FUNK: Part 2

Part 2: James Brown Said Let There Be Funk, And The People Saw It Was Good

04 — THE METERS: LESS IS MORE
If James Brown demonstrated the power of rhythm through intensity, The Meters demonstrated it through restraint.

Formed in New Orleans in the 1960s, The Meters developed a style that was remarkably economical.

Drummer Joseph "Zigaboo" Modeliste didn't need to fill every space and guitarist Leo Nocentelli didn't need to play constantly.

Art Neville's keyboards and George Porter Jr.'s bass could leave enormous amounts of space between their notes, but the groove never disappeared.

It became stronger because of the space around it.

Records such as "Cissy Strut", "Look-Ka Py Py" and "Just Kissed My Baby" became essential for anyone trying to understand the architecture of Funk.

The Meters demonstrated that Funk wasn't necessarily about playing more.
It was about playing the right thing at the right time.

That principle would become enormously important to producers.

A producer sampling a two-bar drum loop wasn't necessarily looking for virtuosity.

He was looking for a pocket. A groove that could survive repetition and a piece of music that could become the foundation for something else.

The Meters had mastered exactly that.

05 — SLY STONE OPENS THE DOOR
James Brown made Funk disciplined. Sly Stone made it expansive.

With Sly & The Family Stone, rhythm became a meeting point for Soul, Rock, Gospel, Psychedelia and Pop.

The band itself reflected this philosophy.

Black and white musicians played together.
Men and women shared the stage.
Different musical traditions collided inside the same songs.

And rather than treating Funk as a narrow musical formula, Sly Stone used it as a platform for experimentation.

"Thank You (Falettinme Be Mice Elf Agin)", "Family Affair", "Dance to the Music" and "I Want to Take You Higher" demonstrated how powerful Funk could be when combined with melody, social commentary and psychedelic experimentation.

Albums such as Stand! and There's a Riot Goin' On would become essential records for generations of musicians and producers.

Sly also understood something that Hip-Hop would later embrace completely:

A groove could carry a message.

The music could make people move while the lyrics made them think.

Funk wasn't simply party music. It could be political, confrontational, psychedelic, spiritual and experimental.

06 — FUNK GOES PSYCHEDELIC
George Clinton took the Funk and pushed it into another dimension.

Parliament and Funkadelic effectively created an entire universe around Funk.

Clinton's musical collective absorbed Soul, Rock, Gospel, Psychedelia and R&B and turned them into something that felt simultaneously futuristic and ancient.

Funkadelic could sound like a psychedelic rock band while Parliament could sound like a futuristic Soul revue.

The musicians moved between projects, creating a huge interconnected musical universe populated by characters, mythology and an extraordinary collection of musicians.

At the centre of it all was the groove, where Bootsy Collins' bass became one of Funk's defining sounds.

Bernie Worrell's keyboards introduced synthesizers and electronic textures that sounded unlike anything else in popular music and Eddie Hazel brought his psychedelic guitar into the Funk vocabulary.

Clinton created a visual and musical mythology that eventually included the legendary Mothership.

Records such as Maggot Brain, Mothership Connection, One Nation Under a Groove and Funkentelechy Vs. the Placebo Syndrome became treasure troves for future producers.

And future producers would eventually mine them relentlessly.

07 — THE BASS BECOMES THE HOOK
One of Funk's greatest innovations was the elevation of the bass guitar.

In earlier popular music, bass often existed primarily to support the harmony, however Funk changed all that.

The bass became a lead instrument.

Bootsy Collins, George Porter Jr., Larry Graham, Louis Johnson and countless others developed approaches where basslines could be as recognisable as vocal melodies.

Larry Graham's slap technique brought a percussive quality to the instrument.

Bootsy turned the bass into something playful, powerful and almost conversational.

George Porter Jr. understood how to leave space while still driving the entire band forward.

This mattered enormously to Hip-Hop.

A producer could take a bassline and build an entire track around it. The DJ could loop it, the MC could write around it and the bass could become the song rather than a background support instrument.