Dance to the Music - Sly and the Family Stone
- 13 hours ago
- 2 min read
In the summer of '68, when I was thirteen, "Dance to the Music" hit the charts. Even in those heady days when the UK charts were a melting pot of all kinds of music - the number one was Tommy James and the Shondells' "Mony Mony", and rock, pop, folk/ ska/rock, surf music, soul, crooners and even a precursor to hip hop all featured in an eclectic Top Twenty that included the Crazy World of Arthur Brown, the Small Faces, the Kinks, the Beach Boys, the Equals, Simon and Garfunkel, Dusty Springfield, Tom Jones and the legendary Pigmeat Markham - even then, "Dance to the Music" was mindblowingly different to my teen-nascent ears. It seamlessly fused several genres into one, right from the very first notes: a Stax-fuelled horn section set against the the hottest of LA guitar licks. This is followed by one of the greatest riffs of all time as Sly Stone, his brother lead guitarist Freddie Stone and bassist Larry Graham verbalise a bass rhythm to immediately get your feet uncontrollably tapping and it's this new James Brown thing, it's FUNKY! The riff is so good you are always disappointed when it stops, even now, 58 years and hundreds of plays later. This is followed by an order from Sly: "Dance to the Music"! He's not askin', he's tellin'. Then Sly proceeds to introduce every instrument and player in the band individually as though they are ingredients in a recipe, a spoon of gospel Hammond organ from Sly, a pinch of soul, a clove of funk and a generous helping of rock and roll, finishing by an admonishment to anyone who's NOT dancing by now
"....Got a message they're sayin'
all the squares, go home...."
As Sly brings in each instrument, and the sound builds, he is not only introducing the members of the band, he's also putting together a new kind of music, and saying this is a new kind of band to make that music, a band with women playing instruments, a band with black musicians and white musicians playing together, each individually EQUALLY introduced.
The sound, the music, is a statement of equality and sixties freedom. It's also saying "we're a new group for new times. Sit up and take notice, then most of all, dance to the music". It may sound like just another great funky pop song, but when it came out it made a statement that is still reverberating today.
Comments