George
Clinton performs during the 54th annual Songwriters Hall of Fame
induction and awards gala on Thursday, June 12, 2025, at the Marriott
Marquis Hotel in New York.AP original
Legendary activist and longtime Daily Kos contributor Denise Oliver Velez sadly passed away
on July 15. She left us with an astounding collection of stories
dedicated to celebrating Black music. Daily Kos hopes to honor her
memory by continuing to share these timeless pieces.
At a time when some folks still don’t think Black lives matter, and
respond to any assertion that they do with deflections and denialist
“All Lives Matter” reactions, I’m reminded of when James Brown’s “I’m
Black and I’m Proud” became an anthem and the genre of music we now know
as “funk” was born. We, as a people, no longer had to hide Blackness
behind white acceptability; we could express Black sensibilities without
apology. A lot the Black pride and assertiveness you see today is
rooted in that ‘60s and ‘70s era, that wave of funk rhythms and back
beats.
Funk was—and still is—unapologetically and unabashedly Black. Out of
its birth, rooted in times of trouble and strife, came many musical
styles that would borrow from it and follow in the ensuing decades, like
hip-hop and rap. However, none of them can match the sheer pounding
groove and rhythms of the driving bass lines that got us up and “offa
our feet,” dancing and marching. Those bass lines are so potent, it is the most sampled rhythm in today’s hip-hop and rap.
Funk changed Black attitudes and Black styles, shaping many of the
parents of the young folks who have hit the streets in today’s protests.
Get ready for the funk.
This is not gonna be an installment of my Sunday music series that
you can play softly. I double dare you to stay still in your seat. Be
prepared to move. If your neighbors are still sleepin’, better grab your
headset.
Recording both as Parliament and Funkadelic, George Clinton
revolutionized R&B during the ’70s, twisting soul music into funk by
adding influences from several late-’60s acid heroes: Jimi Hendrix,
Frank Zappa, and Sly Stone. The Parliament/Funkadelic machine ruled
black music during the ’70s, capturing over 40 R&B hit singles
(including three number ones) and recording three platinum albums.
Born in Kannapolis, NC, on July 22, 1941, Clinton became interested
in Doo-wop while living in New Jersey during the early ’50s. . Basing
his group on Frankie Lymon & the Teenagers, Clinton formed The
Parliaments in 1955, rehearsing in the back room of a Plainfield
barbershop where he straightened hair. The Parliaments released only two
singles during the next ten years, but frequent trips to Detroit during
the mid-’60s – where Clinton began working as a songwriter and producer
– eventually paid off their investment…
In reviewing Clinton’s illustrious career and success as a producer /
writer/ performer, perhaps his greatest achievement stemmed from his
relentless dedication to funk as a musical form. Funk as a musical style
had been around for what seems like forever, deeply rooted in the music
traditions of New Orleans and the Blues of the Deep South. Following
the lead – and commercial success – of James Brown and Sly Stone,
Clinton took Funk to new heights, blending elements of Jazz, Rock, Pop,
Classical and even Gospel into his productions, eventually developing a
unique and easily identifiable style affectionately called “P-Funk.”
Clinton’s inspiration, dedication and determination resulted in the
elevation of “funk” music to complete recognition and acceptance as a
true genre in and of itself.
Birthday wishes poured in for Clinton on Twitter.
Clinton may be 79, but his music (and unique sartorial style) are still reaching younger generations of funk fans.
For those of you who are not funkaholics (yet), a good starting place
for some funk history is the BBC. The network has produced two
excellent documentaries on funk. The first was 2006’s George Clinton – Tales of Dr. Funkenstein, directed by Don Letts. It features interviews with the Doctor himself, as well as musicians with careers spanning decades.
The BBC delivered another funk documentary, produced in 2017 by James Hale. The Story of Funk: One Nation Under a Groovedigs into
the genre writ large as well as its lasting influence. It includes
interviews with Clinton; Sly & the Family Stone; Earth, Wind &
Fire; Kool & the Gang; War; Cameo; Ray Parker Jr.; and trombonist
Fred Wesley.
I have some quibbles with this documentary, simply because I thought
there was too much focus on Earth, Wind & Fire and not enough on
those groups who were more hardcore funk. Don’t get me wrong, I’m an
avid EWF fan; however, their catalog of hits range from R&B to disco
to pop; meanwhile, other funk groups like The Gap Band barely garner a mention. Though Hale interviews Harold Ray Brown, one of the founders of War, I just would have loved to hear more.
What set P-Funk apart from other bands? In the music industry, George
Clinton was known as much for his innovative business practices as for
his music. Ultimately, Clinton morphed his core band members into
multiple groups on multiple record labels, something no one had ever
done. The band also created an alternate reality in which young P-Funk
fans, especially African American males, could imagine themselves.
George Clinton developed a mythology about “brothers” from another
planet who came to liberate earth from the restrictions of Puritanical
morality. It was a concept that allowed P-Funk’s fans to transcend the
confines of their neighborhood and imagine themselves as citizens of a
much larger universe.
Throughout discussions of funk, including in the aforementioned
documentaries, you will hear people talk about being “on the one,” which
is a beat. You don’t have to be a musician to get a basic understanding
of just what the heck “the one” is, or why it’s the funk foundation.
Here’s Bootsy Collins to demonstrate this key ingredient in the “funk formula.”
Both of the BBC documentaries explore the spark set off by James Brown, whose “Cold Sweat,” co-authored with Pee Wee Ellis in 1967, is most often dubbed the first funk tune.
The West Coast influence of Sly and the Family Stone cannot be ignored; their epic “Dance to the Music” is in the GRAMMY™ Hall of Fame.
Switching back to “P-Funk,” as the combo of George
Clinton’s Parliament-Funkadelic is lovingly called, I spent about nine
years of my life living in Washington, D.C.,
which—pre-gentrification—was dubbed “Chocolate City” (with vanilla
suburbs). It was in Washington that I got “funkified.”
P-Funk fans were everywhere—including Chocolate City.
Check out these “Chocolate City” lyrics for unapologetic Blackness, P-Funk style.
Uh, what’s happenin’, CC? They still call it the White House, but that’s a temporary condition too Can you dig it, CC? To each his reach and if I don’t cop it ain’t mine to have But I’ll be reachin’ for you ’cause I love you, CC Right on There’s a lot of chocolate cities around We got Newark, we got Gary Somebody told me we got LA And we workin’ on Atlanta But you’re the capital Gainin’ on ya
Interestingly enough the theme of this song has been the subject of academic discourse in Black- and POC-majority spaces. In Chocolate Cities: The Black Map of American Life, authors Marcus Anthony Hunter and Zandria F. Robinson explore Afro-futurist visions.
“We didn’t get our forty acres and a mule, but we got you,
C[hocolate] C[ity]!”— George Clinton on the title track of Parliament
Funkadelic’s 1975 Chocolate City album
University of California PressUniversity of California Press
Rather than wait for unfulfilled political promises, Black Americans
were occupying urban and previously White space in massive numbers,
their movement and increasing political power embodied on the track by
multiple yet complementary melodies. Bass and piano take turns keeping
the beat and beginning new melodies, saxophones speak, a synthesizer
marks a new era, and a steady high hat ensures the funk stays in rhythm.
The Parliament, its own kind of funky democratic government, chants
“gainin’ on ya!” as Clinton announces the cities that Black Americans
have turned or will soon turn into “CC’s”: Newark, Gary, Los Angeles,
Atlanta, and New York. Parliament’s “Mothership Connection”
public-service announcement is broadcast live from the capitol, in the
capital of chocolate cities, Washington, DC, where “they still call it
the White House, but that’s a temporary condition.”
Spurred on by postwar suburbanization, by 1975 the chocolate city and
its concomitant “vanilla suburbs” were a familiar racialized
organization of space and place. The triumphant takeover tenor of Chocolate City may
seem paradoxical in retrospect, as Black people inherited neglected
space, were systematically denied resources afforded to Whites, and were
entering an era of mass incarceration. Still, for Parliament, like for
many other Black Americans, chocolate cities were a form of reparations
and were and had been an opportunity to make something out of nothing.
For generations these chocolate cities—Black neighborhoods, places on
the other side of the tracks, the bottoms—had been the primary locations
of the freedom struggle, the sights and sounds of Black art and Black
oppression, and the container for the combined ingredients of pain,
play, pleasure, and protest that comprise the Black experience.
It only seems right that the Smithsonian National Museum of African
American History & Culture (NMAAHC) in Chocolate City became the
proud home of George Clinton’s iconic stage prop, the Mothership.
It’ll be somewhat of a homecoming. The group first formed as the
Parliaments in Plainfield, New Jersey in the late 1950’s, but after
morphing into a two-group collective — Parliament and Funkadelic — it would go on to enjoy one of its most loyal followings in Washington. Parliament’s 1975 album “Chocolate City” gave the nation’s capital an unofficial nickname that still sticks today.
When the band lowered the Mothership from the rafters of the Capital
Centre in Landover in 1977, the response was rapturous. Not only was it
instantly stunning — it felt like a cosmic metaphor for the sense of
possibility that followed the civil rights movement.
That symbolism isn’t lost on the Smithsonian.
“With large iconic objects like this, we can tap into . . . themes of
movement and liberation that are a constant in African-American
culture,” says Dwandalyn R. Reece, curator of music and performing arts
for the museum. “The Mothership as this mode of transport really fits
into this musical trope in African American culture about travel and
transit.”
The Mothership’s current home is worth a visit.
I don’t know how many times I’ve watched this clip from the October
1976 P-Funk concert at the Summit in Houston and thrilled to the
entrance of the Mothership. Wait for it … and then wait some more.
Funk performances on film have never achieved the fame of concert
films like Woodstock; however, the sheer exuberant Blackness of the 1972 Wattstax concert had me hooked from the first time I saw it.
“Originally it was going to be called ‘Woodstax,’ ” said Rob Bowman, a
Toronto-based author of “Soulsville, USA,” a history of Stax Records.
“Thank God it wasn’t.” Bowman noted that although admission was
originally going to be free, “for various contractual reasons they
couldn’t do that. So tickets were $1 apiece. They still gave away
$30,000 in tickets to kids and people who couldn’t afford them.” The
earnings from tickets, about $73,000, went to the charitable
organizations associated with the Watts Summer Fest.
Throughout the hot August day of Wattstax, music fans danced, sang
and celebrated in relative tranquility, while an all-black and unarmed
security force stood watch. “This was the largest single gathering of
African-American people outside of a religious or civil rights
function,” Bowman said. “It was very much a statement. ‘We don’t need
the white police. The community can maintain itself, even 100,000
people, without guns.’ “
Watch the concertgoers jump from the stands to come down and dance the Funky Chicken.
You can watch the entire Wattstax film on YouTube.
Lest I ignore the distaff side of funk history, I want to give a shout out to Chaka Khan, the Black female lead singer with a mixed-race funk band, Rufus, who has been dubbed “the Queen of Funk.”
Chaka Khan grew up as Yvette Marie Stephens in Chicago’s Hyde Park
area, at the peak of the Civil Rights movement. At 16, she moved out and
became a Black Panther, providing aid to Chicago’s youth through the
organization’s free breakfast initiative. Chicago, and the rest of the country was afflicted by segregation,
which rendered upward mobility institutionally impossible for most
black Americans. Like many before her in the Black Power movement, she
rejected her given name as a form of defiance against normative white
society. She was Chaka Adunne Aduffe Yemoja Hodarhi Karifi—or simply
Chaka, which meant “woman of fire,” according to the Yoruba priest who
named her. As Rufus’s leading lady, she was pushing the boundaries of
the spaces she could occupy. “I was a black chick with a white band and I
could do that,” she said in a 2008 interview with The Guardian. “It was powerful.”
As a former Panther myself, a devotee of Yemoja/Yemaya, and a diasporic Orisha worship practitioner, I’ve been following Chaka Khan’s music from its beginning.
So, tell me something that you like … yeah. I could sit here all day
listing funk bands and favorite tunes, but I’ll save those for the
comments section. I hope you’ll share yours too. As we move into the
heat of August, we’ll meld funk to jazz in a heady brew.
As always, don’t forget to get up offa that thang and boogie on down to the mailbox or the polls—and vote.
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All Comments
Comment by Grabber by the Heel.
Great idea.
Keep posting Denise and her gifts to us.
I skimmed too many of these diaries and am grateful for a chance to dig in again.
Comment by UhDave.
Not really my thing but I did like their brief appearance in the movie PCU.
Comment by Satya1.
We miss you Denise.
Folks
near Chicago will want to check out the art exhibit of some of George
Clinton's work, on display for the next ~4 weeks at a terrific west side
gallery on Paulina. A model of the Mothership is also there. A recent
interview of George Clinton with details on the exhibit is here:
I
didn’t make it into downtown Tallahassee but I heard PFunk had a great
birthday party show w George. Good to know the music lives…
Comment by Whatsnuts.
Make my funk the P funk. I wants to get funked up!
Comment by bopamole.
Thank you for this. Still loving Denise and her special ways of bringing the funk to us, in many ways.
Comment by poetry2016.
Good Sunday morning to all!
Comment by MacHAM.
To
me there are things that are like gems, they glitter and you are aware
of your attraction to them. Certain books, certain songs, certain
people. Sometimes hard to explain, but it just is.
Parliament was a gem in my pocket in High School. I shared this with one other, my g/f, who introduced me to P-funk.
Comment by De veritas.
I
remember funk coming out and thinking it was catchy and interesting. I
see that Denise is listed as "contributor". I usually see "community" or
"staff", how many people are in "contributor", how is it defined?
Comment by RtRhead.
That
I am still following Denise is a great gift KOS. Thank you for that.
Funk was my connection to her. You looking for the bridge? There it is.
Funk
begins on the first beat. The Alpha. "The One". And the best thing
about it is that it can't even try to be sad. It stomps out the sad like
a bug. It really is from on high. Don't think. Don't speak. Close your
eyes and let your body take over.
Kind of a drag I haven't figure out how to paste a video in the new format, but I'll get off my ass one of these days.
"...when you finely break it on down...it's the pride."
Isley Brothers - The Pride
Comment by azureblue.
We miss you down here.. But wherever you are, we hope you're strutting
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