#FBF Early 1980’s Panasonic Ad Maurice: …At the time - before Pepsi and Michael Jackson - Earth, Wind & Fire had the largest corporate sponsorship any band had received. I was all for this new way of subsidizing tours, as long as the product wasn’t something like alcohol, or overtly sexual. I signed on to a $500,000 television campaign, in which EW&F would endorse Panasonic products, and Panasonic in turn would use various vehicles to promote our latest release, Faces. Still I was cautious about

From Earth, Wind & Fire’s show in Rio De Janeiro, Brazil (1980), here’s the group performing “Can’t Let Go” from their 1979 release I Am. “Can’t Let Go” Written by Maurice, Allee Willis, Bill Meyers Maurice: We were always popular in South America, but for some reason or another we’d never gone beyond Mexico City. The people of Brazil loved us, and we loved them. I believe they embraced Earth, Wind & Fire on some primal musical level, because there’s so much of a Latin feel in all of our music.