Thankful n' Thoughtfull: The Sly Stone Dedicated Chronological Listening Thread

https://www.theguardian.com/music/2023/oct/06/i-never-lived-a-life-i-didnt-want-to-live-sly-stone-on-addiction-ageing-and-changing-music-for-ever

The Axiom Funk version of this is a different, less wander-y mix (spoiler: Maceo’s vocal is still terrible). It also features studio chatter at the beginning and end with Sly – including him seemingly getting ready to comp over a double time rhythm box in the latter right before it cuts out.

Somebody needs to make a supercut of Sly studio chatter. Going back to Fresh, there’s a metric ton of it.

199. Earth, Wind and Fire - Good Time (Heritage, 1990)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jSezf9GMOoQ
In a testament to just how many aging, big name R&B stars were willing to give him a shot, Sly wanders into the studio to provide some backing vocals for EW&F on this Cameo-endebted track. But as with many of these late-period collaborations he's not particularly prominent.

200. 13CATS - Thank You (March of the 13CATS, 1991)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kBrbLb7KuNs
Wikipedia credits Sly with playing guitar on this, but no other information is available. A pointless retread with lots of 90s-era bells and whistles. This becomes common for subsequent releases with Sly's name in the credits, they generally slot into a post-90s G-Funk/Prince-post New Jack Swing sort of sound that updated 70s funk tropes with a digital production sheen.

201. George Clinton - Ain't That Peculiar (George Clinton and His Gangsters of Love, 2008)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4zPVrKynudE
After almost 20 years of silence, Sly's voice audibly pops up towards the end (he trails off: "that's all I can do right now"). That's about it.

202. George Clinton - Fever (George Clinton and His Gangsters of Love, 2008)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sQT8g2_TcPs
The noodling at the beginning sounds a bit like Sly, as do some of the autotuned vocals in the main body of the track. Otherwise the track sounds like studio scraps dressed up with some modern-ish overdubs.

203. BabyStone - Stonetro / Ask Me (BabyStone, 2008)
https://www.thefunkstore.com/Sounds2012/BabyMp3Stone.mp3
Recording project of one of Sly's daughters (Novena Carmel) that put out an EP in 2008. Full songs do not appear to be online, these links/clips from the website were all that seem to be publicly available. Sly's damaged voice opens the EP, dredging up some passably entertaining DJ patter from his days with KSOL and KDIA, and also shows up (about 1:30 in) for the brief track "Ask Me". The material and musicianship is not bad at all, credible and well produced post-G-funk throwbacks. Sly, however, is little more than a grunting shadow of his former self.

Memoir via Questlove is coming out it seems. Feature on CBS Sunday Morning on ot: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PpdlfVVLPQ4

*it*

205. Sly Stone - Plain Jane (I'm Back! Family & Friends, 2011)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zP1b7zAe6RI
His latest and final(?) attempt at a comeback. This album was primarily remixes and covers of his old material, with a ton of (mostly regrettable) collaborators lending a hand. It also had a couple of originals, including this liquid, midtempo funk track. Who's doing what is not entirely clear. A talkbox and a phaser-enhanced bassline take the lead over some rather pedestrian drumming, burnished by female vocals and a scrappy horn part, with Sly's strained voice popping in on the choruses for a single line. Much of the lyrics are indecipherable, the song generally seems to address a girl who likes to party. It isn't terrible but it's also pretty generic, with little of Sly's compositional skills on display.

206. Sly Stone - His Eye Is On the Sparrow (I'm Back! Family & Friends, 2011)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=72Pop-sr7_w
Now this is a bit more interesting. Sly returns to an oft-covered gospel standard that dates back to 1905, an obvious instance of a career coming full circle. At a guess that's him leading the way on the organ, although he doesn't do much besides play sustained chords, and presumably that's his scratchy voice that briefly appears almost 2 minutes in. The song itself is a statement of faith and this take leans heavily on the refrain ("I sing because I’m happy, I sing because I’m free / For His eye is on the sparrow, and I know He watches me"), with some added "change me / don't change me" lines (Sly, always hedging). The accompaniment is again fine if not particularly distinguished, and the arrangement does little but repeat the chord cycle over and over. Still, the poignant irony of the material itself goes a fair way towards making this resonate.

That comment at the end of the CBS Sunday Morning interview with Questlove was pretty profound - most of Sly's contemporaries died in their 20's, 30's and 40's indeed. The fact he's still kicking, after only just getting clean merely 4 years ago (at age 76?) is extraordinary. Dude's got some Keith Richards level resilience to chemical abuse, but in Sly's case it seems fueled by spite!

207. Sly Stone - Get Away (I'm Back! Family & Friends, 2011)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pK1OLARof5s
Far and away the best of the lot, even if its just a plagal cadence over a drum machine. Did they actually did out a Rhythm Ace for this, or just re-use a bit of the "Family Affair" tracks? Barebones as the structure is, there's a spark of Sly's old arranging acumen; the mix of wah wah guitars, a bobbling bassline, suspended organ chords, crescendoing horns, and gospel backing vocals is both dreamy and propulsive. Sly's raspy voice, now little more than a whisper, is once again out front, plaintive but still melodically playful. The lyrics, just two verses and a refrain, return to familiar tropes - hesitancy about commitment, a faith in music ("You can get away from the guy who loves you / They'll break your heart in two / I can get away from the girl who feeds me / She don't need you like I need you" and "I would bet my pay for a year and a day / If I couldn't be wrong / About this melody written for you and me / And we might as well sing the song"). It's not an incredible song but it is fittingly wistful.

Agree, I like that song.

Based on what I’ve seen of Sly since that WTF Grammy’s performance I can almost hardly believe he is singing on this as well as he is. Can’t he almost barely speak at this point? How is he even carrying a tune? Is it possible this is actually an older cut?

208. Funkadelic - The Naz (First Ya Gotta Shake The Gate, 2013)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QbPLMpgRc-o
Our final entry. While it would be foolish at this point to expect Sly to go out with a bang, he doesn't exactly go out with a whimper either, more like a giggle. This is thanks to George, who, 30 years on, is still trying to pull Sly out of his hole. His loyalty is remarkable. Sly delivers an abbreviated version of Lord Buckley's classic sermon recounting the life of the titular Nazarene over a decent digital funk groove. Clinton characteristically layers in a bunch of synthesizer and electric guitar details into a backing track that more or less works, and then lets Sly loose, looping bits of his monologue here and there. The connection between Buckley and Sly's vocabulary is made explicit, and there's obviously layers of significance woven in here in terms of Sly's life and career - the savior archetype, motormouthed hipster patter, funk. Lots of echoes here. (In one odd bit of symmetry, Buckley's lines: "if they can't straighten it they know a cat that knows a cat that's gonna get it straight", which is very close to Sly's henchman Hamp Banks' description of himself: "When it got to big for me, I knew the cat that knew the cat that could get it done.") Thankfully, Buckley's text does not extend beyond the loaves and fishes story, sparing the listener any implied parallel between Sly's own failings and Christ's demise.

Since further musical output from Sly seems unlikely at this late date, this serves as a strangely fitting capstone to his discography. Hopefully this thread has made the overarching arc of his career clear, even if it's a cliche at this point: a series of undeniable and monumental achievements, marred by a depressing capacity for self-sabotage that lasted for almost 50 years. Unlike Brian Wilson - whose own life and career is in many ways an inverted, white-bread, mirror image of Sly's (Sly loves dualisms but who knows if he would appreciate or acknowledge this one) - there hasn't really been any late-period redemption. Wilson, while still eternally haunted and damaged, got his shit together and appears to have achieved some measure of functionality and peace; the core of his musical talent has never left him, he still loves music, he needs it and believes in it and works at it. By contrast, when Sly attempted a similar comeback in the 2000s it was hampered by his all-too familiar problems and habits. In many ways it's just too late. The Summer of Soul doc and forthcoming QuestLove doc are a historical corrective, rightly emphasizing his massive talent and impact. Based on advance press and published excerpts, Sly's autobiography (which comes out tomorrow), will no doubt shed some light on the details of Sly's life and his perspective on it, but it seems unlikely to contain much in the way of critical self-examination. For an artist who claimed to write his songs while looking in the mirror, he seems to have spent much of his life running away from his own reflection.

*applause*

epic thread, ty One Child

Yeah, this was great, thanks so much.

Cheers, amazing work

Yes incredible effort on this thread, ty <3

Great thread, though becomes inevitably more depressing as we move into the later years.

Legendary thread! Loved reading from start to finish

Surely this is the gold standard for listening threads? So thorough and insightful.

One of my favorite ILM experiences over 20 years here. Just a treasure trove of top shelf analysis.

What am I going to do everyday at lunchtime now? LOL.

Great thread! Thank you so much! Respect.

I didn't give anywhere like enough time to this thread but it's a great acheivement!

Oh, no mention of "If I Didn't Love You", also on First Ya Gotta Shake The Gate?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bBpt8Yu3Q8s

We never did discuss "My Gorilla is My Butler", either...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KbZQ6tIeNH8

It's strange that Sly's status as a "survivor" almost makes his career sadder than if he had died at some point in the last 50 years.

Just finished reading the oral history from a couple of years back in anticipation of reading Sly's new one.

All I can say is ...wow. I blame PCP.

After listening to Questlove's podcast with the autobio writer, I listened to 'Life of Fortune & Fame', which is pretty striking and was apparently on a comp of unreleased '60s tracks that came out in the '90s called Funkmeister. Curious if One Child had heard these?

Also at the very end there's a clip of an actually unreleased '80s Sly song, just a DX7 and drum machine. It's very Prince-y, really something.

Nice clip, thanks for sharing.

BTW it’s kind of nuts that OneChild started this thread 3 1/2 years ago and finished the 208th and last entry the day before his memoir was released.

Autobio is great!

I downloaded Small Talk prompted by this thread - had never heard it - and it's absolutely blazing my Saturday, "Can't Strain My Brain" is wildly, weirdly great. Thank you Sly and Shakey.