An obscure and wildly idiosyncratic funk act from Washington, D.C., Wicked Witch was the studio alter ego of Richard Simms, who earned a small but devoted following among collectors of rare R&B sides for a handful of self-released singles that mixed funk, progressive rock, jazz fusion, and experimental music into a formula that was as much Sun Ra as P-Funk. Richard Simms was a graduate of D.C.'s Duke Ellington School of the Arts who in the '70s formed a band called Paradiagm that was steeped in both funk and jazz fusion. Paradiagm focused on original material and worked outside the go-go scene that dominated the D.C. scene at the time, so the group didn't enjoy much local success, despite some interest from Return to Forever's management. During downtime from Paradiagm, Simms launched Wicked Witch as a studio-only solo side project, with Simms handling nearly all the instruments himself and taking his merger of funk and fusion into a dramatic new direction. In 1983, Wicked Witch made its public debut with a 7" single, "Erratic Behavior" b/w "X Rated," which Simms released on his own Infinity Records label. A second 7" followed in 1985, "Fancy Dancer" b/w "Y Wood U Call It Rock," and Simms also issued a 12" Wicked Witch single that featured two versions of "Electric War," recorded in 1984, along with "Vera's Back," a 12-minute marathon from 1978 which featured Simms backed by Paradiagm. By the late '80s, Simms was occupied with work and raising a family and dropped out of music, but the Wicked Witch recordings continued to circulate, gaining an underground reputation, and in 2009, with Simms' cooperation, the Japanese EM Records label (known for quality reissues of obscure rock, jazz, and funk titles) released Chaos: 1978-1986, a compilation which brought together the bulk of Wicked Witch's catalog along with some unreleased alternate mixes. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi