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Funkiest Man Ever?

Who Was The Funkeist Man Ever?

  • Sly Stone

    Votes: 10 15.9%

  • James Brown

    Votes: 23 36.5%

  • George Clinton

    Votes: 17 27.0%

  • Bootsy Collins

    Votes: 13 20.6%
  • Total voters
    63
Jazzz said:
The world was barren, essentially devoid of funk. There were no 'funk tunes'. Even during James Brown's early period. But then He proclaimed "Let it be on The One", and then there was 'Papa's got a Brand New Bag' and later 'Cold Sweat', and thereafter The Funk existed.

It is really not as if the genre was developing anywhere else independently. Maybe there were hints with Little Richard, but his were rock & roll tunes, for all their brilliance. It's all on the 2 and 4. They weren't funk. (And Scott Joplin was doing syncopation long before him).
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Well I can't deny you make a lot of sense here. But where was the funk before JB became its vehicle? I'm sure you don't buy the Great Man theory of history, whereby individual geniuses are the sole motor of change. So the funk must have been lurking in the Zeitgeist, at the very least, before achieving earthly manifestation.

I suppose we'd have to go back to Africa really. Or at least New Orleans. Wikipedia reckons Black Buddy Bolden did a song called "Funky Butt" in 1907 or something.

On another tangent, when I lived in DC I used to go to a lot of gogo gigs (try saying that with your mouth full). Never have I witnessed greater funk live than Chuck Brown, who should also have been on the poll, or Trouble Funk. Just drums very often, with the merest touch of of bass and keyboards. Only problem was there was always a fight. Something about that music innit.
 
Jazzz said:
You fool! How can you speak like that of the man? There is no denying his funk.

Has anyone else attempted to play the keyboard part from 'Superstition'? I've just discovered why I could never get it to sound right. It's actually eight clavinet parts!

Stevie Wonder’s Superstition clavinet part dissected

Bear in mind that not only is Stevie Wonder playing eight clavinet parts there, and singing, but the drums are all his too. No-one else could have done this.
Click to expand...

Stevie Wonder is an undoubtedly gifted musician (or at least was), but funk isn't about being lyrical, it isn't about being a song, it is a feeling, and you need to dance, you want to dance, you have to dance to the funk.

Funk at it's best is sex on the dancefloor - and you either have it, or you don't.

:)
 
phildwyer said:
I suppose we'd have to go back to Africa really. Or at least New Orleans. Wikipedia reckons Black Buddy Bolden did a song called "Funky Butt" in 1907 or something.

On another tangent, when I lived in DC I used to go to a lot of gogo gigs (try saying that with your mouth full). Never have I witnessed greater funk live than Chuck Brown, who should also have been on the poll, or Trouble Funk. Just drums very often, with the merest touch of of bass and keyboards. Only problem was there was always a fight. Something about that music innit.
Click to expand...

Cripes, Buddy Bolden (alas, the unrecorded) is one of the names that comes up as an originator of jazz, he can't have funk as well! That just wouldn't be fair :D

I'm sure troublefunk put on a show. I'm just listening to some Chuck Brown now, thanks for that.

On another slight tangent, did you know that perhaps the most famous George Clinton bassline - Flashlight - had nothing to do with Bootsy Collins, who actually played drums on the track? - if we had a thread for unsung funk geniuses Worrell has to be right up there.


Incidentally I managed to chat to Fred Wesley when he sat nearby between sets once at Ronnie Scotts, and you know how if meet someone like that you think 'oh I wish I'd asked him x'? For me out of all the questions that one might have forgotten to ask Fred Wesley, it was 'who wrote the horn arrangement on 'Up for the Down Stroke'? - I think it was Bernie Worrell.
 
Jazzz said:
Cripes, Buddy Bolden (alas, the unrecorded) is one of the names that comes up as an originator of jazz, he can't have funk as well! That just wouldn't be fair :D
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Didn't you know? Buddy Bolden also invented the novel, back in Storyville in 1743. Also sliced bread I believe.

Jazzz said:
I'm sure troublefunk put on a show. I'm just listening to some Chuck Brown now, thanks for that.
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I first saw Trouble Funk at Glastonbury, of all places, must have been circa '85. Even in that rather alien environment they blew me away. Much better in a small, dark club though.

Chuck Brown basically invented Gogo single-handed, and is the local hero in DC. He used to do (probably still does) a gig on the Mall each year, in front of the Capitol building, which was always nuts. I suppose Gogo was a slower version of drum'n'bass, avant la lettre.

Jazzz said:
On another slight tangent, did you know that perhaps the most famous George Clinton bassline - Flashlight - had nothing to do with Bootsy Collins, who actually played drums on the track? - if we had a thread for unsung funk geniuses Worrell has to be right up there.


Incidentally I managed to chat to Fred Wesley when he sat nearby between sets once at Ronnie Scotts, and you know how if meet someone like that you think 'oh I wish I'd asked him x'? For me out of all the questions that one might have forgotten to ask Fred Wesley, it was 'who wrote the horn arrangement on 'Up for the Down Stroke'? - I think it was Bernie Worrell.
Click to expand...

As with jazz, I suspect that the true pioneers of funk are names we don't know. Or if we do know them, they're inevitably overshadowed by the more flamboyant or nutty characters like Bootsy. One more reason to ascribe these things to the Zeitgeist rather than the individual.
 
Jazzz said:
The world was barren, essentially devoid of funk. There were no 'funk tunes'. Even during James Brown's early period. But then He proclaimed "Let it be on The One", and then there was 'Papa's got a Brand New Bag' and later 'Cold Sweat', and thereafter The Funk existed.
Click to expand...



Funk was invented collectively by Jazz music

James Brown just decorated it and made it available to the masses

Little Richard was playing funk before JB was and Jazz musicians were playing it even before that
 
Jazzz said:
Cripes, Buddy Bolden (alas, the unrecorded) is one of the names that comes up as an originator of jazz, he can't have funk as well! That just wouldn't be fair :D

I'm sure troublefunk put on a show. I'm just listening to some Chuck Brown now, thanks for that.

On another slight tangent, did you know that perhaps the most famous George Clinton bassline - Flashlight - had nothing to do with Bootsy Collins, who actually played drums on the track? - if we had a thread for unsung funk geniuses Worrell has to be right up there.


Incidentally I managed to chat to Fred Wesley when he sat nearby between sets once at Ronnie Scotts, and you know how if meet someone like that you think 'oh I wish I'd asked him x'? For me out of all the questions that one might have forgotten to ask Fred Wesley, it was 'who wrote the horn arrangement on 'Up for the Down Stroke'? - I think it was Bernie Worrell.
Click to expand...
bring back the music posting jazzz :( he dont talk about the funk no more

good thread bump phildwyer :cool: i proclaim today to be funky Saturday.
 
phildwyer said:
I first saw Trouble Funk at Glastonbury, of all places, must have been circa '85. Even in that rather alien environment they blew me away. Much better in a small, dark club though.
Click to expand...
I saw them at Glastonbury too, think it was '87. They were so good I saw them in London the following week, possibly at the Town and Country.
 
I said in 2009 and I'll say it again: Hamilton Bohannon has gotta be up there.

Can't find any video clips of him being funky, but this is what he sounded like:

 
Curtis and Isaac should be there, and, arguably Prince and Dr Dre. I know the latter certainly took others' funk, but he melded it together very funkily and didn't detract any funk from the originals.
 
James Brown was such an awful human being it's hard to vote for him, but really there's no contest. Clinton would be nothing without JB's band. Sly Stone's There's a Riot Goin' On has to be one of the greatest achievements in pop history, but it's too idiosyncratic to take into account. Prince doesn't come close, and Rick James was shite (and possibly an even bigger dickhead than Brown).
 
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