One story I heard of his influence was that Stevie Wonder did a guest spot in a Sly & the Family Stone gig and could feel the energy of the whole place, heaving.
Took that feeling and with a new record deal giving him creative control did Superstition, Higher Ground and all those classics.
It's hard to be cynical enough about rock history you see on tv, but it's at least plausible that one genius can inspire another, thinking of a Haydn & Mozart kind of thing.
"If You Want Me to Stay" probably my favourite Sly Stone track.
I never got around to listening to his stuff with Funkadelic, maybe today is that day.
The best funk band: early Earth, Wind and Fire (before 1976 when they lost themselves into disco). Their funk was harmonically rich and rhythmically complex: A blend of jazz, soul, funk and R&B. Listen to their live double record Gratitude (1975).
I was listening to an interview of Alan Parsons and when they were talking about 1973’s Dark Side of the Moon, he mentioned that it was not nominated for the album Grammy and that Stevie Wonder won.
So I listened to Wonder’s Inner Visions and it was clear why it won. It is a much better album. It is a pity Inner Visions is largely forgotten.
Innervisions is hardly a forgotten record. To claim its better than Dark Side of the Moon is totally subjective and I would argue that its not. Dark Side works as an album while Innervisions feels like a collection of songs. Also, "Visions" as the second song, just sucks the energy out of a listen. They should have tacked that tune onto the end.
I love Dark Side, it's great. Stevie on that form was something else and isn't going to be forgotten for a century or two at the minimum as long as civilisation survives to remember one of its high points. Maybe Sylvester Stewart had an influence in it too.
That's a really good take. I wholeheartedly agree that Inner Visions was a "much better" album than Dark Side of the Moon. It's a real pity one is largely forgotten and the other is not, and I wonder why that might be.
Took that feeling and with a new record deal giving him creative control did Superstition, Higher Ground and all those classics.
It's hard to be cynical enough about rock history you see on tv, but it's at least plausible that one genius can inspire another, thinking of a Haydn & Mozart kind of thing.
"If You Want Me to Stay" probably my favourite Sly Stone track.
I never got around to listening to his stuff with Funkadelic, maybe today is that day.