Shake Your Body (Down to the Ground)

“Shake Your Body (Down to the Ground)” is a song recorded by The Jacksons for their 1978 album Destiny, and released as a single the same year. It peaked at No. 7 in the Billboard Hot 100 in May 1979. The most successful of the Jacksons’ recordings for Epic, “Shake Your Body” (originally demoed as “Shake a Body”) was produced by the Jackson brothers, written by Randy and Michael, and featured Michael on lead vocals. The chorus “let’s dance/let’s shout (shout)/shake your body down to the ground” was inspired by an ad-lib from Marvin Gaye’s “Got to Give It Up”: “Let’s dance/let’s shout (shout)/gettin’ funky’s what it’s all about” and the rhythmic pattern from Teddy Pendergrass’s “Get Up, Get Down, Get Funky, Get Loose” (from his album Life Is a Song Worth Singing was released a couple of months previously).