Funkadelic

05.03.03

Funkadelic came into the life at just the right moment. I was a bit lost - I had left my Michigan sanctuary and had entered the wild northern Californian hippie vortex at seventeen for college - and luckily one of my freshman year neighbors had excellent taste in music. Turns out her introductory dose of Funkadelic in my life was just what I needed to start to make some sense of it all. Some.

And since then, I've been a loyal Funkadelic fan.

Most people collapse Parliament and Funkadelic into one, but I just can't seem to bring myself to do it. The groups are both the children of funk-father George Clinton (photo), but I still keep them distinct in my head. I'm just more attached to Funkadelic because of silly sentimentality associated with each song.

For an official declaration of how the two groups differ, here's a quote from this site:

Sly

13.02.03

Here it is. Perhaps my favorite song. Sexy voice, groovy beat. I have certainly listened to it over a thousand times. I don't need to make an introduction. But for anybody that doesn't have it in their collection, you must get it. Now. It is absolutely imperative.

Donny...

23.01.03

Not Osmond. Hathaway. I first discovered Donny Hathaway by the humble means of an excellent compilation series called "Blaxploitation," a four-volume set (two CDs per volume) made up of - you guessed it - songs from Blaxploitation films of the 60's and 70's. That means we're talking about the original "Shaft" or the original "Superfly," and not the scammy 90's and 2000 remakes. This series of CDs has probably influenced my musical collection to date more than any other lone source. I recommend to anybody interested in soul, disco, funk, and their offshoots, to invest in at least one of the volumes. Even if you know every artist on the back cover, the combination of songs is so well done that it is worth the money. Even in these file-sharing program days.

Donny Hathaway's first single, "The Ghetto," has remained a permanent in my playlist ever since I discovered the song six or seven years ago. It is an excellent song to walk around town to: it is upbeat, funky, and musically just amazing.

Donny has remained a bit of a lesser-known figure in the music history (besides his mediocre hit featured here, and a few bigger hits in the form of duets with another well-known star of the times, Roberta Flack) probably because his career was cut short by a mysterious suicide - he jumped off the 15th floor of the Essex Hotel in New York at a point when his career was just getting moving. He was 34 years old.