DURING THE SOULFUL '70S, R&B acts ruled the airwaves, so it's not surprising that honkies (Hall & Oates in particular) wanted to jump on the bandwagon. However, of all that decade's blue-eyed soul practitioners, few captured the sound better than Boz Scaggs. Born and raised with the blues, Boz's infatuation with the genre led him to tour Europe with his own R&B band, before returning to the States and joining a group featuring his old high school buddy, Steve "Fly Like an Eagle" Miller. After two years, Boz left Miller's gang to embark on a solo career, and recorded five rootsy R&B albums before finding commercial success with Silk Degrees--an album so soulfully smooth, it can make Isaac Hayes sound like Captain and Tennille.

Perhaps even more surprising than a white guy producing some of the smoothest R&B of 1976 was his backup band--a set of seasoned studio musicians who eventually became (brace yourself) Toto. Though this band eventually produced such stomach-churning hits as "Hold the Line," "Rosanna," and "Africa" while with Boz, Toto turned out possibly the funkiest opening four bars EVER with "Lowdown." Starting with the "sst-sst" of a high-hat, followed by that slippy infectious bass line, "Lowdown" puts the Hammond organ on reverb, cranks up the Superfly flute, and when Boz starts testifying about "facing the sad old truth/the dirty lowdown"? Well, white or black, street-smart soul don't get dirtier than that.

This combination of classic blues enunciation with horn-driven R&B and boogie rock powers most of Boz's work, which is pretty formidable for a so-called "one-hit wonder." Though his public spotlight faded substantially after Silk Degrees, Boz has been performing regularly, and with a set featuring such R&B staples as "Lido Shuffle" and "Breakdown Dead Ahead" coupled with his more famous ballads, "We're All Alone" and "Look What You've Done to Me" (from the Urban Cowboy soundtrack), there'll be more than enough recognizable tunes to carry the casual Boz fan through the upcoming show at the Pier.

(And don't worry--Toto probably won't be there.)