from the LP Juicy Fruit, Epic Records, 1983
When Dâm Funk recently stated in an interview that he felt Mtume’s Juicy Fruit was one of the most prolific and important albums of the last thirty years, he wasn’t kidding; granted, this style of sophisticated boogie is exactly the type of sound Funk aspires to in his own career, so I won’t go as far as him in describing the overall significance of this album, but Mtume most definitely brings the funk for us here. Coming off like some robot who composed an ode to the fluidity with which humans can move their bodies, this whole LP is unadulterated proof that being slick & being loose are, indeed, not mutually exclusive, and this vocoder-heavy track flawlessly lays out that dialectic for us; the blazing, Hazel-ian electric guitar solo at the very end (care of Ed ‘Tree’ Moore) comes out of nowhere and kicks my ass every time.
from the LP My Queen, Hotlanta Records, 1978
Look, up in the sky, is it a bird? Is it a plane? It’s…well, fuck if I know just what in the hell that’s supposed to be---some kind of winged, scantily clad, female afro-insectoid with giant antennae, Ugg boots & a whip…?! Perhaps they have come to bring us the funk… Maybe they’re related to the Thumpasaurus people, like distant cousins or something; in fact, these sentient beings have such a hardcore appearance that one could make a good case for their inclusion in a Blaxploitation version of Star Wars, call it Space Hustle or some equally ghetto designation. In all seriousness, it doesn’t surprise me in the least that the band responsible for this hot mess, Gaston, is from Atlanta; the humidity literally drips from those warped polysynths, trickling down into the heady stew of funk which is the behemoth rhythm section (more cowbell!). All I know is that, if this track is any indication of what life might be like in the distant galaxy from which those creatures hail, sign me up for an exploratory mission to their planet.
from the LP No Mystery, Polydor Records, 1975
Pretty much every player from the Bitches Brew sessions, or those who jammed with Miles during that era, wound up playing in (and often fronting their own) unruly fusion units well into the ‘70s, and keys maestro Chick Corea was no exception; it must of seemed like the apocalypse to jazz purists, watching all their former hard-bop heroes expand the palette into territory that was previously taboo to any self-respecting jazznik---I would’ve liked to have seen the looks on their faces! Chick put together his band Return to Forever in early ’72 and initially focused on a mellower Latin vibe, one which bears no resemblance to the jazz-rock behemoth you are listening to right now; this was largely a product of guitarist Al DiMeola’s entrance into the band, but everyone here is a star in their own right (Lenny White on drums / percussion & the insanely talented Stanley Clarke on bass), not least of all Chick himself. He lays down some of the spaciest synthesizer runs this side of Saturn, demolishing time signatures and sounding something like the noises I would imagine coming from R2D2’s family reunion, but never straying so far that you fall out of the pocket. A true fusion super-group if there ever was one, superior to Weather Report & perhaps even the Eleventh House in my opinion (I know I’ll take shit for that), thus it’s no surprise that this LP took home the Grammy for best jazz performance that year.
from the LP Mothership Connection, Casablanca Records, 1976
Outer space just got a little funkier. Today I woke up to the news of Gary Shider’s passing, the longtime guitarist for P-Funk and George Clinton’s right-hand man---the thing giving me chills right now is that he actually passed away on Wednesday even though it was just announced a few hours ago, which was the same day I posted a Parliament track on this blog… Now, I don’t have any firmly held beliefs on the afterlife (or even if there is one), and I can honestly say that I wasn’t feeling anything ghostly or paranormal guiding my hand that morning, but in retrospect the coincidence makes me smile. All of us who have spent our lives going to P-Funk shows know Shider well, the cat in the diaper who essentially acted as band leader until Clinton managed to get his ass out on stage (we’ve been to shows where it’s taken him an hour & a half, although he’s been much better lately), but Shider’s place in P-Funk history is so much more, having co-written many of the crew’s most memorable songs & also just the fact that he was there for the whole funky ride. Gary spent his entire life pursuing the groove, giving “…people what they want, when they want, & they want shit all the time…”, and now he has perhaps returned to the far-out galaxy from which he came. R.I.P. Starchild.
from the 12” single, Red Greg Records, 1976
Coming on like a Quaalude that’s been chased with some clean base, the Universal Robot Band woozily redefined many heads’ conception of dance music, utilizing whatever they wished from both the disco and funk camps, and in the same way that “deep house” has sought to intensify and expand beneath the basic foundation of house music, these cats dug into the subterranean depths to find their grooves. One of the earliest official collaborations between legendary producers Patrick Adams & Greg Carmichael, this effort catapulted the duo from stoned basement freaks to bona fide underground champions, divulging a new blueprint for android based interplanetary funkmanship, set apart from P-Funk’s vision in its minimal yet sultry disco charm, replete with goosebump inducing synthlines and synthscapes, an omnipresent appeal to, “…dance, and shake your tambourine, your funky tambourine, tambourine, tambourine…” Mad extra points for the whistles, you know that this recording session was a good time had by all!
from the 7” single, Stones Throw Records, 1999
Atari was a big deal when it came out, affording potheads everywhere the priceless luxuries of a couch & circulating pipe while playing their favorite game, as opposed to standing on your feet in a stuffy arcade while chain-smoking cigarettes---major upgrade! This peculiar track, by the little-known Captain Funkaho, manages to give a shout-out to almost every single one of my favorite old-school, pre-Nintendo games: Pac-Man, Dig Dug, Asteroids, Frogger, Combat, Joust, Space Invaders, Centipede--- for fucks sake, he even reminds us of what happened when you were running around too much in Pitfall (“do the monkey”)!! Leave it to Peanut Butter Wolf & the crew at Stones Throw to find something this unique and, well, funky; no lie, el Capitan brings the funk so hard here that it may leave you bobbing your head & prone to making the “stinky poo poo” face, as if some awful odor had just entered your personal space…but it’s all good, it’s just the funk. He only forgot one major classic that needs mention, because of its eternal dankness: Galaga motherfucker, which I suppose was still being called ‘Galaxian’ when the 2600 came out…the greatest fixed-shooter game ever.
from the LP Zapp, Warner Bros Records, 1980
As the P-Funk crew wandered into quasi-obscurity during the 1980s (due to all sorts of shit like arrests, deaths, temporary loss of minds---all things generally crack-related), no crew did a better job of carrying the torch of spaced-out-wackiness and all-around funkmanship than the four brothers Troutman, known collectively as Zapp. Rather than just aping the P-Funk sound, Zapp brought in elements of electro, new wave and hip-hop to create an altogether new vibe that, though still owing a big debt of gratitude to the originators, is immediately recognizable as Zapp. The family grew up in Hamilton, Ohio, smack dab between the ghetto’s of Dayton and Cincinnati, and that area’s deep tradition of funk clearly infused them all with high doses funkiness (that’s a scientific term). All of the group’s first three albums are fucking essential, but this track alone is equally (if not more) responsible for the style of beats inherent to early ‘90s gangsta rap as P-Funk themselves were.
from the LP Long Stroke, Cotillion Records, 1978
Yes, this is unarguably a shameless imitation of the P-Funk sound, but their fellow Detroit denizens, the ADC Band, do a flawless job in their reproduction of that vibe, managing to create a song worthy of inclusion into the P-Funk cannon. Much like their musical inspiration, these cats weren’t afraid of psychedelic drugs, praising the almighty mushroom openly, “…do you know what I mean, or have your eyes ever seen?...let the fungus be among us, ya’ll give a big hoorah for the fungus; hoorah rah, da da da-de-de-da for the fungus…”
from the LP Ahh…the Name is Bootsy Baby, Warner Bros. Records, 1977
Branching out on his own after tenures in both James Brown’s backing band (he got kicked out for eating LSD in the days before James Brown was hittin’ the crack pipe), & numerous P-Funk-related projects, Bootsy Collins absolutey shines when the grooves are built around his bassline. William ‘Bootsy’ Collins hails from Cincinnati, Ohio, and at the tender age of 18 he found himself and the band he had thrown together being asked to support none other than the godfather of funk (JB); back in those days, 1969-1972, James Brown had a lot of rules for his supporting band and crew, and Bootsy’s wild ways never jived. Where else for a wild-afroed, acid-eating black bassist to go than in P-Funk’s direction?! On this track, and most of Bootsy’s solo material, his backing “Rubber Band” consisted of fellow bandmates from both of his former projects: his brother ‘Catfish’ and pal ‘Kash’ Waddy from the JB’s & a host of interchanging funkateers from the P-Funk mothership. Bernie Worrell is here with his trusty synthesizer to keep everything really surreal and fantastic, and Maceo Parker, Fred Wesley & the Horny Horns bring the party anywhere they blow! Most of all though, Bootsy’s style of bass playing is just magnetic and hypnotizing, right in the front, sometimes carrying the rhythm, sometimes playing like it’s a lead guitar---that’s chonkeyfire ya’ll! When he declares, “This is the world’s funkiest sing-along!” I have a tendency to believe him. Given the tornado which is the state of the world right now, it puts a smart-ass grin on my face when I hear them sing, “these good old days, these days…” This was right when disco music was rising to it’s ascendance, and taking into account Bootsy’s very public hatred of disco music, I have to presume when he says, “somebody, been funkin’ with my funk’, funkin’ ‘round…until they done funked it up…don’t mess with my funk baby…” he is pointing his finger squarely in that direction. Due to his cartoon-like image, it’s easy to forget what a prodigious talent Bootsy Collins is, but this track should leave no doubt in anyone’s mind that he can go toe-to-toe with any bassist on earth---or outer space…
from the LP Funkentelechy vs. The Placebo Syndrome, Casablanca Records, 1977I’m a total sucker for a number of things that George Clinton and the P-Funk crew bring in large supply: crazy synthesizers, check! strange dystopic visions of life in the present and future, check! deeply funky breaks and basslines, check! horns that kick your ass all over the place, check! I think Parliament manages to get away with narrating such potent and topical commentary on our world by wrapping those truths in layers of space-related metaphors & general wackiness. This track was recorded at the pinnacle of P-Funk’s popularity in the mid – late-‘70s, and the entire cast of the mothership are in full effect on this oft-overlooked jewel of smooth-sailing funk. Above all other things which I love about this song, Bernie Worrell’s fantastically spacey synthesizer work here just absolutely sets the whole thing off; truly, no one can touch Bernie when it comes to wild and adventurous synth-scapes! The ladies singing the backing vocals, from P-Funk family band Parlet, work the perfect balance of sweet and strong; their dulcet tones ease the listener along this cloud-like song, and yet, around two and a half minutes into the track when they declare, “...there’s so much syndrome baby...”, you remember this cloud is tethered to the mud and grime below. You might not expect to be intellectually lubricated by a band generally known for all things wild & crazy, but I fucking dare you to ignore a line like, “When your ups lift you down, your placebo is too weak, you’re in the syndrome…”; go ahead, you try juggling references to drug use with powerful statements about socialization and illusory reality---not easy stuff folks!
from the LP Juicy Fruit, Epic Records, 1983
