Comments on: The Funk, in the Golden Age

The Funk, in the Golden Age

flapjax at midnite — Thu, 26 Apr 2007 19:29:54 -0800

Tha interweb have the 70's funk you need: Stevie Wonder. Sly & the Family Stone. James Brown. Ohio Players. Bootsy Collins. Edwin Starr. And the documentary Make It Funky, parts 2, 3, 4, 5 and 6.

By: flapjax at midnite

flapjax at midnite — Thu, 26 Apr 2007 19:30:49 -0800

And just for the helluvit, you might wanna watch Dick Cavett interview a very obviously substance-altered Sly Stone. And now, let the "WHAT? No [insert favorite 70's funk link here] ?"s begin!

By: Burhanistan

Burhanistan — Thu, 26 Apr 2007 19:34:23 -0800

Man, I'm getting stoned just looking at Stone in that interview.

By: davidmsc

davidmsc — Thu, 26 Apr 2007 19:43:34 -0800

Sorry for the snark, but didn't you mean to say: "Tha YouTube have the 70s funk you need"?

By: unSane

unSane — Thu, 26 Apr 2007 19:47:12 -0800

To be REALLY funky you gotta spell it with an H someplace. Fuhnky. Funkhy. Fhunkhy. But thanks! I guess tomorrow's work day is a bust... also -- WHAT, NO FATBACK BAND??

By: bodega

bodega — Thu, 26 Apr 2007 19:49:02 -0800

Thank you for the mouse-over text. (And the videos.)

By: unSane

unSane — Thu, 26 Apr 2007 19:54:37 -0800

oh, yeah, I missed the mouseover text. That's awesome. I hope everyone does that from now on. Including me.

By: Burhanistan

Burhanistan — Thu, 26 Apr 2007 19:59:54 -0800

Halleluwah (on a funky tangent).

By: Burhanistan

Burhanistan — Thu, 26 Apr 2007 20:06:57 -0800

I Want More

By: Burhanistan

Burhanistan — Thu, 26 Apr 2007 20:11:52 -0800

Also, why does it have to be a black tag? While a strong case can be made for funk being an afroamerican creation, Funk transcends all distinctions.

By: lekvar

lekvar — Thu, 26 Apr 2007 20:13:47 -0800

Good lord. Bootsie's got to be about the same age as my dad, but The. FUNK. don't. STOP!

By: unSane

unSane — Thu, 26 Apr 2007 20:14:07 -0800

You've opened a Can of worms there, Burhanistan.

By: googly

googly — Thu, 26 Apr 2007 20:17:19 -0800

[This is badass]

By: nickyskye

nickyskye — Thu, 26 Apr 2007 20:18:23 -0800

Git downnnn! Shake that bootie. Nice post, packed with great stuff! Yes! Having some okra tonight for dinner, goes perfectly with funk. mmmm. God I love funk, that music makes me get up and dannnce! Wooo! And What, no Electric Flag? The Mike Bloomfield riff gives me the thrills. woo hoo. So it's funkadelic, funk is generous, it accomodates different stylistic variations under its umbrella. And *swoon* Otis Redding, singing a funky rendition of My Girl, Try a Little Tenderness, Ready Steady Go.

By: unSane

unSane — Thu, 26 Apr 2007 20:35:23 -0800

Afro Overload!

By: marxchivist

marxchivist — Thu, 26 Apr 2007 20:37:59 -0800

That Otis Redding clip nickyskye linked to is pretty amazing. If you haven't watched it yet please do now.

By: unSane

unSane — Thu, 26 Apr 2007 20:39:37 -0800

nickykye, that last Otis Redding track is 'I Can't Turn You Loose'. The show is Ready Steady Go. And Otis is soul rather than funk but who can complain. And, good lord, but he had the HOTTEST dancers I've ever seen.

By: nickyskye

nickyskye — Thu, 26 Apr 2007 21:01:28 -0800

unSane, You're right, thanks for the correction about the song name. Anyone can complain. :) Yes, Otis is supposed to be soul but he has so many funk elements, the strong electric bass, big brass section, the strong beat. James Brown is also considered a soul musician but he's way more funk to me. Otis has both going on, funk and soul, don't you think?

By: amyms

amyms — Thu, 26 Apr 2007 21:12:21 -0800

To be REALLY funky you gotta spell it with an H someplace. To be REALLY, REALLY funky you have to pronounce it "funk-AY"... These are great, flapjax, thanks!

By: billyfleetwood

billyfleetwood — Thu, 26 Apr 2007 21:12:24 -0800

Oh man, that Stevie Wonder clip is beautiful. If you like The Funk, You owe it to yourself to check out Wattstax.

By: unSane

unSane — Thu, 26 Apr 2007 21:13:59 -0800

I agree soul vs. funk is in the eye of the beholder. Musically I think of funk as having a super-tight meter and being much more of a groove-based (as opposed to song-based) form. So you have an ostinato bass line and a really consistent, hypnotic groove (very tight, very swung) that goes into middle 8/bridge someplace in the song, and then right back to the groove. Also soul seems to be much more about those off beat guitar chops and the stomp drumbeat. But it's a sliding scale to be sure.

By: unSane

unSane — Thu, 26 Apr 2007 21:20:34 -0800

On the black/white thing, it is fascinating how many of the Golden Age funk musicians were white. Donald 'Duck' Dunn is the most obvious example but the trumpet player in the Stevie Wonder clip is white and so were many others. Much less so in the case of soul, much more so in the case of disco.

By: unSane

unSane — Thu, 26 Apr 2007 21:23:09 -0800

... and now for something completely white.

By: flapjax at midnite

flapjax at midnite — Thu, 26 Apr 2007 21:23:44 -0800

You owe it to yourself to check out Wattstax. Damn, you took what was gonna be my next FPP! Figured I'd do it in a few days or so... but now that the cat's outta the MeFi bag, check out Rufus Thomas at Wattstax, and Isaac Hayes (introduced by a dashiki-wearing, afro-sporting Jesse Jackson, no less) at Wattstax.

By: flapjax at midnite

flapjax at midnite — Thu, 26 Apr 2007 21:27:44 -0800

And I'd say unSane's delineations on soul and funk are spot-on. And his Jodie Foster link is making my brain trickle out of my ears a little bit. That shit is avant-garde.

By: nickyskye

nickyskye — Thu, 26 Apr 2007 21:30:58 -0800

Hot dammmmn, Edwin Starr singing War (the lyrics), is sizzlin'. Definitely a timely song. Wattstax is so cool. The Make It Funky vid has the added culture flavor of the Japanese narrative, a little soy sauce on the okra. Love that one world thang.

By: flapjax at midnite

flapjax at midnite — Thu, 26 Apr 2007 21:40:15 -0800

a little soy sauce on the okra. Funny you should say that, nickyskye: okra is a very popular vegetable here in Japan: so much so that many here think it's native, and unique to Japan. They're often surprised when I tell them I grew up in Alabama eating okra! "Ah! Honto desu ka?"

By: the painkiller

the painkiller — Thu, 26 Apr 2007 21:40:55 -0800

what, no larry graham? part 1 part 2 (thanks flapjax - great posts all, i do love me some waaaaaaaay back yonder funk. even can!)

By: jdfalk

jdfalk — Thu, 26 Apr 2007 21:53:24 -0800

youtubefilter. (which is kinda okay, because youtube desperately needs filtering.)

By: unSane

unSane — Thu, 26 Apr 2007 21:55:27 -0800

...and Larry Graham did beget Level 42. Mark King was my friend's milkman for a while.

By: flapjax at midnite

flapjax at midnite — Thu, 26 Apr 2007 21:55:54 -0800

because youtube desperately needs filtering At your service, jdfalk!

By: nickyskye

nickyskye — Thu, 26 Apr 2007 22:15:03 -0800

huh, flapjax, you're from Alabama? Now from Alajapan...or Japanabama. Yup, I can see the Japanese liking okra, they like some pretty funky stuff. :) East-West recipes make for some interesting enjoyment. Otis played in Japan. In this YouTube version there is some Eastern subscript, is it Japanese? Otis said Mick Jagger was "in the house", so Otis sang Satisfaction.

By: dirigibleman

dirigibleman — Thu, 26 Apr 2007 22:28:10 -0800

That funked me like I don't funkin' know.

By: First Post

First Post — Fri, 27 Apr 2007 00:21:35 -0800

Also, funk comes down on the one. It might go all over the place in other respects, but it's always gonna come down hard on the one. That's one good way to tell. It's the irrefutable law passed down from the Godfather and George Clinton.

By: pracowity

pracowity — Fri, 27 Apr 2007 00:50:20 -0800

Oh... I was just singing "Fire" in the shower this morning. Throw some water on me.

By: salmacis

salmacis — Fri, 27 Apr 2007 01:12:35 -0800

But do you know how the funk was found and lost?

By: PeterMcDermott

PeterMcDermott — Fri, 27 Apr 2007 01:22:22 -0800

Where all the women at?

By: PeterMcDermott

PeterMcDermott — Fri, 27 Apr 2007 01:27:05 -0800

What we gonna do right here is go back...

By: PeterMcDermott

PeterMcDermott — Fri, 27 Apr 2007 01:33:07 -0800

And for those who like their funk blue eyed...

By: andihazelwood

andihazelwood — Fri, 27 Apr 2007 02:01:30 -0800

When I was a kid I remember hearing a mind blowingly trippy funk song by the Commodores called "Captain Quickdraw", from the album Hot on the Tracks. Shame its so hard to get ahold of today.

By: asok

asok — Fri, 27 Apr 2007 03:22:38 -0800

Parliament Funkadelic could be included in a post about funk. Funk: Used to be a bad word. Irre-ducible essential pulse, life force, hyperventilatin' Groove. Not only moves, it can re-move; will sit and sit and never go sour. "If you got Funk, you got style

By: davehat

davehat — Fri, 27 Apr 2007 04:16:25 -0800

Billy Cobham George Duke Band, Live 1976. Wowsers! These links are heaven, thanks. I'm a huge funk and soul fan, mainly thanks to being completely blown away first by "Blue Lines" then by "Endtroducing" all those years ago and trying to work out where all the samples came from... Now, I know we're not supposed to talk about illegal ways of obtaining music here.... ...but lets just suppose that some people here were to visit a website with the words "mini", "nova" and "org" in it. Then, lets imagine they were to search for "hit the beaks" and "breakonomics". Now I'm not saying that anyone who likes the music in this thread should do this (wink, wink), but if they were to do so, they might just find 130 albums worth of funk, soul and electro tracks wrapped up in 12 handy ~~torrents~~ packets. (The "Hit the Breaks" series is better than "Breakonomics").

By: flapjax at midnite

flapjax at midnite — Fri, 27 Apr 2007 05:40:46 -0800

nickyskye writes: Otis played in Japan. In this YouTube version there is some Eastern subscript, is it Japanese? Otis said Mick Jagger was "in the house", so Otis sang Satisfaction. Yes, that is Japanese on the subtitles there, but the shots of the audience at the beginning of the clip indicate that the footage is not from a gig in Japan: totally western audience there, mostly white with a smattering of black folk. My guess would be England. Especially if Jagger was in the audience, it'd probably be an England gig.

By: unSane

unSane — Fri, 27 Apr 2007 05:51:51 -0800

Brick House. Another example of the Commodores laying down a mighty slab of funk. Lionel Richie on sax. Shake it down, shake it down down! Boom shackalacka!

By: unSane

unSane — Fri, 27 Apr 2007 05:56:11 -0800

Wow, Davehat... just wow. Time for a bigger iPod.

By: Dantien

Dantien — Fri, 27 Apr 2007 06:59:51 -0800

Glory be. The Funk's on me. As an avid funk collector for years now, thanks for the links! The documentary was something I hadn't seen and since it's in Nihongo, my wife and I can watch it! wooo.... "You've got....all that is really needed...."

By: nickyskye

nickyskye — Fri, 27 Apr 2007 08:28:20 -0800

hi flapjax, my bad grammar there...I knew that vid wasn't Otis in Japan, could see the Western faces, as you did, just that he'd been there and there was a vid of him with Eastern subtitles. Still soaking in the goodness of your post's links.

By: languagehat

languagehat — Fri, 27 Apr 2007 08:51:58 -0800

Wow! [on the one; insert bass break here]

By: ZenMasterThis

ZenMasterThis — Fri, 27 Apr 2007 12:59:32 -0800

Trivia: Bootsy (supposedly) lives in my town (though I've never seen him).

By: Eothele

Eothele — Fri, 27 Apr 2007 13:23:11 -0800

whatno="meters, ToP";

By: flapjax at midnite

flapjax at midnite — Fri, 27 Apr 2007 17:16:09 -0800

Thanks for the Meters clip, eothele. I'm a huge Meters fan. I actually knew about that one, but didn't include it due to a certain purist idea of "funk" that I had in mind for the FPP, which is also why I didn't include the Wattstax stuff at first, either. The Stax artists featured at that festival tended to fall into a little more of a "Southern roots/R&B" vibe than the straightup funk of, say, Ohio Players. But of course, as mentioned upthread, it's a sliding scale, for sure. Now, the New Orleans wing of Southern funk/soul/R&B is where I think of the Meters as residing, and actually, I'd say they kinda fall into a category of one (albeit with cousins like Booker T and the MGs). They aren't "the funk" like James Brown is "the funk". Needless to say, the Meters were one of the funkiest units to ever cook up a groove. The ultimate New Orleans funkiness. I guess that's at the heart of my sense of where to draw the line: the difference between "funk", and "funky". When referring to the Meters, I guess I'd say "New Orleans funk". When referring to the Ohio Players, it'd just be "funk". Anyway, I'm really glad that you and other folks added so many new links to the thread: the focus widened, and that's a good thing: all the kids bring their own toys to play with and to show their little friends! I've said it before and I'll say it again, it's one of the best things about MeFi.

By: mesmerx

mesmerx — Sun, 29 Apr 2007 04:43:12 -0800

Interesting article.