Sly & The Family Stone

There was a revolt underway in America in 1971, a musical and social revolt, a revolt that left behind the marks of struggle (a visible scorch) and the seeds of hope (stars turned into flowers) on the American flag depicted on the cover of "There's A Riot Goin' On". No, it wasn't the fierce political assault of the Black Panthers, nor the war cry of the free jazz saxophonists, nor even the black fist raised to the sky in 1968 from the Olympic podium in Mexico City by Tommie Smith and John Carlos. No, the revolt of Sly & The Family Stone wasn't the same as the poetic, legendary one of Muhammad Ali. It was, however, something equally important, even if less dramatic.

In 1971, in an America still shaken by racial and social tensions, topping the music charts with a band made up of Black and white members, men and women, who instead of splitting over their differences came together through their shared passions, seemed like an impossible feat. This was the revolt of Sly & The Family Stone: proof that people from different ethnic and social backgrounds could cooperate and achieve great things, as shown by the success of their 1969 album "Stand!". It might seem a small thing today, but back then it was no trifling matter to make white people understand that Black people weren't animals, and, at the same time, to make Black people understand that not all white people were racists. What was needed wasn't a bloody uprising, but an act of real courage: the courage to approach one another, individual to individual, in an ecumenical spirit. Sly Stone, with his eccentric family, managed to do exactly that.

Then there was the purely musical revolt: Ray Charles, Otis Redding and Aretha Franklin had carried soul beyond the church pews; James Brown, Marvin Gaye and Stevie Wonder had given it groove; Sly Stone turned it psychedelic. The band led by Sylvester Stewart, Sly's real name, started out from soul-funk and soured its guitars, making its rhythm more intoxicated and hypnotic, following a stylistic trend that, in the early Seventies, was also being pursued - with varying results - by groups like Last Poets and Funkadelic.

In truth, "There's A Riot Goin' On" has a fairly different sound from the two groups mentioned above: it certainly shares the same jumble of music and styles, but the irresistible pop hooks of tracks like "Family Affair" and "Runnin' Away" were light years away from the proto-rap assault of Last Poets and the funk-psychedelic orgies of George Clinton's band.

Sly And The Family Stone's music flirted dangerously with the psychedelic rock of Hendrix, with country (the music of white America), and of course with jazz and Caribbean music. It's an immense stylistic kaleidoscope that, besides being the musical manifesto of an era, remains a record whose influence on music to come would be enormous, felt indiscriminately by both Black and white musicians alike (celebrated by many, from Miles Davis to the Red Hot Chili Peppers, by way of Prince, Talking Heads, and Gang Of Four). And to think that such a masterpiece was born in a far from easy period for Sly: his drug habit and his mythomaniac streak strained his relationship with the rest of the band, who left him alone in the studio for much of the album's making: the songs were written and arranged entirely by Stewart, though the instrumental contribution of the rest of the Family proved essential all the same.

The chart-smashing single "Family Affair" is the crown jewel of "There's A Riot Goin' On": it's one of the first tracks in the history of popular music to make use of a drum machine, but beyond such historical trivia, it was the sultry vocal counterpoint and the orgasmic piano flourishes that won over the hearts of so many Americans.

Sly's voice at the time had a double soul: one warm and seductive in tone, the other histrionic and sickly; this made him an extremely versatile singer. Sly Stone could certainly sound sensual in his singing, and his band backed him with a touch of glossy decadence that stands as one of the stylistic hallmarks of their sound.

On the opening "Luv N' Haight", an erotic, vibrant soul lets its head be drenched in waves of lustful funk; "Poet" doubles down with white-hot grooves washed in crystalline organ tremors.

The album's masterpieces are the two soul-funk jams "Africa Talk To You (The Asphalt Jungle)" and "Thank You For Talkin' To Me Africa": possessed guitars venture into previously unknown psychedelic forests, the bass ejaculates outrageous grooves, and the keyboards in the background revel in their jazzy chords. It's sex set to music, and one must shed every prudish inhibition of listening to fully appreciate these two long tracks.

Sex set to music, as we said, and the breathless horn-driven moans of "Brave & Strong", as well as the raw, languid atmospheres of "Just Like Baby" and "Time", only confirm it. Three songs perfectly suited as the soundtrack for nights spent amid the smoke of seedy little clubs and chance hotel rooms.

The showstopper is called “Spaced Cowboy”, in which Sly indulges in a kind of clownish yodel, while soul lets its fleshy legs be licked by the tongue of a decidedly willing country.

There was an uprising underway in America in 1971, an uprising whose aftershocks still echo today in the grooves of many current records (Shape Of Broad Minds, Tv On The Radio, Dusk + Blackdown), which have become symbols of the musical and ethnic cross-pollination of the 2000s: that uprising was not in vain, that uprising is still going on.

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23/11/2008