But something doesn't quite click on the first side, and even with the talent involved -- scattered in all kinds of configurations throughout the record -- it sounds like they're trying to work their way through other mutations of earlier ideas that don't stick as well as the party jams on the flipside. "Generator Pop" and "Catch A Keeper" are decent if shaky melanges of '78 vibes that tailgate off some of their most transcendent moments; they respectively sound like a subtly reworked "One Nation Under A Groove" and an outtake that wasn't wild enough for the undersea-themed Motor-Booty Affair. And while having DeWayne "Blackbyrd" McKnight handle all the instruments on "Acupuncture" but one is a slick feat, the instrument he doesn't play -- a drippy lite-jazz sax seeped out by Norman Jean Bell -- sounds like it was airlifted in from a dentist's office. Still, having one kinda-bad song isn't this album's failing: it's that this record just isn't outrageous enough. Aside from the Junie Morrison-driven duck-call/Moog-chirp R&B ballad "One Of Those Summers" and the sequel-itis-stricken "Copy Cat," there's a noticeable shortage of the straight-up weirdness and conceptual depth P-Funk had made as much a part of their DNA as the instrumental virtuosity, hi-tech forward-thinking, and heavy commitment to the groove. Three out of four's usually fine, but it's a slump for a crew that spent the previous decade batting 1.000.
You know that twangy yodel from De La's "Potholes In My Lawn"? That's from "Little Ole Country Boy," which features an honest-to-god steel guitar and a full-tilt wailing lament of a monologue from Fuzzy Haskins freaking out about being busted as a peeping tom after trying to find out if his girlfriend was cheating on him. "My Automobile" pulls Clinton and Haskins' doo-wop origins by the collar right into the thick of a down-home, uptempo rockabilly-blues shuffle (with a little bit of what sounds like a sitar for twangy flavor). And cuts like the booze-brewing, family-supporting bootlegger tale/"Cosmic Slop" quasi-prequel "Moonshine Heather" and dirty-drawers goof "Funky Woman" ("she hung them in the air/the air said 'this ain't fair'/ she hung them in the sun/the sun began to run") are in keeping with the kind of oddball heaviness Funkadelic were concurrently cranking out. There's still room for headier concerns -- the gospel lament of "Oh Lord, Why Lord/Prayer" is easily their most reverent and straightforward cry against racial injustice, and there's an unbeatable series of koans running through "Nothing Before Me But Thang" ("There's good, there's bad/ But a thang is a thang/ And there is nothing before you but thang"). And if there's more weight than usual in the closing one-two of spiritual-minded sincerity -- the Jesus-invoking environmentalism of "Livin' The Life" and the afterlife reflections of "The Silent Boatman" (the only P-Funk cut to feature bagpipes!) -- they're strong early indicators that Clinton and company had more to them than just party jams and psychedelic freakouts. (Later CD pressings, including the retitled First Thangs, tack on outtakes, rarities, and a few expanded versions of '71-'72 Invictus singles like "Breakdown" and "Red Hot Mama," that adds some excellent music but dilutes the original album's character a bit.)
in a space outta sound nightmares on wax zip
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For a band considered to be one of the most spectacular live acts of its day -- including when "its day" were the years they spent almost entirely on the road -- P-Funk have a relative dearth of wide-release concert albums. (At least ones that are easily accessible -- for this list, I've limited it to the commercially available stuff you could get on Westbound or Casablanca; factoring in micro-indie releases, import oddities, and bootlegs would have us here all day.) Live At The Beverly Theatre is one of the only recordings you can get of the P-Funk in the tumultuous early-'80s days, where what seemed like the waning possibilities of what the band were capable of in the '70s got a jolt of energy from the success of Clinton's "Atomic Dog." Why this record wasn't released until 1990 is a mystery -- despite the absence of Bootsy Collins, most of the original Horny Horns, or any of their pre-'79 drummers, it's as definitive a slice of P-Funkanalia as you could hope for from a live record of the time. Drummer Dennis Chambers and bassist Rodney "Skeet" Curtis, who provided the elastic spine of the original Uncle Jam Wants You standout "(Not Just) Knee Deep," make for a strong rhythm section; Chambers is a straight-up virtuoso prone to sneaking some rubbery blast-beats into the pocket, while Curtis's groove is a little slappier than Bootsy's space bass but still sounds supple (check for him on "One Nation Under A Groove") and keeps pace with a marathon set that frequently ratchets up the pace to a metallic frenzy. And the The P. Funk Horns -- at least what you can hear of them; they're kind of low in the mix -- are strong enough to serve as more than just a consolation prize. (Maceo Parker's there, too -- playing flute. On... "Maggot Brain"? Well, damn.) 2ff7e9595c
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