Pain is the 3rd album by The Ohio Players, and their debut for the Westbound label. After two albums for Capitol Records that didn't do so well, the group had split up. Some of the members decided to take a chance once more and it lead them to Armen Boladian, whose Westbound label in Detroit was the then-home of George Clinton and his band Funkadelic. The group recorded "Pain" and was released as a single. Positive feedback lead to Boladian signing them for a full contract, making the band record enough material for their Westbound debut. The group still has some of the vocal and musical qualities found on their Capitol material, but their first work in the 1970's showed them incorporating a bit of jazz and a harder yet polished soulful sound. A number of things were established with this album. The romantic and sexy aspects of their music started with Pain, with songs devoted to their love of women. It would become one of their trademarks throughout their career. The group would also become known for their suggestive photos on the album covers. Fans of the group in the mid-1970's may have been taken aback by ladies in various states of undress, but for those who knew of them beforehand, the music was defined by the S&M, bondage & discipline imagery on their sleeves, which can be viewed as a mixture of the sexual and perhaps cultural metaphor. The group would also present a character in the form of a grandmother who was simply known as Granny, voiced by Walter "Junie" Morrison. Granny and her stories would remain with the group until Junie left the group in 1974, the year the Ohio Players signed with Mercury.
