Here’s a tasty slice of funk from the Duke of Earl himself, Gene Chandler. Masterfully dapper, ever-so-smooth, Chandler gets funky on this Checker side from 1969. An early version of the Curtis Mayfield-penned track titled “Hard Times”, the record manifests a ‘creature feature’ vibe that’s fits this time of year like a rubber mask.
An alumnus of Englewood High School, Chandler is one of the founding fathers of Chicago Soul, having begun recording around 1960. Click here for my interview with him. You can’t see it, but that day he wore an O.G. diamond encrusted pinky ring that read “Gene”. Smooth.
darkjive.com 
December 28th, 2009 at 3:11 pm
amazing work. never knew about this cut. good interview, too. i like how you spliced in music.
December 13th, 2010 at 7:20 pm
What a great song. My friend didn’t believe that the John Legend and Roots track called “Hard Times” was a curtis song; but I had no idea it had an even earlier version. And the interview is a nice touch
December 14th, 2010 at 4:27 pm
yes, roguegroove, “In My Body’s House” is the precursor to “Hard Times”. Curtis Mayfield’s version is on 1974’s album “No Place Like America Today”; but the version John Legend remade (almost exactly) is the circa 1969 cut by Chicago-based bluesy funk rockers Baby Huey and the Babysitters. Baby Huey tragically died in 1970, the same year as Jimi Hendrix and Janis Joplin.