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Rating: Parliament are famous not for tracks like "My Automobile", "I Call My Baby Pussycat", "Moonshine Heather" (the highlights of "Osmium"), but for indisputable masterpieces like "Give Up The Funk", "Sir Nose d'Voidoffunk", "Up For The Down Stroke", and so on. Famous indeed...famous in the United States where they were, and in some ways still are, just short of deities, a part of their popular culture; in Italy, they’re quite overlooked. Imagine, then, an album like "Osmium" (1970), shadowed in the group's discography, underrated, and ignored. An almost forgotten album, for many just "the debut album of Parliament", neither here nor there.
Why is it a forgotten album? Because it has a very peculiar sound, which has nothing to do with the sound that George Clinton's crew would develop in the late '70s. Much closer to the early phase of the twin group, Funkadelic, the phase of albums like "Free Your Mind And Your Ass Will Follow" and "Maggot Brain", to be clear. There is affinity, no doubt, but there is also a fundamental difference: the early works of Funkadelic are homogeneous, it’s clear a common thread runs through all the songs. This common thread is missing in Osmium. A blessing and a curse, because it’s true that it makes the album harder to listen to, but it is also true that it characterizes it, perhaps making it unique in the entire discography of Parliament-Funkadelic and related spin-offs (an extensive discography of which I know only a small part, so I allow myself the benefit of the doubt).
In "Osmium" you go from the driving black-rock of "I Call My Baby Pussycat" (the title says it all) to the wonderfully epic concluding ballad "The Silent Boatman", complete with bagpipes. In this mix, there’s gospel ("Oh Lord Why Lord/Prayer"), some country influences ("Little Ole Country Boy"), there’s doo-woop, reminiscent of The Parliaments’ recent past (to unravel the intricate web of Clinton’s band history, here is not the place) in "My Automobile". There’s all this, here and there there’s a vague parodic intent, certainly a playful tone, and absolutely no common thread. I like it that way.
Tracklist Lyrics and Videos
06 My Automobile (04:44)
spoken]
Hey dig it y'all, hey dig it
What you got there?
Hey remember how, when you got your car
And you take a girl out for a ride
And you take her way out in the boonies somewhere
Well, if you don't give me a kiss, I'm gonna put you out here
And I ain't gonna ride you back
Oh yeah!
Dig, dig
Hold on, hold on!
Hey, dig this tune
Bernie, I'll play this,
Doo, doo doo-doo doo
Dig it dig it, yeah, yeah
Check this out
This is what I want you to do
Right here, big lines
You don't have to walk home, my dear
(I'll get that, yeah, yeah)
You don't have to walk home, my love
(sing with me right here, right here, yeah)
If you'll be nice to me (yeah, uh-huh)
Oh, I'll be good to you
And we'll both ride home in my automobile
Wait a minute, I've got something here
Listen to this
Listen
All that I want is a little kiss (yeah go ahead and try that,see how that works)
All that I want is a teeny weeny hug (go back there)
If you'll be nice to me
Oh, I'll be good to you (mm-hmm!)
And we'll both ride home in my automobile (ha ha!)
Uh, let's try it, let's try it hillbilly
You...
No wait, go again
All that I want is just a little kiss
(yeah I think we better do it like that, let's do it like that)
With that sound?
Yeah, with that hillbilly sound
OK, let's go and cut man, let's go and cut it right now, OK
[sung]
You don't have to walk home, my dear
You don't have to walk home, my love
If you'll be nice to me
Whoa, I'll be good to you
And we'll both ride home in my automobile
All that I want is just a little kiss
All that I want is a teeny weeny hug
If you'll be nice to me
Whoa, I'll be good to you
And we'll both ride home in my automobile
Sit just a little bit closer, my dear (come on, woman)
Sit just a little bit closer, my love
If you'll be nice to me
Whoa, I'll be good to you
And we'll both ride home in my automobile
Come over here, woman!
Give me one of those big sloppy kisses!
You know I don't kiss on my first date!
What!
No, sorry
You gonna wind up walkin'!
You would not make me walk
No kisses?
I don't want to walk home
I know you're walkin' now, you gotta go
I don't want to kiss you!
It's my automobile
What? No kisses, my dear
What? No huggin', my love
If you don't want to talk
You're a gonna have to get out and walk
And I'll ride home in my automobile
You don't want to ride in these cams
I've got four kinds of cams
I can wheel and deal and go on home, lord
In my automobile
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