead horn player, played with Phil Collins for over ten years, toured with Earth Wind & Fire, and continued work with Syl Johnson. The LP was shelved, and the band dissapeared without a trace – that is until now. Check out, arguably, the most important piece of lost Chicago Soul, the band that created the notorious Windy City Sound, Pieces of Peace.
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