Deep Album Cuts Vol. 373: Sly and the Family Stone
Questlove's new documentary Sly Lives! (aka The Burden of Black Genius) is out on Hulu today, and I'm watching it right now, it's really good, I recommend you check it out.
2. Advice
3. Turn Me Loose
4. Higher
5. Are You Ready
6. Color Me True
7. Into My Own Thing
8. Love City
9. Fun
10. Don't Call Me N*****, Whitey
11. You Can Make It If You Try
12. Somebody's Watching You
13. Just Like A Baby
14. Luv N' Haight
15. Poet
16. In Time
17. Babies Makin' Babies
18. Mother Beautiful
19. Wishful Thinkin'
20. Who Do You Love?
21. Blessing In Disguise
22. It Takes All Kinds
23. Ha Ha, Hee Hee
Tracks 1, 2 and 3 from A Whole New Thing (1967)
Tracks 4, 5 and 6 from Dance to the Music (1968)
Tracks 7, 8 and 9 from Life (1968)
Tracks 10, 11 and 12 from Stand! (1969)
Tracks 13, 14 and 15 from There's a Riot Goin' On (1971)
Tracks 16 and 17 from Fresh (1973)
Tracks 18 and 19 from Small Talk (1974)
Track 20 from High on You by Sly Stone (1975)
Track 21 from Heard Ya Missed Me, Well I'm Back (1976)
Track 22 from Back on the Right Track (1979)
Track 23 from Ain't but the One Way (1982)
A Whole New Thing did pretty much nothing commercially, and nothing from it was even included in the band's best-selling release, Greatest Hits. But the band's debut really impressed me. One of their best known vocalists, Sly's sister Rose Stone, hadn't joined the band yet, but their sound is pretty fully formed on there already, and they were just so far ahead of just about everyone else. "Fun" is the only non-single that appeared on Greatest Hits, which was released when Sly kept missing deadlines for the album that would eventually be known as There's A Riot Goin' On, his masterpiece. "Higher," "You Can Make It If You Try," and "Love City" were all part of the band's most famous performance, at Woodstock. And quite a few of these songs are featured prominently in the new documentary.
I always knew that a lot of artists had sampled Sly and the Family Stone, but I was a little amazed at how many Sly deep cuts were sampled on hit singles and well known songs from classic albums, sometimes my jaw would drop when I put on a track and made the connection. LL Cool J sampled "Trip To Your Heart" on "Mama Said Knock You Out." Fatboy Slim sampled "Into My Own Thing" on "Weapon of Choice." A Tribe Called Quest sampled "Fun" on "Can I Kick It?" and also sampled "Advice" on "Skypager." Public Enemy sampled both "Turn Me Loose" and another Sly song, "Let's Be Together," on "Power to the People." Ice Cube sampled "You Can Make It If You Try" on "Wicked" and also sampled "Don't Call Me N*****, Whitey" on "Horny Lil' Devil." Kendrick Lamar sampled "Wishful Thinkin'" on "Momma." The Beastie Boys sampled "Are You Ready" on "Finger Lickin' Good." Missy Elliott sampled "In Time" on "X-tasy." Beck sampled "Love City" on "Sissyneck." John Legend sampled "Just Like A Baby" on "She Don't Have To Know." De La Soul sampled "Poet" on "Description." Scarface sampled "Babies Makin' Babies" on "The Diary."
You often hear about Sly Stone as a reclusive enigma, and it's true that his public appearances have been rare and unpredictable over the last 40 years. But I was surprised to realize that he made a real effort at staying in the spotlight before that -- after Fresh, his last really successful record, he made 5 albums in the following decade, sometimes with sort of needy titles like Heard Ya Missed Me, Well I'm Back and Back on the Right Track. The Family Stone essentially disbanded in 1975, but Sly kept on using the group name with mostly different people after his one official solo album, High On You, was unsuccessful. Those later records are all pretty good, though, even if they're not masterpieces like There's A Riot Goin' On, they're worth checking out.
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