Slave was one one the premiere funk and soul groups to come from the criminally overlooked geography of Ohio during the hot-funk era of the 70's and early 80's. Formed in Dayton, Ohio in 1975, Slave originally consisted of bass guitarist Mark Adams, trumpeter Steve Washington, drummer Tim Dozier, guitarist Mark Hicks, sax players Orion Wilhoite and Tom Lockett, trombonist Floyd Miller, keyboardist Carter Bradley and vocalist/guitarist Danny Webster.
The group signed with Cotillion Records for their self-titled debut album and immediately scored with the blazing funk track, "Slide", which hit #1 on the Soul charts and earned Slave a grammy nomination for best new artist. However, the group's next two albums failed to land big hits, and Slave risked the "one hit wonder" label. In 1979, singers Steve Arrington, Starleana Young and Curt Jones joined the group, and Slave's fourth album , Just A Touch Of Love, stormed onto the top ten on the power of the title cut. they continued their re-emergence in 1981 with the hit "Watching You" and the accompanying album, Stone Jam.
Arrington left the group for a moderately successful solo career in 1982, and the next few years saw a shakeup in Slave's lineup. Washington, Lockett and Young left to form the group Aurra, and the remaining group members continued to record with lesser success through the rest of the 80's, landing minor minor hits with "Shake It Up" and "Ooooh". Slave left Cotillion for Ichaban Records in 1986 and recorded five albums on that label through the mid-90's before going silent.
A revamped version of Slave began touring again in multi-artist funk group shows after the turn of the century. In 2011, Slave lost two of it's founding members in Mark Adams and Mark Hicks.
