Songoftheday 8/16/20 - Stomp your feet if you like my beat, clap your hands if you want some more...

 

 

"I Like It" - The Blackout Allstars

from the albums I Like It Like That (Original Soundtrack) (1994) & Global Basics: Dance Music For The Millennium (1996)

Billboard Hot 100 peak: #25 (four weeks)

Weeks in the Top-40: 9

 

Today's song of the day comes from the one-off Latin music supergroup Blackout Allstars, who were assembled to record the title song for the 1994 movie I Like It Like That starring Lauren Velez and featuring Rita Moreno. The film at the time had the distinction of being the first major-studio release directed by an African-American woman.  The titular song was a classic of the "boogaloo" genre, which combined Latin mambo with soul music, and Pete Rodriguez' single "I Like It Like That", written by bandleader Rodriguez and Tony Pabon, who sang on the record, was released in 1967, is considered one of the best...

 For the movie version in 1994, producer Sergio George put together singer Tito Nieves with Latin music icons Tito Puente, Ray Barretto, Sheila E., Grover Washington, Pabon, and more to recreate the excitement of the 1967 recording, with the title shortened to "I Like It". The "Blackout" part of their moniker came from the movie's original title (and plot point)...

The song didn't get too much notice on mainstream airwaves, though the house music-inspired remix by Bobby D'Ambrosio climbed to #19 on Billboard magazine's Dance Club Play chart in 1994.

Fast forward to 1996, when the D'Ambrosio Club mix was included on a dance music compilation, Global Basics. The remix was also used in an advertisement for fast food giant Burger King, and for the first time in over a decade, a TV commercial gave new life to the song, becoming insanely popular and requested enough to be re-released as a single, to have radio embrace the pumped up grooves...

The reworked version of "I Like It" reached the American top-40 in February of 1997. Even though it would be the "end" of the "Allstars", the parties involved regularly include the song in their shows.

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And here's Nieves performing "I Like It" in New York in 1996...

In 2018, rapper Cardi B along with new Latin music stars J Balvin and Bad Bunny had a #1 hit single with "I Like It", which interpolated the record for a new generation, who a big chunk of most likely didn't know it was a sample...

Up tomorrow: Cuban-American pop star is not letting go.