The Hues Corporation's 1974 chart-topper "Rock The Boat" is widely credited with pushing disco into the mainstream, even though the group and its collaborators had no idea at the time that they were shaping a new musical movement. The trio, formed in Las Vegas in 1969, had originally intended the track as an album cut rather than a single, but its unexpected popularity in New York's emerging dance clubs forced a rethink that changed the trajectory of pop music for the rest of the decade.

Written by manager Wally Holmes for the group's 1973 debut album Freedom For The Stallion, the song featured a Caribbean-inspired drum pattern and an unconventional structure that opened with the chorus. It was not chosen as the lead single until DJs began looping two copies of the record in clubs to extend it, prompting producer John Florez to create a new mix for radio, which then went to No. 1. Lead singer Fleming Williams delivered the song's nautical love-song lyrics, while the group's only other charting single, "Rockin' Soul", reached just No. 18 and has since been largely overlooked.