The Mt. Rushmore of Funk

Please vote.


Let's consider who deserves to be on the Mt. Rushmore of Funk.
That's Four Faces of Funk, etched on a monument somewhere suitably funky.

That could be a debate right there; where to put this monument to the monumentally funky. Memphis, New Orleans, Detroit? James Brown's front yard? And what are we going to call it? Mt Funkmore? The Funk Rock?

We could also cheat a little and perhaps add a Fifth Face of Funk. As I'm hoping to make this a collective effort, I hope you will jump in with an opinion and an argument.

The criteria would have to be that they are a true founding father and inventor, not just an innovator--we're talking about the building blocks, the very Fabric of Funk. It's not enough to just be an icon to make it to Mt. Rushmore; they have to be a master, a member of a small and select circle that is the well-spring of everything funky that came after them.  

So. It seems pretty irrefutable that James Brown and George Clinton deserve two of the slots. Is this even debatable? Between the two of them they pretty much represent the two major rivers of funk of the last forty + years. Brown is the sine qua non of funk, the original master that took R&B, dropped the 4/4 in favor of an off beat and presto! bingo! originated funk as we know it. The popping or slapping bass, chunky guitar, horn charts that jump in and out and call and response vocals are still being worked out today. Brown produced a body of work, on record and in performance both, that will most likely remain untouchable in it's quality, quantity and influence. So, there's one.

George Clinton took Brown's R&B generated funk and turned it on its ear, then inside out and back again. P-funk sometimes sounds like funk in slow-mo, other times in like funk in a mescaline and steroid frenzy, or Sesame Street with huge hair and shoes and synths doubling the crazy Space Bass line while a whole extended families of vocalists and players jump in for a never ending interstellar houseparty. Clinton and his cohorts in Parliament, Funkadelic, Brides of Funkenstein, etc. brought the Freak to Funk. The musical landscape will never be the same. I say there's two. You may say different.

Where do we go from there? Consider the candidates: Sly Stone, Issac Hayes, Curtis Mayfield, Stevie Wonder, Bootsy Collins, Fela, The Meters (groups are problematic for Mt Rushmore), Prince and...who? No women? Does Miles Davis qualify due to his mind-blowing early 70s recordings? How about the producers (Norman Whitfield, Willie Hutch, etc.)? Can we nominate Stax Records as a whole (including the MGs), or the Funk Bros., or the whole city of New Orleans? Was Thriller a funk album? How about Madonna's bubble-gum funk? Or Latin Funk? Are there any Brits or Jamaican's that qualify? Any DJs? Hip hop artists?

I'm going with Sly Stone for the third spot. His biggest hits are both true funk classics and true cultural signifiers, his performances (Woodstock!) the stuff of legend and his mixture of rock and funk smashed thru a boundary desperately in need of smashing. He also had hits - lots of them. I say Sly qualifies for the number three spot.

It's gets pretty complex from here and will naturally devolve into personal taste. You could certainly make arguments for Hayes, Mayfield, Wonder Fela and Prince. "Shaft" was such monster that it practically qualifies Hayes by itself, but spotty quality control and a propensity for ballads dilutes Hayes funk factor. Curtis Mayfield qualifies with an abundance of great songs and an intelligence and social conscience that perfectly mirrors the revolutionary times he was recording in. Ditto Stevie Wonder, who revolutionized the sound of funk in a peerless series of hits in the 70s that also had the social consciousness down. Fela's influence and world-wide popularity are hard for American's to fathom, but he really was an funk ambassador to the world. And Prince? Well, he brought funk into the modern world, sexed it up to a delirious degree and blew through all the boundaries between rock, pop, funk, soul, R&B, and hip hop.

One peer has already made an impassioned argument for Bootsy Collins. Who have we missed? Who deserves to be up there with the Godfather?

If you please, vote with your opinion on who the Four Figures of Funk might be - or a fifth, if it pleases you. I'm leaving the fourth spot open, and hoping for a Funk Epiphany.  

You can leave comments below or e-mail them to me directly at modmedia@theriver.com. 

Carl Hanni is a music writer, music publicist, disc jockey and vinyl archivist living in Tucson, AZ. He  hosts the vinyl-only Scratchy Record Show every Tuesday night at the Red Room in downtown Tucson, and spins records wherever and whenever he can. He believes that in a better (all analog) world all records would be released on vinyl, but takes good music from wherever he finds it--even on CD. His feature piece on legendary bass player/record producer Harvey Brooks was recently published in Goldmine.