KC & The Sunshine Band – That’s The Way (I Like It)

They Re-Recorded It Because KC Sounded Like He Was Having Sex

Released on June 10, 1975, KC & The Sunshine Band’s “That’s The Way (I Like It)” became their second number one hit, spending two weeks at the top and selling 2.5 million copies. But here’s what almost nobody knows: Harry Wayne Casey and Richard Finch recorded it once, listened back, and immediately scrapped the entire take. Casey’s utterances sounded too much like guttural groans, like he was imitating Jane Birkin’s breathy moans on that scandalous French hit. They went back in and turned those sounds into simple affirmations instead, toning down the sex just enough to get radio play while keeping disco dancers guessing.

The song hit number one twice in a single month, dropped for a week, then climbed back up. Time magazine called it part of the new scourge of sex rock in December 1975, warning this type of music dominated 15 percent of AM radio. Conservative leaders including Jesse Jackson threatened boycotts, worried lascivious music encouraged teenage pregnancy. None of the protests worked. The track appeared on the self-titled album released in July 1975 on TK Records, which went triple-platinum and spawned another number one with “Get Down Tonight”. The original working title was “What You Want”, but Finch convinced Casey to change it because people wouldn’t understand what he was saying.

Casey and Finch met in 1972 at TK Records in Miami, where Casey worked the phones while moonlighting as a session musician. Finch was a 19-year-old bass player and studio engineer from Hialeah. They started writing together after hours when Casey had keys to the studio. The Miami music scene soaked in Cuban and Bahamian influences, particularly Junkanoo music with its percussive rhythms and horn sections. Casey attended a party at Betty Wright’s house featuring a Junkanoo band and immediately knew that sound belonged in what they were creating. They formed KC & The Sunshine Junkanoo Band initially, pulling in TK studio musicians.

Recording sessions featured Finch producing and playing bass while Casey handled vocals and keyboards. The arrangement was deliberately simple, built entirely around one spiraling hook that repeats endlessly. The song has no introduction, just exploding immediately with horns, rhythm guitars, and Casey’s vocals. Finch later said you could hear everyone smiling while they sang because they were riding high on “Get Down Tonight” success and knew they’d captured magic again.

The Casey-Finch partnership produced five number ones between 1975 and 1980, plus George McCrae’s “Rock Your Baby”, which hit number one in 51 countries. But by 1981, the partnership ended as disco died and TK Records went bankrupt. Casey survived a serious head-on crash in January 1982 that left him partially paralyzed for six months. The disco revival of the early nineties brought him back, and he’s been touring ever since.

What makes “That’s The Way (I Like It)” endure is its refusal to complicate what works. One hook, repeated endlessly, wrapped in Miami’s humid groove and topped with just enough suggestion to make dancers feel something without crossing the line. Casey and Finch figured out what the rest of the world hadn’t quite grasped yet: subtlety was for suckers. They recorded it once with too much sex, pulled back just enough to get on the radio, and accidentally created one of disco’s defining moments.