The world lost funk visionary Sly Stone this week at the age of 82, and Gov’t Mule guitarist Warren Haynes took to social media to pay tribute to Stone’s groundbreaking musical legacy.
“As I’ve said many times, I grew up on Soul music. In my house, as a kid, James Brown, The Four Tops, The Temptations, Wilson Pickett, Stevie Wonder, and Aretha Franklin ruled the roost,” Haynes wrote. “Before I discovered Hendrix and Cream, it was all about Motown, Memphis, and Muscle Shoals. Then along came Sly. He changed everything. It was Soul music and Rock music, but strangely defied both. It was something new, funky as James Brown and as otherworldly as Hendrix. The music was raw, the sound was dirty, and the grooves were undeniable, with lyrics that challenged the listener in a way that had never happened before. It seemed to come from another planet, an amalgamation of influences that no one could pinpoint.”
Sly and the Family Stone made their studio debut with 1967’s A Whole New Thing, when Haynes would’ve been 7 years old growing up in Asheville, NC. Through the rest of the ’60s and into the mid-1970s, Sly would challenge the conventions of funk and rock music and the stylistic (and racial) barriers that separated them. Albums like Dance to the Music (1968), Stand! (1969), There’s A Riot Goin’ On (1971), and Fresh (1973) brought psychedelic influences to funk music and propulsive rhythms to rock music. The result created a new breed of funk, paving the way for artists like George Clinton & Parliament-Funkadelic and inspiring a young Haynes.
“His voice was tremendous, as were all the voices in the Family. They were all intertwined into the songs in a way that had previously been reserved for legitimate Soul acts like The Temptations and The Four Tops. But this wasn’t legitimate or traditional,” Haynes continued. “It was mold-breaking and redefining in the same way that James Brown and Jimi Hendrix blew open the door with something the world had never heard. Somewhere in between those two, Sly brought us something fresh and powerful that couldn’t be labeled. Traditional Soul music fans loved it. Hippies loved it. Casual fans just discovering the music on the radio were moved by it. It was infectious in a way that appealed to so many people for all different reasons.”
Though the original Sly and the Family Stone officially disbanded in 1975, their influence has reverberated out for generations. Stone has become the most sampled artist in hip-hop history, and his music has been heralded as an inspiration by everyone from Michael Jackson and Prince to John Mayer and Dean Ween.
“I’ll never forget hearing songs like ‘I Want to Take You Higher’ and ‘Thank You (Falettinme Be Mice Elf Agin)’ for the first time,” Haynes concluded. “I had never experienced anything like that. When my oldest brother brought home a Sly and the Family Stone record, a light bulb came on for me that illuminated a pathway to Rock music that I would soon discover. A whole other world of music was about to open up, and I was at that impressionable age where everything made a deep impact. And it was Sly that opened that door. He changed everything.”
Check out Warren Haynes’ tribute to Sly Stone below and revisit Live For Live Music‘s full obituary here.
View this post on Instagram