Funkadelic
Funkadelic

THE REVIEW

“If you will suck my soul I will lick your funky emotion”
“Hey babe!”

This is how “Mommy, what’s a Funkadelic?” begins, the opening track of the first, self-titled, album by Funkadelic: what I would call a significant statement of intent.

1: The story

In the late '60s, the great master George Clinton gathered an authentic army of African-American musicians (among which I'd note the unfortunate guitarist Eddie Hazel), simultaneously founding two essential groups in the history of funk: Parliament and Funkadelic, with the former more danceable and bright, the latter darker and hallucinogenic.
Funkadelic's debut was in 1970 with the album in question: Funkadelic.
To simplify, also due to my not exactly encyclopedic knowledge on the subject, we can say that Clinton doesn’t strive to devise particularly innovative formulas, but rather he draws heavily from the African-American musical heritage developed in the previous decade: James Brown, Jimi Hendrix Experience, Sly And The Family Stone, and also the much maligned (for some reason) Black Merda.

2: The advertisement

In our presumption to rise above the vulgar mechanical folk, we often fall victim to doubts normally considered intellectual snobbery: is what I am about to listen to also important/innovative musically? Am I about to listen to Creed when actually I could be listening to Soundgarden? Once such doubts are dispelled, there are plenty of reasons to listen to Funkadelic. We could start by saying they are cool. And you will also agree that a platoon of '70s black dudes dressed to rival Lady Gaga and against whom Snoop Dogg seems like one of the guests at Babette’s Feast predisposes you much more to listening compared to four gym-toned and teased-up white guys with silly nicknames and leather and studs outfits intended to appear mystically evil while they actually look very '80s gay BDSM and ignore the fact that this way of dressing was made famous by one of the homosexuals I most admire, namely Rob Halford of Judas Priest. I think the only ones as cool as them are the four Germans who claimed to be robots or at most those with the yellow jumpsuit and pyramid hat. Also, the story of drugs: Funkadelic indulge heavily in hallucinogens resulting in 15 albums each more beautiful than the last plus nine by Parliament, given that the members are the same. Nowadays, loser drugs like Pete Doherty's are so popular and the outcomes are visible.

3: The album, finally

Funkadelic, the band’s self-titled debut album, is therefore highly recommended listening and paves the way for two stellar albums like the subsequent Free Your Mind and Your Ass Will Follow and Maggot Brain. Seven unmistakable songs, each more beautiful than the last.
“Mommy, what’s a Funkadelic?" introduces us to the world of this absurd group and answers when we ask who these madmen are: together with the concluding “What is Soul” it sends the listener into a world of intricate jams where male and female choirs intersect with instruments without ever becoming chaotic. In case we wondered if they could produce a standout single, the answer could only be “I Got a Thing, You Got a Thing, Everybody Got a Thing”:  three minutes and fifty seconds of explosive danceable funk that makes you want to sing furiously like a black funkster in '70s America among his peers even to a half posh peroxide guy like me living in '10s Italy surrounded by people too brutish or too flashy to appreciate funk. Funk that then gets drowned in a sea of blues with “Qualify and Satisfy”, just to show us what music Led Zeppelin would have made if they were African-American. And then “Music for my Mother”, “I Bet You”, and “Good Old Music”: without risking to drag on with a much-hated track by track, I’ll say these tracks, the last two being remakes by Clinton’s previous band, The Parliaments, are on the same quality level as the others, keeping the quality of this fabulous album high.

The essence of the discussion is just listen to it.
Why did I only give four balls rating despite praising this masterpiece so intensely? For the simple reason that ratings are purely indicative (whatever that means) and that, as good as it is, Funkadelic is surpassed by the beauty of its aforementioned two successors.

Funk you all!