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List Price: $13.98 | | Label: Varese Sarabande
Salesrank: 144845
Released: March 11, 1997 |
| Our Price: $48.93 |
| Used Price: $16.60 |
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| Media: Audio CD |
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Let's All Chant: The Michael Zager Dance Collection Track Listing:
1. Let's All Chant
2. Think It Over - Cissy Houston
3. Traffic Jam
4. Do It With Feeling - Peabo Bryson,
5. Planet Funk - Johnny "Guitar" Watson
6. Love Express
7. Doctor Rhythm
8. Time Heals Every Wound
9. Life's a Party
10. What's Your Name, What's Your Number - Andrea True
11. Don't Sneak on Me [Disco Version]
Let's All Chant: The Michael Zager Dance Collection Reviews:
A Nice Sampling Of The Musical Style Favoured In The Late 70s/Early 80s 
2008-06-18 - Despite the so-so reviews before mine, this isn't a bad production out of Varese Vintage. The sound quality is excellent, and it comes with informative liner notes written by singer/songwriter/producer Mike Ragogna. If there's a fault - and I can't be my usual critical self in this regard since it doesn't claim to be "the greatest hits of" or "the best of" The Michael Zager Band - it's that they present the 12" 7:02 version of his biggest hit, Let's All Chant, rather than the hit single rendition which runs around 3:00 minutes, nor does it include the B-side to his only other hit, Do It With Feeling.
That came out in the spring of 1976 on Bang 720 billed as Michael Zager's Moon Band With Peabo Bryson, and reached # 25 R&B and # 94 Billboard Pop Hot 100. The flipside, missing here, was This Is The Life, and that does not seem to be anywhere in CD format. In a 1978 re-release on Bang 737, the A-side charted again at # 76 R&B in June/July. Sandwiched in between was his biggest hit, Let's All Chant which, billed to The Michael Zager Band, peaked at # 15 R&B/# 36 Hot 100 in March/April 1978 on Private Stock 45,184 b/w Love Express.
Although those would be his only hit singles Zager, born on January 3, 1943 in Passaic, New Jersey, is perhaps best known as a composer, arranger and, not least, as an award-winning producer of material for some of the biggest names in the industry. In addition to the above-mentioned Bryson, there was Johnny "Guitar" Watson, whose 1982 # 62 R&B hit The Planet Funk is here, Cissy Houston, whose 1978 # 32 R&B/# 106 Hot 100 "Bubble Under" hit Think It Over is here as well (other Houston hits produced by Zager include Love Is Something That Leads You and Tomorrow), and The Andrea True Connection, from whom we get their 1978 # 56 Hot 100 hit What's Your Name, What's Your Number?
He also produced for Cissy's daughter Whitney (whose first record, Life's A Party and produced by Zager, is here as well), Luther Vandross, Herb Alpert, Deniece Williams, Gladys Knight & The Pips, The Spinners, Joe Williams, Jennifer Holliday, Arturo Sandoval, and Daniel Ray Edwards - which illustrates that his focus extended way beyond Disco. Indeed, he has, to his credit, 13 gold or platinum records, several European accolades, and a Grammy nomination for Cupid/I've Loved You for a Long Time, which became a # 4 Hot 100/# 5 R&B smash for The Spinners in 1980 on Atlantic 3664.
Nor was that the limit of his vast talent as he is probably among the best radio/TV commercial jingle writers around, having done things for such widespread companies as Buick, Budweiser, Crest Toothpaste, Dr Pepper, Maxwell House Coffee, IBM, Kodak and too many more to mention. A graduate of both The University Of Miami and The Mannes College Of Music in New York (where he has also taught), he is a Dorothy F. Schmidt Eminent Scholar in Performing Arts as well as Professor of Music at Florida Atlantic University in Boca Raton, and has written a book entitled Writing Music For Television and Radio Commercials (A Manual for Composers and Students), which is also available through Amazon.
So, all things considered, a nice little volume covering the musical style favoured in the late 1970s/early 1980s and also featuring the vocals of Dollette McDonald, Jolyon Skinner, Alvin Fields, Bill Baker, Ralph Agresta and Tom Cary. Well worth a listen if you're least bit nostalgic about those times.
THREE OBSCURE DISCO CLASICS 
2003-05-19 - This album from the heyday of disco includes at least three underground club classics: Le's All Chant by the Michael Zager Band, a weird chant that was a disco Number One in 1978 and also made it big on the pop charts, Whitney's mom Cissy Houston's magnificent Think It Over, a real club stormer, and Andrea True's eurodisco hit What's Your Name What's Your Number, a song that really reflected the nature of those decadent disco days. Let's All Chant has been revived by many different artists down the years but none of these cover versions has the weird otherworldly sound of the original. Get this album for these dance classics, they're far better than most of today's Techno and House music.
poor. 
1999-06-11 - This album is not worth your money or your time. The only decent song is the first track, all the other are just imitations of it. I'll admit that I'm pretty picky about my disco music, this one doesn't measure up.
