I’ve been having a crazy week as I
work to clear the decks for some quality time off over the first week of June.
My week off is an almost sacred ritual for me, when I recharge my batteries for
the rest of the year, get some writing done and generally decompress. Last year
this was interrupted by a family crisis, so this year I am even more in need of
a break. Sometimes you just need to slow
down.
Of course, there are other times
when you need to get on up! For those times, here is the album I’ve been working
through for the past week or so.
Disc 621 is…. Foundations of Funk: A Brand New Bag 1964-1969
Artist: James
Brown
Year of Release: 1996 but the music
is from 1964-1969
What’s up with the Cover? Soul Brother No. 1,
aka Mr. Dynamite, getting down on stage as only he knows how. I usually love
outlandish clothes (I wear them myself) but this cape is not doing it for me,
style-wise. Also, I bet it is a bitch to clean.
How I Came To Know It: My buddies Nick and Spence both had this album and played
it a lot when it was first released. I liked what I heard and so I bought it
for myself.
How It Stacks Up: This is a compilation album, so it doesn’t really
stack up at all. If it did, it would stack up well.
Rating: you can’t put a rating on a ‘best of’ album.
Two full
albums, twenty-seven songs – eight of them over seven minutes long, and a total
of over two and a half hours of music, and not once did this album lose my
attention.
I talk a
lot on the CD Odyssey about double albums that should be single albums, and how
albums should ideally not exceed 14 tracks. I am also not keen on compilation
albums because they tend to gloss over an artist’s career. “Foundations of
Funk” breaks all these rules, and yet still comes out shining like the diamonds
on James Brown’s cape.
In terms
of overall length, when you deliver the funky stuff as consistently as James
Brown and his band, you can play all night as far as I’m concerned. I recently
reviewed Glenn Miller and as tight as that is, there is nothing more together
than James Brown’s band in these years.
The
album is perfectly timed during the latter half of the sixties where Brown’s band
has some of the finest musicians. Other than the amazing Maceo Parker on saxophone,
I didn’t know any of their names, but I broke my own rules to look them up and
give them the recognition they deserve. Pee Wee Ellis also plays Saxophone,
Jimmy Nolen delivers the funkiest guitar ever, and Bernard Odum (bass) and
Clyde Stubblefield (drums) hold down the rhythm section.
Brown is
the consummate band leader and guides the band, calling for them to be softer
or faster, “give the drummer some” or at times to just let it ‘ooze out’. They respond to every one of his directions
perfectly in time, and never lose the irresistible grooves that make these
songs the most sampled in rap music history.
A lot of
James Brown compilations make the mistake of choosing very short versions of
James Brown songs, sometimes even just having them fade out prematurely, like a
bad K-Tel record. “Foundations of Funk” recognizes that part of James Brown’s
charm is his ability to maintain and develop a powerful energy over a long
period of time. Long cuts of “I Can’t
Stand Myself” (7:19), “Cold Sweat”
(6:50), “I Don’t Want Nobody To Give Me
Nothing” (9:43) and “Ain’t It Funky
Now” (9:28) take time to develop their groove and let you sink into the
full band experience.
There
are 27 tracks on this album, but with the exception of the last one (“Mother Popcorn”) there isn’t much chaff
to complain about. These are all great versions of these songs that sound as
organic and natural today, over forty years later, as they must have to the
amazed audiences in the sixties, as James Brown set about almost singlehandedly
inventing a new style of music – funk – out of the soul of the times.
In terms
of covering an artist’s career, “Foundations of Funk” avoids the pitfall of
trying to cover the many decades of James Brown’s catalogue. Instead it focuses
tightly around six critical years where he developed from a basic soul crooner
into a unique artist.
The
songs are a mix of general good times, political messages of self-affirmation,
often fused together. “I Don’t Want
Nobody To Give Me Nothing (Open Up the Door I’ll Get It Myself)” and “Say It Loud – I’m Black and I’m Proud” deliver
a message of self-empowerment that spoke positively and unequivocally about the
need for racial equality. On the other end of the spectrum, “Ain’t It Funky Now” and “I Can’t Stand Myself (When You Touch Me)”
are just good sexy fun. All the songs get your head bobbing and fill you with
positive energy.
I don’t
have any studio albums by James Brown (all three of my albums are compilations),
and I would be happily be introduced to those someday. That said, as
compilations go, you can’t do much better than “Foundations of Funk” – it takes
its time to immerse you in the music and doesn’t rush you past all the things
that make it great, just like each individual song on it. It is well worth your
time.
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