Sly Stone S/D

How about High On You from 1975? The critics seemed to like it around the time it came out. It just...tanked.

Small Talk is very good, High on You is spottier but still nice-sounding. W/r/t to the critical consensus, I think Fresh is the last great record, but the stuff that followed isn't as embarrassing as many lazy critics would have it. It's sort of a shame that the records I mention have all but been written out of history. Although the inclusion of some tracks from Small Talk and High on You (in remastered versions!) on the recent Essential Sly and the Family Stone set bodes well.

No kidding. I remember having some cassette hits compilation in college that had "Loose Booty" from Small Talk, easily one of the tightest little jams he ever did (and famously sampled on Paul's Boutique). It's almost embarrassing that the song has been available exclusively on those Rhino funk comps until this recent comp.

Maybe on the end of side A, it's track 4 on my CD. Anyway, terrific, yes! It's called Dance to the Medley and it's over twelve minutes long. A great album, Dance to the Music.

Maybe on the end of side A, it's track 4 on my CD. Anyway, terrific, yes! It's called Dance to the Medley and it's over twelve minutes long. A great album, Dance to the Music.

post-Riot Search: Fresh is fantastic, as is High On You, Small Talk, and Back on the Right Track. This stuff is *all* up there with his best work in my opinion.

Destroy: Heard You Missed ME, Well I'm Back.

why are these late-mid period Sly CDs out of print, and his last coupla albums relatively easy to track down now??

Plus, from the late records, the aforementioned "Crossword Puzzle," the title track of "Small Talk," "Same Thing (Makes You Laugh, Makes You Cry"), "Loose Booty." And from one of the early ones, "Advice."

(Plus I really want to know what the fucking chords in Family Affair are).

i rate his albums like this:
riot
stand
whole new thing
fresh
dance to the music/life

i like the others in the 70s but his songwriting was going down the pan a bit, already.

S: "Underdog," a song I love to kick a mixtape off with.

Presumably this isn't referring to the Electric Spanking of War Babies. The tracks from that album that Sly collaborated on are brilliant!

(Plus I really want to know what the fucking chords in Family Affair are).

Shakey Mo, do ya know what I own? The "Riot" SONGBOOK, with all 'em in it. I can't believe I ever found this, but I do have it, and if you want the chords to any of the songs, be glad to e-mail them to you, make copies and regular mail them, whatever. ("Family Affair" is actually quite simple!)

the lack of a closing quotation mark here had me thinking that sly had recorded a song entitled ""ha ha, hee hee, and sly's so out of tune he's nearly pushed out of that song altogether"

is out of print too, and fucking hard to track down.

yeah. no market for that.

ILM, I KISS YOU!

many others...

It's not even better than Back on the Right Track

I used to really like Back on the Right Track -- or at least, spent a lot of time with it when I got that Charley reissue in the 90s. But I think this one is sneaky -- those "philly soul sorta arrangements" are more clever than they seem. There's a lot of Sly syncopation going on -- but also some welcome diversity in the styles: Latin, doo-wop, pop. Maybe give it another shot?

I'd have to listen to a youtube rip or something - sold back my copy years ago lol

Runs out of steam on Side 2, songwriting is far from top notch Sly but, yes, some neat arrangements, basslines etc.

I don't mind side one of Heard Ya Missed Me! Sly and Cynthia are in fine voice! The first 2 tracks are fire emoji.

Loved this passage in this review I found online of High On You:

Sly frittered away the last ten years of his career doing his best to convince the world that, as his drug habits and isolationist tendencies worsened and the Family Stone fell to pieces in a morass of guns, bulldogs, and PCP, everything was fine! Better than ever, in fact! You don’t believe me? Check out my album titles! “Heard Ya Missed Me, Well I’m Back!” “Back on The Right Track!” I wouldn’t be surprised if there was an unreleased album from that era called “I Don’t Do Drugs Anymore, So Trust Me When I Say That Everything’s Cool!”

To my ears, this very hot Coffey set, ' bout to be served up by Omnivore, has Sly-type appeal:

Dennis Coffey
One Night At Morey’s: 1968
Release date: June 1, 2018

From his early work with ’50s/’60s hit makers The Royaltones (who also backed other artists like Del Shannon)—to his run through the Motor City’s independent labels as a session ace—to his pioneering and legendary work with The Funk Brothers, backing band to massive Motown hits like “Just My Imagination,” “Ball Of Confusion (That’s What The World Is Today),” “War,” “Cloud Nine,” “Someday We’ll Be Together” and “Band Of Gold” among many others—Dennis Coffey is a guitar legend.

The ’70s didn’t slow him down for one second as he struck out on his own and had a million selling hit with “Scorpio,” in 1971. He continued his studio session work (notably appearing on “Boogie Fever” by The Sylvers), scored films and produced other artists’ albums like Gallery’s Nice To Be With You and Rodriguez’ Cold Fact.

The 2000s have found Dennis appearing on the big screen including the 2002 film Standing In The Shadows Of Motown and the 2012’s Searching For Sugarman. And to this very day you can find him playing every Tuesday night in Detroit.

One Night At Morey’s: 1968 is drawn from the residency at Morey Baker’s Showplace Lounge in Detroit by the Lyman Woodard Trio. The trio consisted of Coffey on guitar, brilliant organist, Lyman Woodard, and drummer Melvin Davis, and could be found at Morey’s once a week. They played to a dedicated, often repeat, audience so the band kept the repertoire fresh and changing. One Night At Morey’s: 1968 follows last year’s Hot Coffey In The D: Burnin’ At Morey Baker’s Showplace Lounge released by Resonance Records, also drawn from the Morey’s residency, but with an entirely different track list.

All tracks on One Night At Morey’s: 1968 are previously unissued and come directly from the vaults of Dennis Coffey and producer partner, Mike Theodore. Tracks include original compositions, “Big City Lights,” “Mindbender,” and “Union Station,” as well as surprising and funky covers of “Billie’s Bounce” by Charlie Parker, “Burning Spear” by The Soul Strings, “Cissy Strut” by The Meters, “Eleanor Rigby” by The Beatles, “Groovin’” by The Young Rascals, and “I’m A Midnight Mover” by Wilson Pickett from the pen of both Pickett and Bobby Womack.

CD / DIGITAL TRACK LIST:
I’M A MIDNIGHT MOVER
ELEANOR RIGBY
CISSY STRUT
GROOVIN’
BURNING SPEAR
IT’S YOUR THING/UNION STATION
MINDBENDER
BIG CITY LIGHTS
BILLIE’S BOUNCE
All tracks previously unissued.
Cat: OV-284

“I Don’t Do Drugs Anymore, So Trust Me When I Say That Everything’s Cool!”

lmao

Love the first half of "Heard Ya Missed Me..." and that title track is fantastic.

“I Don’t Do Drugs Anymore, So Trust Me When I Say That Everything’s Cool!”

sounds like a good "clickbait that would make a good album title"

The album title is only slightly more on the nose than the song titles and lyrics (which are nowhere to be found on the internet BTW). “Everything In You Has to Come Out,” “What Was I Thinkin’ In My Head” – every lyric on this is some perversion of the optimism of his earlier records—“Everybody Is a Star,” “Life,” “Stand”—into this staring-into-the-abyss “Holy shit, I’m gonna DIE/Please give me one more chance” desperation.

It’s obviously not as successful or revolutionary as, say, There’s A Riot Goin’ On. But in a lot of ways the result is infinitely more pained.

Thanks, don. Speaking of Dennis Coffey, his book wasn’t bad either. Recommended reading about the rise and fall and return of a studio ace running the maze of interrelated Motor City music worlds.

Remembered the first two words but had to look up the full title: Guitars, Bars and Motown Superstars.

The idea that High on You is anywhere near the banality of Heard Ya Missed Me is just ludicrous.

High On You is definitely second tier Sly, but Heard Ya Missed Me is, like, fifth tier by that measuring stick.

xxp Thanks, James! Posted your tip about the book here:
Diary of a POLL Star: what are your most/least favorite books by musos?

I'm slightly annoyed that Ten Years Too Soon is so hard to find on the interwebs. The "(I Get) High on You" remix is pretty good: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lF06ACOtc1M

All about fresh

The idea that High on You is anywhere near the banality of Heard Ya Missed Me is just ludicrous.

High On You is definitely second tier Sly, but Heard Ya Missed Me is, like, fifth tier by that measuring stick.

I'm with you.

It’s possible I just wrote more words than have been written in aggregate on that record over the last forty-two years.

I think you're overstating the "interesting" aspects of Heard Ya Missed Me by quite a lot.

I don't understand how Sly mimicking the Philly Soul sound is a good thing at all. I mean, Philly Soul and McFadden and Whitehead are fine, but I find it really disappointing that someone as unique as Sly would ditch his one of a kind sound for a (sub-par) imitation of what was essentially a cookie cutter operation. To me, that just magnifies the record's shortcomings.

At least he still sounds like himself on High on You. Granted, a not as good version of his previous self, but still undeniably him.

I feel like Heard Ya Missed Me could have been made by any number of people.

I don't really think he's mimicking Philly Soul that much tbh.

Neither do I. I noted the two songs he did seem to be – one was a small flourish on Heard Ya Missed Me, the other was on High On You.

Sly documentary in 2019!

https://deadline.com/2018/12/sly-and-the-family-stone-feature-documentary-winter-state-entertainment-1202526757/

Sounds terrible tbh

horrible title.

In all honesty I am amazed that Sly still lives. If he's making the money he's due now, then bless him.

Sure, agreed. But a movie about his last 10 yrs as a crack addic trying to get paid sounds like a p grim one

Uh yeah. I don’t really have a lot of desire to gawk at Sly in his present state.

Posting this interview as a tribute to Dr. Morbius since the portrait picture you usually see of him was taken by the interviewee:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1gbUGS8sots

Newmark kills it on “in time.” What a groove

I'd say Fresh is his second-best record.

It appears that the documentary mentioned two and a half years ago is still unreleased. It's amazing that George Clinton seems to have been the only person in the last 40 years to bring anything to completion with Sly, who is also just about the only person in Clinton's memoirs who receives a vivid portrait. Clinton spends a lot more time in his book talking about ideas than other people.

I'd say Fresh is his second-best record.

not trying to be aggressive or argumentative here, but i thought that was the generally accepted consensus? riot and fresh the firm 1 + 2, with the #3 spot *usually* going to stand, but even that was never as firm a lock as the top two.

"skin i'm in" popped up yesterday while shuffling my ipod and, MAN YES, calstars! newmark just owns the whole album and rusty allen is right there with him. just some super fat, warm grooves all over that album. very dope.

Yeah. I don’t want to disparage Ericco though, he is fantastic on the earlier stuff, full of groove and space. I guess Sly could pick ‘em

I guess I'm remembering the Rolling Stone Top 100 1967 to 1987 list, which contained BOTH Stand and Greatest Hits, despite the latter record containing about 90% of what people want to hear on the former.

that line about the midget does not fly in 2021. #slyiscancelledparty

Fresh > Riot > [if we can't choose the classic pre-Riot Greatest Hits] Dance To The Music (the medley is just sublime, some of the most exciting music comitted to tape, and as great as Stand! is, Sex Machine and the long, turgid Don't Call Me ****** are hard skips for me)

And I really love large chunks of Small Talk, High On You and Back On The Right Track

Relistening to Sex Machine now and hush my mouth, it is a jam. Stll think Dance To The Music is the stronger album, though.

Fresh > Riot

correct

Fresh is great, but Riot is the greatest album of all time

I was at a yard party last weekend where the hosts were spinning Greatest Hits and I told my friend it seemed at the time, on that sultry summer day, to be the best record ever.

https://i.imgur.com/eGm2Pqo.png

Cynthia ❤️

Timing.

Fantastic news: @NovenaCarmel just revealed that #SummerofSoul director @questlove will be making a documentary about her dad, Sly Stone. pic.twitter.com/CSANjx8WL9

— Яandall 🎧 Яoberts (@LilEdit) July 12, 2021

Fantastic news... Summer Of Soul is just brilliant, one of the best music documentaries I've ever seen.

OMG

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2sgxbpFfk0M

Whenever they knew Sly was gonna miss a gig they should have sent that dude out there and let the chips fall...

That would be almost as hilarious as this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l5C2woQLgto

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VMQhO-ee-Cw

eat your heart out mike flowers pops

at least the Dick Jensen video had a recommend for this (although, bass player absolutely ruled):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bJ_QaEir7FU