Parliament
The Clones Of Dr. Funkenstein

THE REVIEW

"As a genre, I’m really getting into funk"
"Oh yeah, the Ramones and the Clash are so cool! In Bologna two years ago I went to see Blink-182; it was awesome!!"

Funk really should be a genre reevaluated by pseudo-intellectual hipsters who are starting to frequent our cities, our bars, our favorite sites. Distinct yet often united with the already widespread indie crowd with super skinny jeans and the inevitable reflex camera, they pursue their fervent crusade against the mainstream and the overrated. The point is that in their quest for unknown and profound music, they usually end up finding tunes that are justifiably not famous. And they don’t realize it.
Funk, on the other hand, is music that makes everyone happy, when you find the right one. There are excellent musicians, interesting themes are addressed, it can be cheerful, carefree, intense, danceable, or hallucinogenic and largely needs to be rediscovered. Yes, because once it ceased to be mainstream, it led tons of great records into oblivion. With funk, alternative hipsters could combine the joy of this music with their cheap elitism. Furthermore, their know-it-all attitude would be rewarded by being able to recognize that galaxy of samples and recycled loops from pop, hip hop, and commercial electronic music of the last twenty years. Unfortunately, this is often not the case, and it’s a real shame.

"The Clones of Dr. Funkenstein" (1976) is one of the most eminent P-Funk chapters, and the title and cover alone make it such. In fact, it's a tasty, intense, pure funk and rhythm album, in a word, a fun but not trivial album. Compared to the albums immediately preceding and following, "The Clones..." features a shortening of the average song length to focus more on catchiness and immediate melodic involvement, yet it still manages to grow with every listen and does not tire quickly as often happens with easily pleasing music.
Unforgettable the choruses of "Dr. Funkenstein", truly wonderful "Children of Production" and "Gettin' To Know You", unforgettable "Do that Stuff", heavily sampled (think of Röyksopp's "Happy up Here"), perfectly fitting "Everything is on the One" and "I've Been Watching You (Move your Sexy Body)".

In short, one of those energetic albums that put you in a good mood. And above all, it does so without making you feel naive.
If you like Parliafunkadelicment, funk, or the ‘70s, you simply must listen to it. If you are alternative by definition, convert and penitenziagite.