"The Cisco Kid" (War)

War's roots stretch back to Long Beach, CA, in the early 1960s, when the band was known as The Creators.  Even back then, the band's sound was a soulful stew of its multicultural members' musical influences, including everything from rock and jazz to funk and Latin music.  
It was while The Creators were backing Deacon Jones--pro football defensive end and occasional R&B singer--at a Los Angeles nightclub in 1969 that they were plucked to back former Animals frontman Eric Burdon for his new project.  From that point on, they would be known as War, keeping the name even after Burdon left the band in 1971 due to health problems.
I actually had a chance to see War in LA back in the early 2000s.  Despite almost getting shivved by a really beefy dude in the crowd (whose girlfriend we'd accidentally bumped while dancing), it was a helluva performance.  Along with some expected songs on the setlist ("Low Rider," "Spill the Wine," "Why Can't We Be Friends"), they played a loooooong, smokin' version of "The Cisco Kid" from the 1972 album The World Is a Ghetto.  No song--not even "Low Rider"--quite encompasses all of the elements of War's music the way "The Cisco Kid" does.  It's funky (B.B. Dickerson's bassline is as stanky as anything Bootsy or Larry Graham ever put down), it's jazzy (the late Charles Miller's sax goes hand-in-hand with Lee Oskar's harmonica), and it's got this SoCal barrio swagger (Harold Brown's steady, galloping rhythm on the rim of his snare drum establishes the laid back groove that sets the perfect backdrop for the tale of the swashbuckling Cisco and his sidekick Pancho.)
It sounds like no other band on the planet.