Category: Funk

Galactic & Orgone bring the funk to Bourbon Country

What better 30th birthday present than two great funk bands playing down the street from my house in Louisville, Kentucky? On top of that, Galactic’s management gave me permission to videotape, guaranteeing quality for the viewers.

SCROLL DOWN FOR VIDEOS.
NOTE: I recommend watching youtube videos in HD when possible, it makes a huge difference! Just click the “360p” in the bottom right hand corner and change it to “720p”.

Orgone is a funk band from LA that has been on the road non-stop the last few years. They toured with Galactic back in February and March, and, luckily for us, their tours just happened to criss-cross in the midwest for a few shows this summer.

I urged all of my friends to arrive early, and I was happy to see a semi-full house when Orgone hit the stage. Orgone headlined this same venue on a Saturday night back in November and there were barely 60 people in attendance. But that’s how you do it: start by converting a room of 60 people, who end up telling their friends about you, then come back through again.

Orgone opened with an instrumental cover of “Melting Pot” by Booker T & The MG’s. It was a great warm up choice that worked to get the crowd grooving. Of course, lead guitarist Sergio Rios always gets the crowd into it with this body gyrations and bouncing afro….

Portions of Orgone’s set featured their new vocalist Niki J. Crawford. It’s definitely sad to see their old singer, Fanny Franklin, leave to focus on her solo album, as her voice just had a grit to it that can’t be matched. When Franny would join the band, they always jelled like one organism on the same groove. Although Niki J. held her own, she seemed a little timid and it will be interesting to see if she continues with the band after this long summer tour is over…

Galactic was the band everyone came to see and the room was expectedly packed with people. I was lucky enough to have my buddy Brent in attendance, and he brought his audio recording equipment. We used my new clamp to mount his video camera to his mic stand, allowing us to have two HD video cameras running for the entire performance. On top of that, I shot a few videos near the front with my iphone4.

Three cameras + Galactic’s light show = !!!

In recent years, Galactic has been bringing vocalists and MC’s out on the road with them, and that’s actually what really got me into the band. As much as I love the funk, I never really got into Galactic when they were purely instrumental (& I was a little late to experience the Houseman era).

This tour featured Corey Glover from Living Colour on vocals. Featured here is a double dose of Allen Toussaint covers. First up is “What Is Success?” I love the colored lights on this video, and the performance is over the top with Corey pretty much going off at the end.

Next up, another Allen Toussaint / Lee Dorsey cover, “Night People.” Galactic & Corey Glover played this song during Jazz Fest when they did a mini-set with The Funky Meters with all members of both bands playing together. Lucky for us, that wasn’t a one time performance and they’ve continued to work this tune into their setlists.

Only Galactic can turn a traditional Mardi Gras Indian chant into a hip-hop influenced funk workout like this next tune, “Hoo Nah Nay.” Corey Smith, trombonist for Rebirth Brass Band, takes center stage on this one (he has pretty much become a full time member of Galactic the last few years). This video also includes a Stanton Moore drum solo. Fortuitously, I started shooting video up front with my iphone right before the drum solo started, so there are plenty of close ups.

If you’ve made it this far, you will be rewarded by this last video. To close out the encore, a super intense cover of Led Zeppelin’s “How Many More Times.”

Special thanks to Galactic’s management for permission to run video. Also special thanks to Brent Stober for the audio, the wide video angle, and the first photo.

Phish used to get funky; here’s twenty seven minutes of proof.

Phish – Ghost – July 23, 1997 Atlanta, GA @ Lakewood Amp.

I’ll admit that I’ve never been a big Phish fan. A few of their tunes interest me (mainly the instrumental passages, crazy prog epics like YEM, and funk work-outs like Meat) and many do not. But when a friend of mine forwarded me this 26 minute version of Ghost from a 1997 show, it gave me a newfound appreciation of the band.

I always heard that they were capable of “transcendant” musical moments, etc. but I rarely had the patience to get past the vocal heavy song beginnings and the many goof-ball choruses. One listen to this track caused me to revisit their 1998 album, The Story of the Ghost. Since then, I’ve learned that 1997 was the year of their “funk” sound period. And I do believe I may search out more 1997 live recordings in the future.

Happy Birthday Prince: The 1984 Birthday Show

Prince & The Revolution – Erotic City – June 7, 1984 – The 1984 Birthday Show

An audience recording of this show has been around the bootleg circuit for years (“Erotic City”, “Noon Rendezvous”, “26”), but I could never really listen to the whole thing because it sounded so bad. Now the pristine multi-track soundboard recording has leaked out into the general public and you can download it here:
http://www.megaupload.com/?d=6LI5DCCH (the password is reggolboge)
or here: http://www.thetradersden.org/forums/showthread.php?t=91209.
The artwork is here: http://www.megaupload.com/?d=GLAL48KV (the password is dontbuypressedrehash).

Here is the accompanying “press release” (if a bootleg can ever really have a press release):

Presented here for the first time, just a month shy of 27 years, is an absolutely astounding soundboard recording of this historic show. In an unprecedented move, the two leading fan labels Free Boot Generation and 4DaFunk have joined forces with a completely anonymous benefactor in an effort to put the finest possible experience into the hands of the fans. For free. Enjoy.

Prince And The Revolution
“From The Soundboard: 1984 Birthday Show”
June 7th, 1984
First Avenue
Minneapolis, MN

Source: Soundboard
Lineage: SBD > Tape > WAV > Soundforge > FLAC > TLH SBEs fixed > You
Label: Anonymous / FBG / 4DF
Cat.-No.: Anony001 / FBG39 / 4DF088
Released: May 2011
TRT: 79:52

1. Shortberry Strawcake (PA) / Drums check (0’56)
2. 17 Days (5’24)
3. Our Destiny (3’23)
4. Roadhouse Garden (4’45)
5. Interlude (1’20)
6. All Day, All Night (5’42)
7. Free (4’40)
8. Noon Rendezvous (9’02)
9. Erotic City (8’31)
10. Something In The Water (Does Not Compute) (10’10)
11. When Doves Cry (11’37)
12. Happy Birthday Interlude (2’27)
13. Irresistible Bitch (6’07)
14. Possessed (5’48)

Prince celebrated his 26th year with a concert at the famed Minneapolis nightclub First Avenue. Sheila E. had flown in from California along with Prince’s management team. A mobile multi-track recording truck was hired to record this show. The 85-minute set opened with ”17 Days”. It was followed by two new songs, ”Our Destiny,” which went into ”Roadhouse Garden.” ”We’ve got some stuff you’ll recognize and some you won’t,” Prince said before playing another new track, ”All Day, All Night.” Both ”Our Destiny” and ”Roadhouse Garden” remain unreleased, although they were worked on later in 1984 by Wendy and Lisa. The Latter was at one point planned for release on the stillborn 1998/99 Roadhouse Garden project. ”All Day, All Night” surfaced on Jill Jones’ 1987 album, which featured basic tracks pulled from this performance.”Free” finds Prince at the piano accompanied only by Bobby Z. on drums. Prince dedicated ”Noon Rendezvous” to “that little girl over there, that’s Sheila E.” Next on the set-list were ”Erotic City” and a dramatically rearranged version of ”Something In The Water (Does Not Compute).” An extended take on ”When Doves Cry” was followed by an audience-led rendition of ”Happy Birthday”. The b-side ”Irresistible Bitch” and the unreleased ”Possessed” close the show.

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