George Clinton had just imagined a young Barack Obama in
the White House-
That was Pete
... with his album, Chocolate City, in April 1975.
Excuse me.
Now, just a few minutes later-
Pete's clear.
What?
Yeah.
What?
We don't-
I'm setting it up, man.
I know we usually do that, but we don't need a bespoke intro for this
show.
We absolutely need an... We always do an introduction.
This album comes with an introduction.
Good evening. Do not attempt to adjust your radio.
There is nothing wrong. We have taken control as to bring you this
special show, and we will return it to you as soon as you are grooving.
Welcome to station W-E-F-U-N-K, better
known as WE FUNK, or deeper still, the Mothership
Connection, home of the extraterrestrial brothers, dealers
of funky music, P-Funk, uncut funk,
the bomb.
Coming to you directly from the mothership. Top off the chocolate milky way.
500,000 kilowatts of P-Funk power.
So, kick back, dig, while we do it to you in your eardrums. Oh, me?
I'm known as Lollipop Man, alias The Long-haired Sucker.
My motto is, "Peace,
funk."
I'm Adam Maness.
And I'm Peter Martin.
And you're listening to the You'll Hear It podcast.
Music. Explore.
Explore. Brought to you by Open Studio.
Go to openstudiojazz.com for all-
Ooh
... your jazz lesson needs.
Now, that was an introduction.
Peter,
I feel like our faces are gonna hurt today.
Yes. Stank face.
Both the stankness of the faces and the smiling of the
faces.
Yeah.
Because this album is not only, and I'm talking about Parliament's
Mothership Connection-
Yes
... 1975's Mothership Connection.
Not only is it one of the funkiest recordings
of music in the history of recordings of music-
Yeah
... but it's also just a pure work of joy.
It is.
It is so joyful, this album.
It is.
It is undeniably infectious.
Yeah.
You cannot not shake your a*s at least a little bit.
Watch your mouth, Adam Maness.
I will-
Wow.
I will not. It is so good, man.
Yeah.
The whole thing start to finish, it is truly a masterpiece, in my
opinion. I love this album so much, man.
I
agree. Ditto. See above to what Adam said.
You know-
It's a dance party. It's a funk masterclass-
100%
... as we're gonna look at. There's
virtuosic funk playing from every single corner, singing,
harmonization. It's a finely tuned, engineered
record-
Yeah
... that we always, we're getting, having fun talking about that.
Oh. I mean, '75. That's right in-
Yeah
... our engineering wheelhouse right now.
Yeah.
But dude, this thing, the whole thing sounds great.
It's with a bunch of incredible, incredible artists.
Some legends.
Of course, led by the one and only, truly one
of one, George Clinton.
Yes.
But of course, Parliament, some key members, George Clinton,
obviously.
Yeah.
Glenn Goins on guitar and vocals.
Yeah.
The legendary bassist, Bootsy Collins,
who's really kind of like, in a lot of ways, the heart and soul of this band,
Bootsy Collins.
Yeah.
He's sort of like everything underneath that's happening is literally bubbling
underneath-
Yeah
... is coming from Bootsy's bass.
The, I think, most underrated keyboard player, at
least on this show.
Interesting.
This might be the second or third time ever we've mentioned Bernie
Worrell-
Yes
... who is maybe one of the most influential keyboard players of the past 60
years.
I was gonna say, he's the Phil, Greg Phillinganes of keyboard players, but that's
kind of redundant, isn't it?
Well, that's the thing is every keyboard player after him owes a lot of-
Yeah
... debit to Bernie Worrell-
Absolutely
... who helped create how we think about a lot of modern synthesizer
sounds.
Yeah.
He was a pioneer on that. Also, a very
accomplished musician as well.
Yeah.
But
then the horn section's ridiculous.
We've got to talk about the rest of the, Jerome Brailey. Bigfoot.
Bigfoot.
The rest of the rhythm section there.
The drums. Everything is on the one-
Yeah
... is something that's gonna be a theme for every single song on here, and it
makes you bounce. It makes everything bounce off it.
Legendary horn section,
Maceo Parker, Fred Wesley.
Also, Michael Brecker, Randy Brecker.
Michael Brecker, Randy Brecker.
Are of the Brecker Brothers fame.
Yeah.
And Joe Farrell making some appearances on the tenor saxophone.
Pretty incredible.
Yeah.
Pretty incredible. And man,
I love this band so much. So Parliament and the sort of
sister band, I guess, Funkadelic.
Yeah.
These two sides of the coin.
Yeah.
The Funkadelic is the sort of psychedelic rock.
Lot of distorted, crunchy guitars.
Yeah.
And Parliament, more of the funk, R&B, dance side of
things, although they do dance in a lot of-
And then later, Parliament Funkadelic, which was just a combination-
And then P-Funk All Stars and, yeah.
Anyway
... which were pretty much the same, anyway.
There's been a lot of different-
Due to legal reasons, these were all entirely different bands, but-
I don't think it gets-
George Clinton was the constant, right?
I don't think it gets much better, for me, around this era, than
this band.
That's interesting.
I mean, they went on a run the entire '70s-
Yeah
... that is, I think, unmatched, as far as just
unbelievable banger album after banger album.
Classic hits, and just, thank you,
Parliament.
And then also, not only did they go on a run in terms of recording, but their
live performances, in a number of different types of venues-
You ever seen them live?
I've seen them several times live.
Me too.
Unbelievable.
Yeah. And you opened for them.
I opened for them once. One of the greatest shows I've ever seen.
Actually, the first time I saw them live was in the early '91,
I believe. It might've been '92 in New Orleans at Tipitina's on Tchoupitoulas
Street. Legendary club. It's still there.
And The Galactic guys actually own it, I believe now.
Talk about lineage from funk and we're gonna talk about New Orleans, of course.
But it was such an amazing... They used to come and do these weekend shows.
They'd play for like Friday and Saturday.
They'd come in with their crazy tour buses.
The shows would be three and a half, four hours long.
I mean, it was the stuff of legends. In a club.
Yeah.
It was kind of a big club.
Yeah.
But they did that a bunch of places.
I saw them at North Sea Jazz Festival in the late '90s, and
they had institutionalized, in a very good way, this
sound, this show, for a whole two, three
generations now.
I'm glad you mentioned New Orleans, because New Orleans has an
unexpected influence on this.
Here's George talking about origins of funk.
When did you start thinking of funk as a genre? As the genre you were working in?
After "Testify."
After "Testify" and
like I said, seeing
Jimi Hendrix, Cream, they did rock and roll and
blues. Like my mother, to me, the only genre that
wasn't taken was that New Orleans
version of R&B. Get out my life,
woman.
"Get out my life, woman"
Lee Dorsey.
Lee Dorsey, yeah.
"If You Wanna Love Me."
Which Allen Toussaint produced.
The Meters are the backing band there.
Absolutely.
Yeah. Isn't that fascinating, though?
Yeah.
When you hear it, you're like, "Oh, of course."
Yeah.
Right? But it's not the first thing I think of.
I think of spaceships and outer space when I think of Parliament and Funkadelic.
Yeah.
Don't necessarily go straight to
Allen Toussaint. Man, let's go onto the next track.
Yeah.
This is,
I don't want to spoil any categories later. But this is an important song for me.
It's important.
Well, all right.
One of the great starts. We talk about off-tempo, out-of-tempo
starts.
We've got to do it again.
Yeah.
We've got to do it again. We've got to hear it again, Peter.
But check it out. So we talked about
Yeah.
All these things where you're like, it's a very subtle thing, but they don't
just go into that thick-ass groove.
Ooh.
There's a little bit of this, and that's very much a Meters, New Orleans thing,
too, right?
This one live, too. Mothership Connection live.
Oh, yeah.
Out of this world.
Yeah.
I mean, literally.
Yeah.
But a whole other experience.
I think she's in there.
Thank you. Okay.
Yeah.
But by the way-
And then
... there's a live concert film from the '70s from this
band that is, it's on YouTube.
There's like 30 of them, buddy.
I know, but so worth checking out.
There's one. Okay, got you.
"Mothership Connection"
Yeah.
Woo.
Well, all right.
It's syncopated from the beginning. Before it turns.
Citizens of the universe, recording.
Ooh.
Man, that hi-hat. Talk about the bass drum sound.
"Pardon on the mothership. I am"
Oh, that crash.
"Connection"
Big.
"Getting down in 3D"
Crash.
Every time.
On the one. Everything is on the one.
Yeah. Every eight beats, it's hitting.
"Hear the noise, ladies"
Oh.
"Make me move"
Oh.
I love sometimes too Bigfoot will just give a little space.
"Get down"
And it is always on the one, but he's still got some of that four and.
Check it out.
Oh. There's the extra bass drum.
"Me and the boys"
Woo.
"Grooving"
Woo.
"You gotta hit the band. All right"
Horns.
"All right"
Never been a funkier horn section.
So, crash cymbal.
Every eight.
Hi-hat.
Yeah.
Yes. Crash.
"Put a glide in your stride and a dip in your hip"
Hi-hat.
"And come onto the mothership"
Yeah. Well, that was all sequenced, so.
All that stuff, the
Bernie Worrell, man.
You say sequence?
No, I'm just kidding.
Cut it out, Peter.
Oh, what do we got over there?
And the horns-
The horns is back
... I don't need the wah all the time, but.
F#9. You know what I'm saying?
"Bass man"
Maceo, Fred Wesley.
Yeah.
"Even your memory bank never got this far"
Brother's.
"Mothership Connection"
Right there. There's a little-
Little details
... variances.
"Home of the p-funk. The bomb"
It's pattern, pattern, pattern, pattern interruption.
But there's four different levels that's happening at the same time.
I've had to play this live a couple of times, and like-
Did it sound like this?
Getting those details is super challenging, man.
It is. Whoa, that break.
Yeah, hold on. I've got to back it up. I've got to back it up.
There's that Gb that happens.
Yeah.
The drum breaks.
"Doing it in 3D"
Right here.
Oh.
What?
"Let me put on my sunglasses"
Man, it's so...
You think of them going crazy on this, but it's so disciplined.
"Funk you up. Yeah, here we go"
Oh, my face already hurts.
"You better hit the band. You have overcome, for I
am here"
Oh, take it to the bridge.
This is my favorite moment of 1975, probably.
It's also apparently Dr. Dre,
Snoop, and a bunch of people's favorite moment.
"Swing down, sweet chariot, stop, and
let me ride. Swing down,
sweet chariot, stop, and let me ride"
Bernie Worrell.
Yeah.
Square wave synthesizers.
New sounds. Yeah.
Triangle wave.
The clavinet with the wah-
Yeah
... effects. Unbelievable.
"Let me ride. Swing down, sweet chariot"
Going all
Jaco Pastorius.
"Let me ride"
What's that, CC?
"Swing down, sweet chariot, stop"
Woo.
"And let me ride"
The timing on that wah, too.
"Are you hip to Easter Island?"
Uh.
"The Bermuda Triangle.
Well, all right"
Man.
"Ain't nothing but a party"
I remember this coming on the radio.
I thought these were two separate songs,
because they'd fade it out before here.
"Starchild here"
Uh.
"Citizens of the universe, I bring forth to you the good
times on the mothership"
Woo.
"Are you here?"
Uh.
"Say, fellas. If you're here,
hear the noise. Nobody but me and the boys.
Me and the boys getting bad"
I think Kirk Franklin was really influenced by this.
I mean,
the amount of genres-
I know
... that are influenced by this.
Yeah.
"Me and the boys getting bad. You gotta hit the
band"
Yeah, man.
"Starchild here"
This is all-
"Doing it in 3D. So good, it's good to me"
Hit the band.
If you're
feeling naughty. It's just me and the boy in the window.
What I love about these tracks too, Peter, is we're not going anywhere.
No.
Let's take our time and settle in.
And I said, they went to the bridge, it's almost like they fade to
another song.
Honestly, I don't know of any more life-affirming music than this music.
I know that sounds dramatic.
Oh! Man,
but, so like I said earlier,
Brailey, he's so
disciplined in the way he's playing this pattern, but then when he
mixes it up, oh.
What's that?
Let's take you higher.
But when he does little details, you're like, "Oh."
Do it for me, kid. I like it.
There's that break.
And you talk about taking the same chord-
Yeah, man
... the same material, and just stretching it out, and it's all this
It's very modal. It's all mixolydian, right?
I honestly, I can't take it without just
losing my mind.
I know.
It's so good. The little details. That's the thing, too, is one
chord,
right?
Yeah.
You got one chord for a long time, and you have all these little
subtle changes that-
Yeah
... are cued in here and there, and the textures that Bernie Worrell is playing are
so genius. And then you mentioned Jerome "Bigfoot" Brailey just
holding it down for the most part.
Oh, my God.
But then just every once in a while-
Little change
... every so often, he'll just put in the thing, or he'll just put in a pause.
Just sometimes the silence that he'll put in sounds deafening.
Yeah.
You know what I mean?
It's that kind of play.
Great funk players can play,
I'm going to state the obvious here. You ready?
Yeah.
State the obvious.
Yeah.
Can play in the groove, right? But there's that next level where you're
stuck in the groove.
Yeah.
There's nothing they can do to leave the groove.
And that doesn't mean that they play the exact same pattern, it means they play
95% of the exact same pattern, and then the taste-making is when
they change it up. It's not only the "step back" or
he does a bass drum every 16 bars or
so that's a little bit different that leads back into the one, but it's the
decisions of not only how to do it, but when to do it.
That's so brilliant.
With the whole rest arrangement, with the horns.
There's all these different layers going.
Yeah.
And it's already great if they just stay the same, but it's the little parts, the
little patterns that interrupt that are just so joyful.
So, in just a minute, we're going to listen to just the bass and the drums
isolated, and you can hear the great Jerome Brailey-
Can you take it?
... and Bootsy Collins. I don't know.
I don't know if you can take that.
We're also going to listen to some people that have used this music in samples.
But before we do that-
Really?
... Peter, I want to talk a little bit about Open Studio.
I actually just recorded a lesson today.
I heard it.
We were talking about playing on one chord.
Yeah.
And so, this show is sponsored by Open Studio, where we teach piano
lessons.
Yeah.
And we were talking about playing on this one chord.
Can you play an E flat seven, like an E
flat dominant seven chord, right?
Yeah.
So when you got just one chord for one time, and you hear this especially in James
Brown's music-
Yeah
... and in Parliament, and in Sly & the Family Stone.
But you have that E flat seven. Instead of just playing an E flat
seven chord, Peter, could you play a B flat minor triad in
the first inversion over E flat?
First inversion.
Yeah.
So, we have that sound. That B flat minor triad over E flat, which is like an E
flat seven sus two.
Yeah.
And you'll hear great keys players and great guitarists take that shape up-
Yeah
... a whole step to the C minor.
Right? Now put a little funk on it, put a little
grease.
Right? So you just have, this is E flat, right? We're just in E flatness here.
Yeah.
But you can use those pairs of triads.
Anyway, that's what we were talking about today on my course, "The Harmony Games."
If you want to check it out,
go to openstudiojazz.com. That's openstudiojazz.com for
all your jazz lesson needs. Okay.
Yeah, that's right. Okay, back to it. Man.
Bass and drums. Ready?
Yeah.
Let's do it.
Oh.
So this is the bridge.
Mothership connection.
Let it ride.
Ooh, the hi-hat on and the four. Ugh, love it.
Ah.
Ha.
Oh, man, that's perfect crash.
Everything Bootsy served.
Oh!
Did you hear that?
Isn't that so fun? Man, you could literally listen to this whole album of just the
stems of the bass and the drums and have the time of your life. It is.
Could you imagine if Fagen and
Steely Dan had got their hands on that bass?
So this is very-
On that drum pattern.
This is very, very interesting, right?
Because we talked about this on that Steely Dan "Gaucho" episode.
Yeah.
About how they did all these takes and all of this like, "We got to get it
just right." But there's something about this openness of being here.
Not that these guys weren't doing takes and getting it right.
Yeah.
But it's just like there's a feeling of anything can happen.
Right.
That is so infectious. That makes me feel so alive when I listen to these
albums, that I think sets Parliament.
There's no other band I can think of where you feel like anything could happen.
Well-
Literally, a freaking spaceship could land on the stage, you know what I mean?
No, it will. That's coming.
And it will.
But I mean, the thing is too, what was so great about that, I was talking about it
earlier, their legendary live performances for decades, is
their actual, especially the OG recordings, are very
restrained in a way. I mean, they're definitely like a part-
Oh, compared to the live shows.
Yeah.
I mean, even just compared to how everybody's playing, because they'll play this
stuff for 30 minutes straight, and crazy fills and-
It's the greatest feeling in the world
... I remember seeing Dennis Chambers with them. He played for, oh my God.
Yeah, that is talent. Shut up.
But I mean, the foundation of it is very
architectural, right? In terms of the decisions about how these
pieces are... I mean, the groove is there, the funk is there.
Yeah.
But then it's not just like, "Oh, we're going to groove out for 30 minutes." Man,
it's like, no, this stuff is put together, and then you've created this world, and
you've got these hits, and people know it, and these riffs-
Yeah
... and these choruses and stuff that people love.
I don't know what your origin story with Parliament is, but I didn't really-
I created the band. Yeah.
I didn't really get hip to them till I was probably 16 or 17.
However, I had been listening to them unknowingly for a couple of years
before that-
Yeah
... with this.
Then I be rolling in my six four.
What everybody saying?
When is the Dre, Snoop-
"Let It Ride," Dr. Dre.
When's
this episode coming? Come on.
The Chronic episode?
Yeah. Come on, man.
Any day you want, bro. Any day you want.
Damn it. Tell us in the comments if you want that.
Hell yeah.
Hell yeah. Come on.
I learned how to talk with this record.
And I don't know if you remember the end of this video, but they show, they have
superimposed footage of the live of the mothership landing.
Oh, wow. Oh, yeah.
And you see George Clinton singing this.
And it looks like it's from the '40s or something.
And that, I think, was my very first exposure, like-
You're like, "Wait."
"What the hell is going on-"
Interesting. Yeah
... in this Dr. Dre?" I've since learned, we had our great
audio intern, Charlie, looking up different people that have used this.
Did you know Wiz Khalifa-
Somebody bit his finger, by the way. Anyway, go ahead.
Oh my God.
Go.
Do you know that Wiz Khalifa did a whole, just a cover?
Like straight up.
Damn.
All right.
Oh.
Earth, Wind & Fire, citizens of the universe.
That's gutsy. That's gutsy.
That's very gutsy. It's very gutsy.
But man, the "Mothership Connection," I think,
it's one of my-
You like it?
It's in my hall of fame for songs.
It's good. Well, I know what you're-
100%.
I see where this is going, too, desert island track.
I'm not gonna spoil it.
Are we moving on to-
You want to get a little unfunky?
Man, I love, this is kind of a passed over track for some reason.
I agree. This is underrated.
There's always when you're at the end of the side A, there's always some question
marks if people are tuning in.
This is "Unfunky UFO."
Yeah.
Oh.
Nothing unfunky about that, by the way.
The lyrics are crazy on this.
All that is really needed. To save
a dying world is toughness and-
Oh
... stoically I forced a smile. My composure was
a killer.
Ah. I think that's Brecker.
I won't take grief from men who wear-
You think that's who?
Brecker Brothers, I think.
Oh.
I think so.
Like a streak of lightning, it came.
Woo.
Filling my brain with this pain.
Woo.
When I heard the word is what I heard.
Give up the funk, you punks.
Bootsy lays out some killer stuff on there.
Bootsy and Bernie on this are just crushing it.
Yeah. Keep going.
Bernie Worrell, by the way-
Sorry
child prodigy on the keys.
Yeah.
Graduate of the New England Conservatory.
Yeah.
Studied at Juilliard.
And went to Juilliard, yeah.
Yeah. Unbelievable musician.
Yeah. They didn't learn this at Juilliard.
I can tell.
They don't teach this at Juilliard.
Check this out.
Right now.
Oh, woo.
Right now.
Uh.
Oh, track.
F*****g hell.
I don't know who this is on bone.
Love would be so much better.
If you would show me-
Oh
... some funk like you do.
Man, the fills.
And that back.
All that is really needed. To save a dying world
is toughness and.
Fish 'n' plains-
Woo
... is the name of some funky friends of mine.
When they were on the road and getting it on.
"Unfunky UFO." I mean, it doesn't get funkier than that, ironically.
That's so great.
Did you know too, that after they recorded that track-
Yeah
... apparently George and Bootsy actually saw a UFO.
That's weird.
We had just finished
the Mothership album. That's what's weird about it.
So on the way back, Bootsy and I are driving along.
We happy we done finished the album.
We gonna go to Bimini. We gonna go fishing.
I think it's in the Bahamas.
On the way back to the
funkadelic house in Mississauga-
Canada
... we see a light.
Oh, Canada
Like a laser, like straight from the sky, clear
day, and it's splattering like electricity, sparks,
like two blocks away, and before I can see anything, it hits the
other side of the street. It's like bam,
bam. And the third one-
Literally saw a UFO-
Yeah
... after they recorded this album.
I know.
The way back from recording the song.
I remember hearing this story. I thought that was the inspiration from this, but it
was-
It happened flip side
... but you know what?
The aliens are watching, man.
Because they're in another time zone.
There is no time.
There is no time. There's no space, no time.
All right.
And then.
Do you know what's coming up next? Do you know the song that's coming up next?
Oh.
I just want to just hear you-
Side B, right?
... try to pronounce it is all.
Oh, Super Groovalistic,
Prozy, Funkasif... Super Califragilistic
Funk-Funk, Gimme the Funk. Yeah.
It's called Super Groovalistic Praizaphunkstication-
Oh, that was very good
... Da Bump's Bump.
Oh. Oh, this percussion.
All that s**t, man. All that s**t.
Why didn't I play on... I wanted to play on this
record.
Baby, do the bump now. Give the people
what they want when they want, and they want it all the time.
Do the. Oh, oh.
Give the people what they want when they want, and they want it all the time.
Give the people what they want when they want, and they want
it all the time.
Damn.
Bump now.
Baby, do the bump now.
Oh, I love this.
Baby.
Ooh, baby, you know it.
Bump now. Baby, do the bump now.
Oh.
Give the people what they want when they want, and they
want it all the time. Give the people what
they need when they need it, and they need it all the time.
So I remember listening to this record, this B side,
when, shout out, I'm not going to name any names, but I was like, I mean, I must've
been like six or seven. No, maybe I was older.
I wasn't nine or 10. In
the neighborhood I grew up with-
Give the people what they want when they want
... with some older kids, and I remember this.
I think it was actually this track.
It was definitely on the B side, where all of a sudden we're listening and I'm
like, "Man, this is kind of weird but cool.
I like this."
I know.
On one of those old RCA record players.
Yeah.
With the frosted thing on top. And all of a sudden I was like,
"Wow, these older kids are... What are they smoking?" Something was like-
Something smells interesting.
I was like-
They call it funky.
That was my first contact exposure.
I wonder if everybody can actually remember the first time they
heard Parliament like
In the wild like that.
Yeah. I remember. Shout out to Jason Moore of U City.
Yeah.
And his older brother, Steve-
Jay Moore
... Jay Moore, and his older brother, Steve. RIP, Steve Moore.
Yeah.
Who had a band here in St. Louis called The Son of Star Child that I was
lucky enough to be in for a while, and I would just hang out at their mom's
house in U City, and we would watch Parliament videos-
Mm
... and listen to music and learn these songs-
Yeah
... and play them for hours and hours and hours and hours.
Yeah. At grungy, dank rehearsal spaces off Kingshighway.
Yeah.
So much fun, man.
So before that, a little bit before, actually, right around the time of this
record, Kelly Martin,
the beautiful Kelly Martin, she saw them at the Checker Dome.
What now?
Yeah, and she went with the same kind of thing.
She was-
The Purina Checker Dome?
The pre-Purina, I believe.
Oh, gee.
Or maybe it wasn't. Over around Oakland.
Yeah.
Oakland.
Of course.
And that was another. She said it was the first time...
She said the whole place was like a contact high, because it's an enclosed
arena. She said the whole thing was just Mary Jane.
Man.
Yeah.
Check out some bass and drums-
Her babysitter took her, I think.
Okay.
Yeah.
Check out some bass and drums on Supergroovalisticprosifunkstication.
Got that envelope filter on it-
Yeah
... for that slap.
What is this, the Moo something
that Bootsy used? The pedal, right?
Yeah.
Yeah. Oh.
Oh.
Yeah. What is that thing? Oh,
I'll be right
back.
Man, that's some
zigaboo bass drum pattern right there.
I'm telling you, man, once you-
We've got to talk about that
... hear the New Orleans, you can't unhear-
That's some zigaboo, more or less
... the meters and the New Orleans drums.
Pretty amazing.
Yeah.
Pretty amazing.
So this song, I always thought is very connected with the
last song on side B, "Night of the Thumpasorus Peoples," which we'll get to.
I love that song so much, man.
Like, the groove and the vibe and the weirdness of it.
That is close to my-
It's kind of nice bookends on side B.
Here's a little bit... It's so funny because I love hearing Bootsy
talk about George. Bootsy Collins is a little bit of a poet, a little
bit of a prophet, a little bit of a-
An actor. Theatrical.
Listen to Bootsy talk about George. This is so cool.
The one
thing that
I don't even think George wants to overcome real bad
is
he understands what the flesh is.
And he understands that
we are
travelers, time travelers,
and he understands that
we are in these bodies, and these bodies are time machines.
Mm.
And these bodies take maintenance,
a certain maintenance. You have to keep them up.
And he's decided,
like back in the '60s,
all that whole crew in the '60s,
everybody decided that
funk it. I'm going for it
I love that. I can't love that more.
Yeah.
I can't love that more. There's something actually very Buddhist about that.
Yeah.
There's something very mystical about-
Yeah
... about that idea, and I think you can...
I don't know about you. Again, we're just talking about our own origin stories with
music.
Yeah.
But I was not sheltered, but I feel like
especially when I first heard this music, I was like, "This is music not made for
me. This is not for me."
Right.
And not like I don't like it, but this was not made with
a white kid in the suburbs in mind at all.
Right.
And I didn't understand what was happening.
Right. But you were curious.
But I was so curious-
Yeah
... and just infatuated with it.
But that's what made it-
It was so amazing to me that you could even think about music like
this and connect it to our souls-
Right
... in a way that I had never heard, and it really opened not just my musical
taste, but my entire mind to life. And I know that, again, I'm being very
hyperbolic here, but-
No
... this band means so much to me for making me who I am,
honestly.
I know. It's
so important. We talk about different styles, different
genres, but once you just get to great art, great culture,
a lot of that stuff
just fades away. And that's the great thing about, even though there's
certain things about
Parliament's thing that seem like if you just go to the surface
level and stop, yeah, it's not for a lot of people.
The invitation for everybody
is once you get inside of it, once you're able to
just go up a little bit level besides, "Oh, this is
weird. Look, he's getting... Oh, no, this isn't for me." But once you're
curious and you do that, there's so much there for everybody.
I was thinking about, and look, this is an area I know very little about, but I do
know this concept of Afrofuturism-
Mm
... and I don't think George Clinton invented that, but he tapped into that
and was a big part of that story with science fiction-
It's a big deal
... from African American-
It's a big, big deal
... authors as well.
Yeah.
It's such a cool field that I want to learn more about, but it's
very much... And then the connection with the Black American church.
There's so much. A lot of people would be like, "No, this is the opposite of that."
The way the songs unfold, and even the pacing.
There's quartet singing in the choruses.
Yeah.
You know what I mean?
Yeah. And P-Funk is almost like the deacon speaking, and then there's the
in-between-
100%
... where the music's playing.
100%.
So it's a fascinating cultural
artifact as well, but this whole thing, like that Bootsy's talking about
connecting with the future and the past, there's something there.
And also,
even if, like you said, anybody can look at this, almost everybody would be like,
"Whoa, that's not meant for me," or whatever.
But, and yetIt's still inviting you in.
Yes.
It's bringing you in and said, "That's okay.
Just come hang with us for a minute."
Yeah.
"Just come see what this is all about."
And hopefully-
It's impossible not to get sucked in.
Yeah.
It's impossible not to see your perspective shift
when you get sucked in.
Yeah, and if you've ever been
curious about this,
you don't have to just be a young person.
This is available for you at any time, and it's just like any music.
There's classical music, which I love so much.
We've got to do a classical record here.
I know we've-
We have some Beethoven on deck, for sure.
Yeah.
But it's the same thing for me to a lot of people. I came up a lot in that world.
But I also came up listening to this stuff and s**t.
But it's like the classical world, European classical music,
there's so much pomp and circumstance surrounding it.
Yeah.
But the music itself, it's the same thing.
You got to get past that little surface level thing, and once you get inside the
music, there's so much humanity there that's inclusive-
Yeah
... to anybody who's interested.
Just let the poetry of it wash over you. And by the way, it's almost summer.
Nothing feels better than riding your car with some Mothership Connection
banging with your windows down, just saying.
Yeah, exactly. And before we get into New Orleans, I don't know if you want to do
that now or later, but,
well, we talked about it some. But the idea of,
I want to put out Plainfield, New Jersey. I was trying to remember.
I know it was close to Newark, where George Clinton's from, where Jerome
Brailey and a bunch of the band, I'm trying to remember everybody.
Who's the guy who's singing on the next song we're going to hear, which is
"Boom Boom Boom Boom?"
Well, there's Gary Shider.
I know Gary Shider's from there, too, guitarist.
And Glenn Goins, yeah.
Glenn Goins.
Yeah.
A lot of them met in George Clinton's barber shop.
Yeah.
Where he literally owned it and was doing hair and stuff.
Well, we kind of skipped over this, but this whole band, Parliament, started off as
The Parliaments.
Yeah.
And the background band to The Parliaments were called Funkadelic.
Yeah.
So it was Parliaments and the Funkadelic.
Yep.
And this is them.
Yeah.
Friends, inquisitive friends, are
asking me what's going on with me.
Is that Glenn Goins? Is that Glenn Goins?
And this, by the way, came out of a doo-wop-
Yeah
... circumstance.
Yeah.
So it evolved into something really special.
Yeah. And then, of course, George Clinton was staff writer at Motown.
Yeah.
And I always felt like that's where he got from that Motown machine, that
precision, that crafting.
100.
Everybody always thought this was sloppy. Musically, it's very highly crafted.
It's highly crafted. This is, by the way, the fourth mention of the Motown machine.
Yeah.
This is maybe the fourth genius that we talked about that got crafted by that
Motown machine.
This is a record that would've survived the QA meetings at
Motown, right? Where they check quality assurance.
They used to have that whole thing.
Would Berry Gordy release this album? I don't know.
It sold a lot, so you would think so.
All right. "Handcuffs" is next.
Yep. Okay.
Do I have to put handcuffs on you, mama?
Yeah.
Do I have to keep you under lock and key?
All right. This is easier to decipher.
Do I have to put handcuffs on you, mama?
Listen to the kick drum.
Now we both know that's not how it should be.
Oh.
Do I have to put handcuffs on you, mama?
This is another classic
pre-breakup song, right? Trying to avoid the breakup, right?
When you could do without.
Fun fact about this. This line-
All these BVs here.
Do I have to put handcuffs on you, mama?
When I was a kid, I thought they were saying, "Do I have to put handcuffs on your
mama?" Because in the '70s, "your mama" jokes were big, but they say, "On
you, mama."
If I have to keep you-
Whoa!
... barefoot and pregnant.
Oh, can't say that anymore.
Do I have to keep you doing my rent?
Bob DeBoo is over there grooving. Come on.
Right on, girl. Right on. Let's keep on getting loose.
I know. This is the bass player's pick here, so we got to do a little "Handcuffs"
here.
Do I have to put handcuffs?
Let's break it down.
That's good. You can take out the problematic lyrics. That's good.
Oh,
slah.
All the guitars.
Slah.
Why did they have to invent a drum machine when they had this?
Oh.
Yeah, they got Jerome Brailey. Boom, boom, on that tom? Come on.
I mean, man.
It does not get better.
No.
It does not get better. Sorry, Steely Dan. It doesn't. It just doesn't.
It just doesn't.
Well, no, they hit a groove in a different way.
I know. It's different.
But it was like, yeah. There's other things to that.
All right.
So yeah, that's always been sort of the
outlier a little bit on there.
But here's how good this album is, right? We're to the penultimate track, right?
Yeah.
There's two tracks left, and the second to last song would become a wedding
band-
Yeah
... staple.
This is the biggest hit on there, I think.
Tear the roof off. We gonna tear the roof off the m**********r.
M**********r.
Tear the roof off, sucker. Tear the roof off.
We gonna tear the roof off the m**********r. Tear the roof off the sucker.
Tear the roof off. We gonna-
Man.
Every party band-
The mix and master on this, masterful
... in America, you still, as a party band-
Yeah
... have to have something like this.
Yes.
You've got a real type of thing going down, get
down.
Let me pull out a real hardcore pound.
Absolutely ridiculous.
That's going to come back.
Ridiculous.
That's going to come back.
You've got a real type of thing going down, get down.
All the stuff Bernie's doing.
Yeah.
Let me pull out a real hardcore pound.
Those strings, those synth strings.
Oh, we want the funk.
Yeah.
This is my favorite of all.
Oh, we need the funk.
Randy Brecker.
Man, you're home playing a wedding band, you have to know that line.
Yeah,
funk the funk. Oh, we need the funk. You gotta have the funk.
Na, na, na, na. Do,
do, do, do, do, do, do, do.
Oh,
Bootsy goes up for that harmony
You've got a real type of thing going
down. Get down
The guitar's in the background.
Oh, let's keep this rolling. We can go right into my, if you want, my apex moment.
All right. Let's go into the apex moment.
Yeah.
You've got a real type of thing going down.
Get down
2:30. Oh, it's-
There's a whole lot of rhythm going around.
Oh.
How we want the funk. Give up the funk.
Break it down. Oh.
How we need the funk.
No keys.
Everything's on the one, man.
Oh, my God.
How we want the funk.
Give up the funk. How we need the funk.
We gotta have the funk.
Da,
da,
da, da, da,
doo, doo, doo, doo, doo, doo, doo, yeah.
It's coming up.
Doo, doo, doo, doo, doo, doo, doo, yeah.
Da, da, da, da, doo, doo, doo, doo, doo, doo, doo, yeah.
I think it's coming up.
We're gonna turn this mother out.
You've got a real type of thing
going down.
Bernie.
Get down.
Bootsy's going to hit this bassline.
It's just-
There's a whole lot of rhythm going around
... he already hinted at it, but-
You've got a real type of thing going down
... yeah, all those strings are so hip.
Get down. There's a whole lot of rhythm
going around.
Pentatonic. Here we go.
You've got a real type of thing going down.
He's starting to hint at it.
Get down. There's a whole lot of rhythm going around.
Oh. Woo.
You've got a real type of thing going
down. Get down.
Yeah.
There's a whole lot of rhythm going around.
Here we are again. Here it again.
How we want the funk. Give up the funk.
Oh, love it.
How we need the funk.
We gotta have the funk. How we want the funk.
All right.
Geez Louise. Okay, I know, I hate to do this again, but we just have to get to
every single one of these.
Yeah. So great.
I'm going to skip ahead-
Drum solos
... to where we just were.
Oh.
Listen to Bootsy here.
A tickle, tickle.
That's what I'm saying. This whole album was just based on drum stems.
Yeah.
It's unbelievable.
But listen to the guitars, too.
Chicka, dang.
Listen to what the guitar's doing.
So you got one guitar just open strumming.
Yeah.
Like a pad.
Oh, wow. I never noticed that.
Yeah. Check that out. I'm going to back it up.
Oh, that's so killer.
It's like a big open chord.
Yeah.
And the other one doing the little-
Yeah
... the chicken scratch.
Oh, and it goes up to that 11th.
And then,
Bernie Worrell-
Oh.
De
boo deep,
be boo, be boo, be boo deep.
I remember trying to find these sounds on the Roland
XP50 back in '97.
Right.
Wasn't happening.
Yeah, he's doing so much of that great pent-
How we want the funk
... major pentatonic.
It's unbelievable, man. It's unbelievable.
There's a really cool... Yeah, I know. Here's Bernie's story on joining the band.
George had called my wife and-
Bernie Worrell, keys
... and me. I was with Maxine Brown at the time-
Arranger, composer, too
... in Bermuda,
and George called her from the Apollo,
because he had said one day when he could afford me, he'd
call me. So I had gone through college and everything then, and
the call came and moved from
Long Island. That's where I was staying with Maxine Brown.
She's a famous R&B vocalist.
And
moved to Detroit, and the rest is history.
We should mention, too, that Bootsy didn't come out of nowhere either.
Yeah.
Bootsy was in a pretty famous band. Ever heard of it?
Fellas, I'm ready to get up and do my thing.
Go ahead.
I want to get into it, man.
A young Bootsy.
Yeah.
A young Bootsy.
Like the Machine Man.
Yeah.
Moving-
And his brother Catfish -
... and grooving, you know
Yeah
... on guitar.
Can I count it off?
Go ahead.
One, two, three, four.
Get up. Get on up.
Get up.
Bootsy was in James Brown's band, famously, after James Brown fired his whole band,
and then hired basically the band that Bootsy and his brother Catfish had
started.
Yeah.
A bunch of young
very hip players.
I never really thought about, I should have, but it's like this connection, like
you take the Meters,
Allen Toussaint, the New Orleans thing, and then you take James Brown,
and then a little bit of...
Well, I mean, there's other influences for sure. I don't want to oversimplify.
But those two influences on George Clinton, who was already writing and doing
Motown stuff and whatever else-
Yeah
... but crystallizing into this is like you really see the lineage and the
influences, and how unique it is.
Well, and then how influential-
Idris Muhammad, too.
Idris Muhammad.
That's a big influence on this kind of sound.
And then how influential this was.
I mean-
Which is New Orleans as well
... I've heard even people like Dave Grohl of Nirvana talk about-
Mm
... how influential these albums were for him.
Yeah.
Certainly Michael Jackson, Prince.
Here's actually-
Oh, yeah
... Prince inducting Funkadelic into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 1997.
Check this out.
Let me just say something about George, since he's a good friend of mine.
One time he sent me a tape and says, "You pee
on it and then send it back to me."
"And I'll pee on it, and then we'll see what we got."
So
this is what George is all about to me and mine.
It's the body again, though. It's the body.
I went to see him-
It's a dying body
... at the theater, and it was frightening.
14 people singing Knee Deep in
unison. That night I
went to the studio and recorded Erotic City.
Hmm.
This is Erotic City.
Yeah.
There it is.
Yeah.
You know?
That is cool.
It's right there at the surface.
Yeah.
We got one more track on this.
Yeah, Prince and '90s, early 2000 hip-hop.
For sure. Yeah, so much hip-hop influence.
There's been documentaries made about it, actually.
Yeah. Sampling, interpolation, of course.
Of course, the closer is unbelievable.
The whole album, there's not a bad track on this whole album.
Yeah. This is an amazing album.
Everything is a banger. This is maybe a perfect album as far as accomplishing what
they're setting out to do.
Is this the weirdest track?
This is
the fartiest track on the album-
The fartiest
... in the funkiest way. This is Night of the Thumpasorus Peoples.
First diminished chord of the record right there.
We
can learn that at Open Studio no problem.
Unbelievable.
Bass, bass.
All that bass s**t happening.
It's about to get even funkier up in here,
though.
I am love.
Woo.
We are love.
I am
love.
We are love.
The Thumpasorus is both a caveman and a space creature. Did you know that?
Woo. I'm going
to jump ahead a little bit.
Man, that bass line.
This is unreal here.
Gaga goo ga. Gaga goo ga. Gaga goo ga ga.
Funk contrapuntal.
Ah.
That
whole thing. Wonderful.
If this album doesn't make you want to play bass,
I don't know what album would.
Oh, my God.
There can't be a more satisfying bass album.
Yeah.
It just feels unbelievable, these grooves that Bootsy's laying down.
Bootsy recorded so much great stuff, but this may be...
And it's not his craziest playing, but man, it's
so primal and foundational and
so well-crafted. Everything on this record.
Okay, this is a good one.
My cheeks hurt, my jaw hurts. I feel my whole face is-
You okay, man?
... I'm worn out. I'm emotionally drained.
Let's get through some categories before you-
I'm like-
While you still have some
... I have the list out, but I'm, holy smokes.
Let's get through some categories.
All right, Desert Island Track. What do you got?
"Give Up the Funk."
This is a great call.
Yeah.
It's a great call.
Yeah.
I've got "Mothership Connection."
Okay. Another good call.
"Starchild."
You could've said anything.
Apex moment, what do you got?
So, that was that. We played that bass line.
Oh, on "Give Up the Funk."
Yeah, the Bootsy.
Yeah.
But what you got?
I got "Ga Ga Goo Ga." Ga ga goo ga ga.
Oh.
Ga ga goo ga ga.
Well, we just heard-
I love that .
Yeah.
That
section we just left off is one of my all-time favorite moments on any album.
Yeah.
And the ga ga goo ga, ga ga goo ga ga- ... I think is so beautiful.
It is, yeah.
It's so beautiful.
I don't know where I got this note, though.
It says, "The Mothership is both a UFO and a chariot, and the
Thumpasorus is both a caveman and a space creature," in case you're keeping score-
Yeah
... at home.
So the actual Mothership itself-
Yeah
... is from the 1951 sci-fi film "The Day the Earth Stood Still." Did you
know that?
No.
Yeah.
I've visited it, though. I've not touched it.
The one on the cover
is from that film.
Yeah. Oh, I didn't know that.
Yeah.
Well, the one that they used on the tour was, I saw it at the Smithsonian, the
African American Museum in DC.
I think that's a replica-
That's a replica
... but it's of their stage one. But yeah.
It's called Replica.
Replica.
Yeah. Okay, so that's Apex Moment. What's your Bespoke Playlist?
"On the One."
That's good.
And you put some Prince on there, you put some James Brown on there.
Yeah.
And everything's okay.
This is corny.
Morris Day on the time?
Yeah, for sure.
Good.
I got Give Me the Real Funk.
Yeah, that's corny.
Okay.
Quibble Bits.
We miss every shot that we don't take, Brian.
Okay, so now our new category here is Quibble Bits/Hot Takes, because if you don't
have a quibble bit, which oftentimes we don't, because we're listening to all-timer
albums here-
Yeah
... you can have a hot take. And my hot take is,
this is the most important band of the '70s. There's a lot of bands in the '70s.
Oh, I like the way you looked at me as you said that.
It was both with-
There's important-
... with a stern disposition-
Bro, there's important-
... confidence, but a little bit of inquisitiveness as well.
We're talking bands. There's a lot of bands, right? In the '70s.
You still got the look of like, "Can we focus in on this?"
Let me cook.
All right. Obviously, you got '70s hard rock bands, right?
You got Led Zeppelin.
Yeah.
You know what I mean? That's an important band.
Is Stevie Wonder a band?
No, Stevie's an artist, right?
Okay.
But you do have-
Headhunters
... Headhunters.
That's a good band.
Sure, I'll allow it. You got Steely Dan. Can we count Steely Dan?
Are they a band, though?
That's a band.
Okay.
That's technically a band.
Sorry, Reddit.
But you also have Earth, Wind & Fire. That's an important band.
Oh, my God.
You know?
Yeah. You've got some other, yeah.
You've got a lot of bands, basically.
Keith Jarrett.
The Band.
Keith Jarrett. Oh, yeah, The Band.
The Band.
Keith Jarrett solo piano, that's a band, kind of.
That's not a band.
No, not a band.
Peter... No, that's not a band. But-
Oscar Peterson Trio was still kicking.
Okay.
But
I am going to put it out there.
I got one more.
Parliament.
I got two more for you. Hold up.
Parliament and Funkadelic, as a
two-headed monsterIs the most important band of the 1970s.
Fight me.
Okay.
Fight me.
I'm not going to fight you. I'm going to throw out two other bands.
Okay.
And you're going to be surprised that I'm going to say these. Queen.
Great band. No doubt.
Led Zeppelin.
I already said Led Zeppelin.
Oh, you did? Okay.
Yeah.
Got you.
Okay. I'm not going to fight you. More important.
Okay. So that's your quibble bit.
That's my hot take.
That's your hot take.
Right? Quibble bit/hot take.
I have a quibble bit.
What you got?
Is this too funky?
Yes.
Or is that a hot take?
That's a hot take.
The bombeter.
I got a five.
Oh, I got a five.
Perfect. So how snobby is it on a scale of one to 10, is one being not
snobby at all, and 10 being snobby?
I am going to put this one at a five because it is obviously,
you are going to dance, but there is
a-
George Clinton with high-heel-
Hot boots
... knee-high sparkly silver boots coming out crotch first of a
spaceship,
and it is-
How snobby is it? Yeah. Are you saying that makes it snobby or accessible?
I don't know.
Yeah, that's why I went five. I was like, "I can't tell if it's-
I know
... super snobby or super fun."
It's a perfect five, actually.
Yeah.
Is it better than Innervisions?
No.
I agree.
Yep.
Accoutrements, what do you got?
I'm going nine, and I'm very close to a 10 on this one, but I
reserve... It's great.
It's very close to a 10.
You know what is a 10, is this font.
The font is unbelievable.
Yeah.
The font of the logo of Parliament is unbelievable, and the font of Mothership
Connection.
Yeah. And the colors.
And then there's a good gravy spaceship in the whole thing,
Peter.
Yeah.
It's very, very close to a 10.
And then the back. This is what I was saying-
I know
... because you look at the front, because the front, he's come, and then-
And he's in Newark
... he's in Newark. Yeah. He's chilling. In Plainfield, New Jersey, so.
It's so good.
Yeah.
Up next. What do you got?
I got Meters' Look-Ka Py Py. That particular record was an early one for the
Meters, 1969. So it's interesting because it's...
Can I play a little bit? This would be janky.
I'm going to play a little out here.
No, I got you.
No.
I got you. Oh, you're going to play it on there?
Because I'm about to play mine on the system, buddy.
Okay. See who can get to it first.
Oh, here's mine.
Yo, this is Mood Control.
Yo.
Saying you might as well pay attention.
Wait, what is that?
Mine is their 1977, Parliament's 1977 album,
Funkentelechy vs. the Placebo Syndrome, and that's the track "Funkentelechy." That
is
Look-Ka Py Py, obviously. Great call. They're both good calls.
You could also put
any of the early Prince would be a great after this.
I can barely hear it.
Don't worry. It's on your iPhone speaker.
Okay. All right.
Sam is in there-
Yeah, it's on your iPhone
... Sam is in there scowling at you right now, just so you know.
Good. He said, "Good."
Peter?
He said, "Thumbs up."
This was a freaking blast, man. Thank you so much.
This was awesome. High five.
Okay.
I wanted to be weird with it because we're in a weird...
Until next time.
You'll hear it.
Hey. I got your glasses.