Sly & The Family Stone - Theres a Riot Goin On '1971

Tracks list

Strange things happened to Sly and his Family Stone between the wild celebratory
party and tour that followed the release of Stand! and the beginning of the trip
into the studio that yielded Theres a Riot Goin On. Stand! was released in 1969
to critical and public acclaim and became a hit financially. It was followed by
a long, fruitful tour that included a triumphant appearance at the Woodstock
festival. The band recorded two singles in between albums. The first was Hot Fun
in the Summertime, issued in August 1969. It hit the number two spot on the
Billboard chart. Its follow-up was the funk monolith Thank You (Falettinme Be
Mice Elf Agin), which went to the top of the Billboard chart. Its important to
note that neither of these cuts are available on the 2007 Legacy reissues of
Slys Epic catalog even as bonus cuts, since they were recorded without a
specific album in mind, but rather as tracks to keep the band on the radio and
in the public consciousness. This was a period when the band, once a communal
troupe through and through, began to live in different places. Sly was living in
a rented mansion once owned by John and Michelle Phillips, getting loaded all
the time and missing concert dates on tour. According to Joel Selvins excellent
liners, Sly canceled 26 out of 80 dates. During the two-year break between
records, Sly wasnt exactly laying in bed. He was recorded all the time, even if
what he was recording, and with whom, produced nothing substantive. He bought a
primitive drum machine and began experimenting with it. Different bandmembers,
most notably bassist Larry Graham, would show up at different times to add parts
to songs and find themselves mixed out of the proceedings. Through the madness
that went on in the mansion and at Record Plant, where Sly would park a
Winnebago and party and record at the same time, a recording began to come
together. Before a three-night stand at Madison Square Garden, Sly offered the
album to Epic. Credits are sketchy as to who did what, though when Graham or
Freddie Stewart are present, their parts are unmistakable. The albums first
single was Family Affair, a skeletal track on which Billy Preston played
keyboards, the drum machine counted rhythms, and Sly and Sister Rose sang,
according to Selvins notes, through cupped hands, as there were no vocal
treatments. Its a strange, disorienting tune with an infectious melody. Its the
seduction for an album that is a nightmare journey through disillusionment, with
racial and class politics, a resignation to drug addiction and to the nightmare
of trying to ruin ones life in the face of reigning chaos and the pressure of
the four preceding years. The tune, like the album it comes from, seems to drift
with no center, no anchor except that drum machine. Sly sounds weary even if he
pretends an optimism. Hes resigned, and stating a simple truth, that blood is
thicker than mud. Remember this was the Vietnam era. The slippery funk and
Prestons killer fills give the track its irresistible riff. Luv N Haight is a
dark, fractured funk tune that passes its own judgment on the new Aquarian Age
with insulations and allegations that nothing much has changed. Still, its
arrangements are killer. Theres a ton of space between instruments, but the
whole is cohesive, slithering, sliding, and greasy. Its night-time gospel from
the pushers living room. Other places here are nearly impenetrable. The music
becomes so dense. Legend has it that Sly overdubbed and overdubbed until things
bled out into the margins, leaving a muddy, sludgy sound to permeate the records
grooves. If the earlier, joyous psychedelic funk sides were a reflection of
optimism and possibility, Theres a Riot Goin Ons sound is one of entropy, the
sound of the funk caving in on itself and the hope of a generation falling into
a place of darkness. This is after Malcolm X, Dr. King, and Bobby Kennedy, after
the escalation of the war, and more recently, after Kent State. Sly and his
collaborators are circling their wagons and projecting grooves inwardly here,
though they still manage to reach outside themselves. Even on Just Like a Baby,
the weariness in the keyboards and Greg Erricos drums are barely enough to keep
up the heroin-sounding groove. Its all slow, slow, slow. And if a child is being
celebrated, its from some emotionally distant place. The shimmering funk of
Africa Talks to You is led off by the drum machine again and Freddies guitar,
with fills on keyboards by Graham, Sly, and Preston; it trips, stumbles along,
and nearly falters, but the groove stays intact. One can here in the falsetto
Sly employs here, and in their staccato lines and choruses, where Prince snagged
his entire thing from. Brave & Strong is simply the tough funky bassline and a
horn head; everything else is layered underneath for the first 30 seconds: Ive
been down/Aint got a friend/You dont know/Wholl turn you in. This is a far cry
from I Want to Take You Higher. The slow, wispy soul that sounds like its
drifting in from a distant radio somewhere is what introduces You Caught Me
Smilin (Again). Its an unabashed hymn to getting high. Sister Roses voice is all
sweet, and at first so is Slys, but as the horns and bassline come stepping in,
Slys voice gets heavy and is distorting in places deliberately. The delicate
keyboard lines, luxuriant and in the pocket as they are, cannot keep the voice
contained. Theres a minimal instrumental break in the tune and it suddenly fades
just as it emerged. Time is a blues where spooky keyboards haunt Stones voice on
the fringes as he expounds on the concept cynically. The blues and urban soul
meet here under a cloud, through the haze, and the listener is a left at the
gate of the audio speakers, trying to hear her way into this sound world. The
worlds political situation at that time — and much more so right now
— was inaccessible to the masses, especially the young: The universe
seems to be a little stronger/Time is shaped in the hands. The set picks up,
just as you are so completely sucked into the dark murky grooves on Spaced
Cowboy, which is a travel tune in that its circular grooves actually go
somewhere and is deeply cohesive despite attempts at tape manipulation and
chaos. Its melody and yodel are satirical perhaps, but Sly is dead serious.
Runnin Away is one of those beautiful jazz-funk tunes where muted horns, a funk
and pop bass belie what is nearly a nursery rhyme tune: Runnin away/Youre wearin
out your shoes. It breezes by, but it never stays long enough for the listener
to get inside it; its all fluid in slow motion travel. The original set ends
with Thank You for Talkin to Me Africa. Its over seven minutes and begins in a
menacing, backbone-slipping FONK stepper: get close, let the bass speak to the
drums, the guitars translate, and the rest can come and go as it pleases. Vocals
are more ritualistic chant than song. The words thank you falettinme be myself
again come through the middle, but the other lyrics are almost impenetrable and
it becomes a spiritual cousin to Dr. Johns I Walk on Guilded Splinters, but more
seductive and thicker, like cough syrup, like opium tar, like surrender. This is
the mirror image of Marvin Gayes Whats Goin On, released in the same year as
plea for dialogue and forgiveness and togetherness in solving problems. Its the
embodiment of frustration, weariness, isolationism, and the desire of letting
things fall apart. And while it may be disturbing and narcotic to listen to, its
an absolutely essential exercise in the kind of funk that belies, underscores,
and amplifies lifes circumstances. That funk can be the music of the anti-party
as well as the genesis of the thing itself. [The Legacy edition with its expert
remastering makes the original album considerably less muddy. And while it may
sound a bit like a different recording than the original, one has to consider
that with all the overdubbing that went on with the limited number of original
tracks, this might be closer to what Stone wanted rather than settled for. There
are four bonus tracks, including the single version of Runnin Away and three
instrumental jams recorded during the creation of the album, none of which has
been released before. And while these final tracks are illuminating regarding
the long and labyrinthine process it took to get the record made, one has to
wish that Sony would have included the two singles that preceded it, Hot Fun in
the Summertime and Thank You (Falettinme Be Mice Elf Agin), for the sake of
continuity and completion of the period.] ~ Thom Jurek

Tracklist:
 01. Sly & The Family Stone - Luv N Haight (Single Version) (04:04)
 02. Sly & The Family Stone - Just Like a Baby (05:13)
 03. Sly & The Family Stone - Poet (03:02)
 04. Sly & The Family Stone - Family Affair (Single Version) (03:08)
 05. Sly & The Family Stone - Africa Talks to You (The Asphalt Jungle) (08:45)
 06. Sly & The Family Stone - Theres a Riot Goin On (00:04)
 07. Sly & The Family Stone - Brave & Strong (Single Version) (03:32)
 08. Sly & The Family Stone - (You Caught Me) Smilin (Single Version) (02:56)
 09. Sly & The Family Stone - Time (03:05)
 10. Sly & The Family Stone - Spaced Cowboy (03:59)
 11. Sly & The Family Stone - Runnin Away (Single Version) (02:57)
 12. Sly & The Family Stone - Thank You for Talkin to Me, Africa (07:15)

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