Thank You (Falettinme Be Mice Elf Agin) - Sly and the Family Stone
- 7 hours ago
- 2 min read
A year and two hits after "Everyday People", including another US number one, Sly is having doubts about the civil rights and peace and love generation. In the aftermath of the success of "Everyday People, Sly had received hate mail including assassination threats, prompting a less innocent, more nuanced response in the 1970 chart topper "Thank You (Falettinme Be Mice Elf Agin). Maybe he got carried away by the massive success of the band, and the bad letters made him stand back and take a good look at himself. Maybe they helped him see people for real and what he saw wasn't the idealised view he'd been celebrating in his music. "Thank You..." is paradoxical, the thank you for the devil with his gun at the stuffy party which he's leaving behind along with his previous music: "dance to the music....everyday people.... different strokes for different folks".
As well as fame, and power, and flattery, what stops you from being yourself is bullying. We've all experienced bullying, even, or especially rather, the bullies. What bullies do, whether in the playground or in the work place, is they tease you for being who you are. And we all know them when we see them, whether they are a petty office manager or a head of state, we all recognise the type. Whether we stand up to them often depends on how small we are, how much we have to lose or how much we want to succeed in their world by sucking up to them. Sly knows it's not easy, so he settles for irony, something that is generally beyond the comprehension of the average bully, head of state or not. That way you get away with it without betraying yourself. And as an extra bonus, at the same time you create a track that is one of the founding fathers of funk with bassist Larry Graham inventing funk's classic "slapping" technique, or at very least employing it on a hit for the very first time.
"Flaming eyes of people fear burning into you.
Many men are missing much, hating what they do.
Youth and truth are making love, dig it for a starter.
Dying young is hard to take, selling out is harder.
Thank you for letting me be myself again.
I want to thank you for letting me be myself again...."
Comments