In celebration of: 1- The upcoming Pump Me Up: D.C. Subculture of the 1980s exhibit at the Corcoran Gallery of Art, and 2- My recent luck in locating 2 more unusual mid-’70s images of this group, I decided to post a cut from their debut 1977 album, entitled Free Yourself. Not that you don’t know this already, but Experience Unlimited, later shortened to E.U., is a band from Washington, DC that’s still active on the go-go scene. What you may not realize is that the band started out with a funky black rock lean, vibing more on psych funk, Jimi Hendrix, and funky soul jam sessions, than the straight-ahead go-go sound that would one day take the band in a different direction. As the ‘70s progressed, the band inched closer and closer to that later sound.

This album was released during a period of experimentation and transition, only a few years after Chuck Brown and the Soul Searchers first realized the impact of stretching out and simplifying Grover Washington Jr.’s “Mr. Magic” intro groove [with some repetitive percussive elements] in order to get party people at the local discos, [also known as go-gos], amped at the start of the night. The popularity of that latin/afro Cuban percussive element sparked a soon to be infectious spread from band to band, eventually fueling the fire that would ignite the DC clubs. Some elements of that sound are interwoven in this first release by Experience Unlimited. Pressed and distributed by the local label Black Fire, the band itself helped sell copies from its’ DC stronghold, aka “The House of Peace.” Original copies are hard to find nowadays, but thanks to youtube, you can enjoy the EU sound anytime! This LP cut is called “Peace Gone Away.”