AWB is the second studio album

Studio album

A studio album is an album made up of tracks recorded in the controlled environment of a recording studio. A studio album contains newly written and recorded or previously unreleased or remixed material, distinguishing itself from a compilation or reissue album of previously recorded material, or...

 by the Scottish

Scottish people

The Scottish people , or Scots, are a nation and ethnic group native to Scotland. Historically they emerged from an amalgamation of the Picts and Gaels, incorporating neighbouring Britons to the south as well as invading Germanic peoples such as the Anglo-Saxons and the Norse.In modern use,...

 funk

Funk

Funk is a music genre that originated in the mid-late 1960s when African American musicians blended soul music, jazz and R&B into a rhythmic, danceable new form of music. Funk de-emphasizes melody and harmony and brings a strong rhythmic groove of electric bass and drums to the foreground...

 and soul

Soul music

Soul music is a music genre originating in the United States combining elements of gospel music and rhythm and blues. According to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, soul is "music that arose out of the black experience in America through the transmutation of gospel and rhythm & blues into a form of...

 band Average White Band, released in August 1974 (see 1974 in music

1974 in music

-January–April:*January 3 – Bob Dylan and The Band kick off their 40-date concert tour at Chicago Stadium. It's Dylan's first time on the road since 1966.*January 17...

). An enormous best-seller, AWB was the Average White Band's breakthrough record, stunning many listeners with its soul and funk coming from a Scottish

Scotland

Scotland is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Occupying the northern third of the island of Great Britain, it shares a border with England to the south and is bounded by the North Sea to the east, the Atlantic Ocean to the north and west, and the North Channel and Irish Sea to the...

 band.

AWB topped Billboard's Pop Albums and Black Albums charts. Its million-selling single "Pick Up the Pieces" knocked Linda Ronstadt's classic "You're No Good" out of #1 on Billboard's Hot 100.

A 2004 expanded re-issue from Sony/Columbia in the UK

United Kingdom

The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...

 includes a bonus CD with several demo session recordings made before the group joined Atlantic Records – taken from the so-called 'clover sessions'

Track listing

Side one

1. "You Got It" (Roger Ball
   Roger Ball (musician)
   Roger Ball is a Scottish saxophonist, keyboardist, songwriter and arranger.-Biography:Ball attended the Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art in Dundee from 1962, studying architecture. While there he met Malcolm “Molly” Duncan and Alan Gorrie...
   
   , Alan Gorrie, Hamish Stuart) – 3:36
2. "Got the Love" (Roger Ball, Robbie McIntosh, Hamish Stuart) – 3:52
3. "Pick Up the Pieces" (Average White Band, Roger Ball, Hamish Stuart) – 3:59
4. "Person to Person" (Average White Band, Alan Gorrie, Hamish Stuart) – 3:39
5. "Work to Do" (O'Kelly Isley, Ronald Isley
   Ronald Isley
   Ronald Isley is an American singer and is known as the lead singer and founding member of the family music group The Isley Brothers.-Career:...
   
   , Rudolph Isley
   Rudolph Isley
   Rudolph Bernard Isley , better known as Rudy Isley, is an American singer-songwriter and is one of the founding members of the legendary family group, The Isley Brothers.-Biography:...
   
   ) – 4:25

Side two

1. "Nothing You Can Do" (Alan Gorrie, Roger Ball, Hamish Stuart) – 4:08
2. "Just Wanna Love You Tonight" (Roger Ball, Alan Gorrie) – 3:58
3. "Keepin' It to Myself" (Alan Gorrie) – 4:01
4. "I Just Can't Give You Up" (Hamish Stuart) – 3:30
5. "There's Always Someone Waiting" (Alan Gorrie) – 5:35

Bonus track on 1995 Rhino re-issue (Rhino 71588):

11. "Pick Up the Pieces" – 21:40 (from The Atlantic Family Live at Montreux

The Atlantic Family Live at Montreux

The Atlantic Family Live at Montreux is a live recording made at the 1977 Montreux Jazz Festival. It featured the Don Ellis Orchestra together with the Average White Band and guest musicians...

)

Bonus tracks on 2005 Columbia-Europe re-issue (Columbia 520204)

11. "How Sweet Can You Get (Mark 1)"

12. "McEwan's Export"

Expanded 2CD re-issue (2004)

Disc one
Original release

Disc two

1. "Person to Person"
2. "There's Always Someone Waiting"
3. "McEwan's Export"
4. "Got the Love"
5. "Work to Do"
6. "Just Want to Love You Tonight"
7. "Pick Up the Pieces"
8. "I Just Can't Give You Up"
9. "How Sweet Can You Get Mark1"

The Band

• Alan Gorrie
  Alan Gorrie
  Alan Gorrie is a Scottish bassist, guitarist, keyboardist and singer. He is a founding member of the Average White Band and remains one of two original members in the group's current line-up....
  
   – lead and background vocals, bass
  Bass (instrument)
  Bass describes musical instruments that produce tones in the low-pitched range. They belong to different families of instruments and can cover a wide range of musical roles...
  
  , guitar
  Guitar
  The guitar is a plucked string instrument, usually played with fingers or a pick. The guitar consists of a body with a rigid neck to which the strings, generally six in number, are attached. Guitars are traditionally constructed of various woods and strung with animal gut or, more recently, with...
  
   (on "You Got It")
• Hamish Stuart
  Hamish Stuart
  Hamish Stuart is a guitarist, bassist, singer, composer and record producer.- Biography :Stuart had recorded a couple of singles with his first band, the Dream Police, before he was invited to join the recently formed Average White Band in June 1972.A member of AWB from 1972 to 1982, he went on to...
  
   – lead and background vocals, lead guitar, bass (on "You Got It")
• Roger Ball
  Roger Ball (musician)
  Roger Ball is a Scottish saxophonist, keyboardist, songwriter and arranger.-Biography:Ball attended the Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art in Dundee from 1962, studying architecture. While there he met Malcolm “Molly” Duncan and Alan Gorrie...
  
   – keyboards, alto
  Alto saxophone
  The alto saxophone is a member of the saxophone family of woodwind instruments invented by Belgian instrument designer Adolphe Sax in 1841. It is smaller than the tenor but larger than the soprano, and is the type most used in classical compositions...
  
   & baritone saxophone
  Baritone saxophone
  The baritone saxophone, often called "bari sax" , is one of the largest and lowest pitched members of the saxophone family. It was invented by Adolphe Sax. The baritone is distinguished from smaller sizes of saxophone by the extra loop near its mouthpiece...
  
  s, arranger (horns)
• Malcolm Duncan – tenor saxophone
  Tenor saxophone
  The tenor saxophone is a medium-sized member of the saxophone family, a group of instruments invented by Adolphe Sax in the 1840s. The tenor, with the alto, are the two most common types of saxophones. The tenor is pitched in the key of B, and written as a transposing instrument in the treble...
  
  
• Onnie McIntyre – guitar, background vocals
• Robbie McIntosh
  Robbie McIntosh (drummer)
  Robbie McIntosh was a Scottish drummer from Dundee, who was a founder-member of the Average White Band. His father was American born actor, Bonar Colleano, who had a successful career in films,especially in the U.K...
  
   – drums, percussion

Additional musicians

• Ralph MacDonald
  Ralph MacDonald
  Ralph MacDonald is an American percussionist and song-writer. He joined Harry Belafonte's band at age 17. He wrote the Roberta Flack and Donny Hathaway song "Where is the Love" with songwriting partner William Salter. Probably his best-known composition is the Grover Washington, Jr...
  
   – conga
  Conga
  The conga, or more properly the tumbadora, is a tall, narrow, single-headed Cuban drum with African antecedents. It is thought to be derived from the Makuta drums or similar drums associated with Afro-Cubans of Central African descent. A person who plays conga is called a conguero...
  
  s, percussion
• Michael Brecker
  Michael Brecker
  Michael Leonard Brecker was an American jazz saxophonist and composer. Acknowledged as "a quiet, gentle musician widely regarded as the most influential tenor saxophonist since John Coltrane," he has been awarded 15 Grammy Awards as both performer and composer and was inducted into Down Beat Jazz...
  
   – tenor sax
• Randy Brecker
  Randy Brecker
  Randal "Randy" Brecker is an American trumpeter and flugelhornist. He is a highly sought after performer in the genres of jazz, rock, and R&B, and has performed or recorded with Stanley Turrentine, Billy Cobham, Bruce Springsteen, Lou Reed, Sandip Burman, Charles Mingus, Blood, Sweat & Tears,...
  
   – trumpet
  Trumpet
  The trumpet is the musical instrument with the highest register in the brass family. Trumpets are among the oldest musical instruments, dating back to at least 1500 BCE. They are played by blowing air through closed lips, producing a "buzzing" sound which starts a standing wave vibration in the air...
  
  
• Marvin Stamm
  Marvin Stamm
  Marvin Stamm is an American bebop trumpeter.Stamm began on trumpet at age 12. He first attended college at, then known as, Memphis State University and then attended college at North Texas State University where he was a member of the world renowned One O'Clock Lab Band...
  
   – trumpet
• Mel Davis – trumpet
• Glenn Ferris
  Glenn Ferris
  Glenn Ferris is a jazz trombonist who has also worked in other fields. Outside of jazz he has played for Frank Zappa, Stevie Wonder, James Taylor, Duran Duran, and others....
  
   – trombone
  Trombone
  The trombone is a musical instrument in the brass family. Like all brass instruments, sound is produced when the player’s vibrating lips cause the air column inside the instrument to vibrate...
  
  
• Ken Bichel
  Ken Bichel
  Ken Bichel is an American actor, composer, pianist, and synthesizer musician. Bichel attended the Juilliard School where he graduated with a Bachelors degree in piano performance in the late 1960s...
  
   – mellotron
  Mellotron
  The Mellotron is an electro-mechanical, polyphonic tape replay keyboard originally developed and built in Birmingham, England in the early 1960s. It superseded the Chamberlin Music Master, which was the world's first sample-playback keyboard intended for music...
  
   (on "Just Wanna Love You Tonight")

Other musicians

(Live at Montreux bonus track)

• Sonny Fortune
  Sonny Fortune
  Sonny Fortune is an American jazz alto saxophonist and flautist. He also plays soprano saxophone, tenor saxophone, baritone saxophone and clarinet.-Biography:...
  
   - alto saxophone
• Jaroslav Jakubovic - baritone saxophone
• David "Fathead" Newman - alto saxophone
• Dick Morrissey
  Dick Morrissey
  Richard Edwin "Dick" Morrissey was a British jazz musician and composer. He played the tenor sax, soprano sax and flute.- Background :...
  
   - tenor saxophone
• Herbie Mann
  Herbie Mann
  Herbert Jay Solomon , better known as Herbie Mann, was a Jewish American jazz flutist and important early practitioner of world music...
  
   - flute
  Flute
  The flute is a musical instrument of the woodwind family. Unlike woodwind instruments with reeds, a flute is an aerophone or reedless wind instrument that produces its sound from the flow of air across an opening...
  
  
• Don Ellis
  Don Ellis
  Don Ellis was an American jazz trumpeter, drummer, composer and bandleader. He is best known for his extensive musical experimentation, particularly in the area of unusual time signatures...
  
   - trumpet
• Lew Soloff
  Lew Soloff
  Lew Soloff is a jazz trumpeter, composer and actor. He studied trumpet at the Eastman School of Music and the Juilliard School. He is likely best known for his work with Blood, Sweat & Tears from 1968 to 1973...
  
   - trumpet
• Gil Rathel - trumpet
• Barry Rogers
  Barry Rogers
  Barry Rogers was a salsa musician and jazz fusion trombonist.Born Barron W. Rogers in The Bronx, he descended from Polish Jews who came to New York City via London and was raised in Spanish Harlem...
  
   - trombone
• Alan Kaplan - trombone
• Jim Mullen
  Jim Mullen
  Jim Mullen is a Glasgow-born jazz guitarist with a distinctive style, like Wes Montgomery before him, picking with the thumb rather than a plectrum.-Biography:...
  
   - guitar
• Richard Tee
  Richard Tee
  Richard Tee was a pianist, studio musician, singer and arranger.Tee graduated from the High School of Music and Art and attended the Manhattan School of Music. Though better known as a studio and session musician, Tee led a jazz ensemble, the Richard Tee Committee, and was a founding member of the...
  
   - electric piano
• Raphael Cruz - percussion
• Sammy Figueroa
  Sammy Figueroa
  Sammy Figueroa is an American percussionist born in The Bronx, New York. At 18 he joined the band of bassist Bobby Valentín and also co-led the Brazilian/Latin fusion group Raices....
  
   - percussion

Other credits

• Gene Paul - engineer (NYC)
• Lewis Hahn - engineer (NYC)
• Karl Richardson - engineer (Miami)
• Steve Klein - engineer (Miami)
• Ron Albert - engineer (Miami)
• Howard Albert - engineer (Miami)
• Arif Mardin
  Arif Mardin
  Arif Mardin was a Turkish-American music producer, who worked with hundreds of artists across many different styles of music, including jazz, rock, soul, disco, and country...
  
   - producer

Singles

Year	Single	Chart	Position
1974	"Pick Up The Pieces"	Disco Singles	10
1974	"Work To Do"		10
1975	"Pick Up The Pieces"	Pop Singles	1
1975	"Pick Up The Pieces"	Black Singles	5

See also

• List of number-one albums of 1975 (U.S.)
• List of number-one R&B albums of 1975 (U.S.)