Word Up, Funk Fans! All of Cameo's Biggest Hits Now on `Anthology,' the Group's First-Ever Two-CD `Best Of' Collection.

Entertainment Editors & Music/Retail Writers

LOS ANGELES--(ENTERTAINMENT WIRE)--May 8, 2002

"All you sucker DJs who think you're fly/There's got to be reason & we know the reason why/You try to put on airs & act real cool/But you've

got to realize that you're acting like fools." --Cameo, "Word Up"

Cameo tore the roof off pop funk -- and the pop hip-hop scene that followed has paid its tributes, from Will Smith's "Big Willie Style" to Mariah Carey remaking "Candy" for her hit "Loverboy." Now Cameo's first-ever two-CD career-spanning retrospective resurrects the best of the "bad boys of black rock and roll."

"Cameo: Anthology" (Mercury/UME), released June 18, 2002, features 30 selections, each digitally remastered. Encompassing tracks from each of the group's first 14 albums, from Cameo's debut in 1977 through its last Mercury album in 1988, "Anthology" compiles an astonishing 23 R&B Top 40s, including 14 Top 10s, of which three were #1 smashes. Also included in the package is a 16-page booklet highlighted by photographs and an essay.

There was far more to Cameo than flat-top haircuts and Jean-Paul Gaultier-designed clothes (with leader Larry Blackmon's red leather codpiece as the focus). Blending JB horns, rock guitar, synthesizers and R&B harmonies, Cameo brought hardcore funk and ferocity to a party groove. Signed to Casablanca's Chocolate City imprint, Cameo debuted with 1977's "Cardiac Arrest" (with the Top 40s "Rigor Mortis" and "Funk Funk"), echoing the cosmic slop of Parliament/Funkadelic, for whom they opened on tour.

The follow-up, "We All Know Who We Are," included the Top 40 "It's Serious" and the disco-flavored "Find My Way" (also heard on the "Thank God It's Friday" soundtrack). After a Top 20 with "Insane" (from "Ugly Ego"), Cameo broke into the Top 10 with both "I Just Want To Be" (here in its 12" extended mix, heard worldwide again recently in a sample by Boyz II Men) and the classic ballad, "Sparkle," from "Secret Omen." Subsequent Top 10s on "Anthology" include "Shake Your Pants" ("Cameosis"), "Keep It Hot" ("Feel Me"), "Freaky Dancin'" ("Knights Of The Sound Table") and "Flirt" ("Alligator Woman"), prior to Cameo moving to Atlanta and pioneering the New Funk Mecca. "Style," the first release on Blackmon's Atlanta Artist label, yielded a Top 20 with its title track before Cameo scored its first #1 with the title track from 1984's "She's Strange."

With the core of Blackmon (who wrote/co-wrote nearly every track and produced all of them), singer Tomi Jenkins and trumpeter/singer Nathan Leftenant, Cameo scorched the charts. The Top 5's "Attack Me With Your Love" and "Single Life" ("Single Life") led to the biggest hit of Cameo's career, the #1 R&B/Top 10 pop "Word Up." The pioneering, platinum 1987 "Word Up!" also spun off the #1 "Candy" and #3 "Back And Forth." "Machismo's" "Skin I'm In" and "Real Men Wear Black's" "I Want It Now" also went Top 5.

Though Cameo continued recording and touring (Blackmon also became a noted producer beyond the group, including Bobby Brown's solo debut), it was during the late `70s and through the`80s, heard on "Anthology," that Cameo was the reigning king of pop funk.