Help me find funk music I would like.

April 24, 2004 1:45 PM

Help me find funk music I would like. (more inside)

I just heard Chicago's "Street Player", and though the entire song is just so-so, the parts that featured Maynard Ferguson sounded really cool to me. Anything in this vein would be fantastic.

What I like: Wah guitars, (loud and high) horns and saxophones, analog synthesizers, funk bass lines, early disco.

What I dislike: Anything soul-ish or slow. Vocals. Most P-Funk.

posted by Kwantsar to Media & Arts (17 answers total)

Rhino records has an excellent "History of Funk" series. If you're rolling your own, you need James Brown, Lee Dorsey, the Funkadelic "Music for My Mother" retrospective may should your mind about P-Funk, the Meters, Kool and the Gang, Super Fly (Curtis Mayfield) and Sly and the Family Stone. On the Disco side, The Best of Chic and, especially, The Best of Chic volume 2 are sublime. A lot of the best disco was one-hit wonder territory: look for compilations featuring Sylvester, the Brothers Johnson, and Sister Sledge (who were pretty much Chic with different vocalists).

A lot of great funk was done by artists who weren't funk artist at all, e.g., "Papa Was a Rolling Stone", "Cloud Nine" and "Standin' on Shakey Ground" by the Temptations.
posted by timeistight at 2:53 PM on April 24, 2004

Should be: "the Funkadelic "Music for My Mother" retrospective may change your mind about P-Funk."
posted by timeistight at 2:54 PM on April 24, 2004

If you rule out P-Funk and related ensembles, you will seriously limit your choices. George Clinton, Parliament, Funkadelic, Bootsy Collins... they define the genré, IMO.

Make sure to check out James Brown, Sly & the Family Stone, Kool and the Gang, Tower of Power, The Gap Band, early Rick James, Earth Wind & Fire.
posted by maniactown at 2:56 PM on April 24, 2004

What about Average White Band? Specifically "Cut the Cake"? There's vocals but it is not like the p-funk sound.
posted by geoff. at 2:59 PM on April 24, 2004

The Ohio Players?
posted by kenko at 3:35 PM on April 24, 2004

I 2nd the ohio players. I would also recommend some older Cameo And if you don't like P-Funk, then you've got serious problems ;)
posted by mkelley at 5:28 PM on April 24, 2004

Isley Brothers. Fight the Power.
posted by damnitkage at 6:08 PM on April 24, 2004

Get it all in THE FUNK BOX.

It's even comes in a crushed velvet box.
posted by answergrape at 6:45 PM on April 24, 2004

i'd rather not help you.
posted by sgt.serenity at 6:56 PM on April 24, 2004

Response by poster: Thanks, everyone (except sarge, of course). I've kazaa'd just about all of your suggestions. Any suggestions with more keyboards?
posted by Kwantsar at 7:04 PM on April 24, 2004

I highly recommend any instrumental albums by The Meters.
posted by waxpancake at 8:01 PM on April 24, 2004

If you like the Meters, try Vida Blue. Same drummer, but the side project of Phish's Page McConnell. "THE ILLUSTRATED BAND" is a great album. Very funky, but also a good jam band too.
posted by mkelley at 9:05 PM on April 24, 2004

Con Funk Shun. Kind of disco flavored.

Karma, which is kind of Afro-Jazz, Latin flavored. Very cool.
posted by geekhorde at 10:28 PM on April 24, 2004

Try digging about in here.
posted by the cuban at 5:44 AM on April 25, 2004

Galactic is funky.
posted by muckster at 3:31 PM on April 25, 2004

I second galactic, and would add soulive, garage a trois, and karl denson's tiny universe (kdtu) to the mix. I've also heard great things about greyboy allstars and lettuce, but haven't heard much of their stuff myself.
posted by rorycberger at 4:07 PM on April 25, 2004

oh, and if you like "wah" guitars, you can't get much "wah"-ier than robert randolph and the family band, which is based around randolph's pedal steel guitar. check them out live if you can, they put on a hell of a show. They have a live album (awesome) and a studio album (haven't heard it) out, both of which are probably available on kazaa. They have a wide variety of influences (gospel, funk, rock, jazz, etc.), and some songs are funkier than others, so download as much as you can until you find something you like. also, some songs start slow, but they all (that i've heard) end up being very high energy, so hear them out.
posted by rorycberger at 4:14 PM on April 25, 2004