My Cigarette Pack's Definition Of Funk Music

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Found within my pack of American Spirit Lights: A music of America vignette fact card. One side pictures an artist's illustration of a black man with a huge yellow afro playing an unlikely-shaped guitar as two sat nite fever types disco-dance behind him.

My cig's def. of "Funk": "Funk evolved out of soul and gospel music and is the least structured style of R&B. The musicians focus on maintaining the rhythmic "groove" while remaining free to explore the musical range of their instruments. Modern music such as disco, rap, psychedelic, and rock can trace parts of their origins to funk."

Discuss?

― Scott Seward, Saturday, 5 April 2003 15:55 (twenty-three years ago)

is the least structured style of R&B = ?????

― jess (dubplatestyle), Saturday, 5 April 2003 16:02 (twenty-three years ago)

actually that whole card reads like it was written by evil little elves who decided to randomize the history of pop music.

― jess (dubplatestyle), Saturday, 5 April 2003 16:05 (twenty-three years ago)

doesn't mention who's got the funk or whether we've got the funk though.

― Anthony Miccio (Anthony Miccio), Saturday, 5 April 2003 16:08 (twenty-three years ago)

The "least structured" bit isn't so bad, Jess, if you take it to refer to traditional popular song formats: I might be forgetting some less-structured form of r&b, but funk does tend to stretch itself out in a way that leaves room for improvisation and such. I mean, the formats -- if not the music -- aren't tightly-constructed like the conventional popular song: they're looser and wider open in something of the same way jazz is, aren't they?

― nabisco (nabisco), Saturday, 5 April 2003 16:10 (twenty-three years ago)

Oh yeah, I also meant to include this from their west coast rap card that I also have handy: "Many songs focused on urban life in the "hood" for young black men, which ironically were particularly popular with young white men from the suburbs." I don't know what makes that ironic. I love cowboy songs and I've never been on a horse!

― Scott Seward, Saturday, 5 April 2003 16:11 (twenty-three years ago)

Although true, there's plenty of funk that's as rigidly structured as prog, Ohio Players funk operas and such ...

― nabisco (nabisco), Saturday, 5 April 2003 16:13 (twenty-three years ago)

well, yeah, nitsuh, but y'know...tighten up; almost all of funk's friction stems from the tension between the martial syncopation and the wiggle of whatever else is thrown on top.

― jess (dubplatestyle), Saturday, 5 April 2003 16:28 (twenty-three years ago)

Live funk and recorded funk would be two different beasts.

― Scott Seward, Saturday, 5 April 2003 16:31 (twenty-three years ago)

But there is a definite structure. I don't understand how a structure that allows for improvisation is less-structured. That is part of it's structure! Ha Ha. Sometimes I have fun.

― Scott Seward, Saturday, 5 April 2003 16:36 (twenty-three years ago)

we must also not get so sidetracked that we overlook the following: Modern music such as disco, rap, psychedelic, and rock can trace parts of their origins to funk.

― jess (dubplatestyle), Saturday, 5 April 2003 16:38 (twenty-three years ago)

i can think of two explanations for the above:

a. they are recognizing funk's primordial primacy as the humpa humpa sex beat
b. evil elves and gnomes

― jess (dubplatestyle), Saturday, 5 April 2003 16:40 (twenty-three years ago)

I'm going with the evil gnomes. They may be pasty faced, but they were in touch with that primal Earth Groove.

― Lord Custos Epsilon (Lord Custos Epsilon), Saturday, 5 April 2003 16:50 (twenty-three years ago)

Man, I must not understand funk, cause that sentence seemed basically true to me as well. I mean, apart from the fact that it makes funk non-modern and it gets a bit wonky time-wise for "psychedelic" and rock. (Meaning both as we know them now certainly owe to funk, but not necessarily in a clear linear progression kind of way.)

― nabisco (nabisco), Saturday, 5 April 2003 16:51 (twenty-three years ago)

Oh wait, sorry, I see: "origins!" That word does not work at all.

― nabisco (nabisco), Saturday, 5 April 2003 16:52 (twenty-three years ago)

Would it be less evil-gnomey if you said, I dunno: (a) disco's origins trace in part to funk, (b) hip-hop's origins trace to a few different things, disco among them, (c) psychedelic and funk have absorbed and reacted to elements of one another, and (d) rock has reacted to loads of genres, funk among them?

― nabisco (nabisco), Saturday, 5 April 2003 16:56 (twenty-three years ago)

(Oh and I forgot that in B hip-hop comes back to funk hardcore, but a bit after the "origins" part.)

― nabisco (nabisco), Saturday, 5 April 2003 16:57 (twenty-three years ago)

funk owes more to rock and psychedelia than the reverse (rock circa 2003 anyway)

― jess (dubplatestyle), Saturday, 5 April 2003 17:00 (twenty-three years ago)

you people are debating with a pack of American Spirit Lights. rock.

― Anthony Miccio (Anthony Miccio), Saturday, 5 April 2003 17:00 (twenty-three years ago)

let it never be said we dont know how to party

― jess (dubplatestyle), Saturday, 5 April 2003 17:03 (twenty-three years ago)

I wonder what Parliament Lights have to say about this?

― Ally (mlescaut), Saturday, 5 April 2003 17:06 (twenty-three years ago)

oh ally no. no ally no.

― jess (dubplatestyle), Saturday, 5 April 2003 17:09 (twenty-three years ago)

Is techno the least structured style of R&B? Is techno a style of R&B? Well, it must be. Techno-Electro-Disco-Funk (going backwards).

― Scott Seward, Saturday, 5 April 2003 17:22 (twenty-three years ago)

probably something like, "Funk upon a time, light up"

― M Matos (M Matos), Saturday, 5 April 2003 18:50 (twenty-three years ago)

funk owes more to rock and psychedelia than the reverse

I think this is definitely true of psychedelia, but, well -- if you think of James Brown as funk or proto-funk, there's a case to be made that funk fed into "rock" in the general sense of the word. (But yeah, granted, when it comes to "origin" it's definitely the other way round.)

― nabisco (nabisco), Saturday, 5 April 2003 19:27 (twenty-three years ago)

Is techno the least structured style of R&B? Is techno a style of R&B?

It depends on who's definition of techno you want to use. Techno can be every bit as elaborate as any other kind of music. Listen to the Jeff Mills Every Dog Has It's Day v. 1-3 or Galaxy To Galaxy records and you will notice that you can do a lot more with it than 8-bar loop DJ-tools.

Techno is just another mutation in black musical history. Techno is as much a style of R&B as R&B is a style of spiritual, and the spiritual is... I think genre names work better as a selling tool rather than as a tool for describing the trajectory of musical ideas in different genres. R&B is a part of it, but a lot of the ideas were borrowed from several different genres, and not just the traditional black ones at that.

― Mike Taylor (mjt), Sunday, 6 April 2003 02:30 (twenty-three years ago)

I agree. And in many cases, genre-wise, you are so removed from the original source, that it almost doesn't matter anymore. It can make the whole notion of offshoots rather silly.But it is easy enough to follow it back. Ever hear any of that space-age techno Sun Ra was making 40 years ago?

― Scott Seward, Sunday, 6 April 2003 02:53 (twenty-three years ago)

I am completely guilty of being unfamiliar with Sun-Ra.

I have publicly shamed myself.

― Mike Taylor (mjt), Sunday, 6 April 2003 03:00 (twenty-three years ago)

Izzokay. There is still time. If you want to hear a mind blowing alternate musical history of the 50's check out the sun ra double singles comp that came out a while back. I think it's on Evidence. Wacked-out R&B, space jazz, electronica. It's hard to believe that it existed so long ago. Interplanetary communications that hardly anybody heard at the time.

― Scott Seward, Sunday, 6 April 2003 03:08 (twenty-three years ago)

i dont know what is meant by structure. funk songs can go on forever with great soloing, etc, which is different from pop, but, in other ways, funk is the most rigid because all of the different rhythmic motifs have to interlock perfectly for te funk to work. funk music can be the same bassline, same drum pattern, same guitar chicka-chicks over and over and over again. rigid. also, there is the "1", meaning that the 1st beat of every measure is always stressed, another structure/stricture that not all musics share. ive said this a million times but my experience as a drummer is that funk, more than any other style, requires a great deal of precision and repetition, and, instead of playing whatever one wants, one must be cognizant of the bassline, and one must be sure to leave a lot of room for it by playing around it or supporting it without distracting from it.

― Aaron Grossman (aajjgg), Sunday, 6 April 2003 04:45 (twenty-three years ago)

my cigarettes define nothing, except a casual and enduring disregard for my own health.
and dixieland jazz

― Bruce Urquhart (Bruce Urquhart), Sunday, 6 April 2003 04:59 (twenty-three years ago)

You don't even wanna know what my new pack is telling me about heavy metal.

― Scott Seward, Sunday, 6 April 2003 05:39 (twenty-three years ago)

yes we do...

― Dave Stelfox, Sunday, 6 April 2003 08:19 (twenty-three years ago)

has anyone had the pleasure of going on the FUNK BLAST "ride" at the EMP? i love the part when the guide turns around to the group and says "ARE YOU GUYS READY TO GET FUNKY, OR WHAT?!?!?!"

― ron (ron), Sunday, 6 April 2003 08:30 (twenty-three years ago)

Okay, Dave, since I can't resist. But I think I'm gonna switch brands.
My cig's def. of heavy metal: "Heavy Metal is the loudest form of rock music and is known for its bass leads and wailing guitar solos. First popularized by several English bands in the 1970s, heavy metal found a home in America. This style remains popular today and continues to adapt to the times. Often outrageous, edgy, and raw, heavy metal has received blame in numerous court cases for causing deviant behavior."

― Scott Seward, Sunday, 6 April 2003 11:29 (twenty-three years ago)

that's a lot better!

― jess (dubplatestyle), Sunday, 6 April 2003 15:53 (twenty-three years ago)

what exactly does structure mean?
i mean,i would have presumed that techno was one of the most structured forms of music,but i'm not sure why...
also,how would you all define funk in a similar amount of words,out of curiosity?

― robin (robin), Sunday, 6 April 2003 18:33 (twenty-three years ago)

heavy metal has received blame in numerous court cases for causing deviant behavior.

There's my defense right there!

― Sean (Sean), Sunday, 6 April 2003 19:29 (twenty-three years ago)

"The Truth" to thread.

I wonder what Parliament Lights have to say about this?

I'm not seeing any references to getting over the hump.

― gabbneb (gabbneb), Sunday, 6 April 2003 19:48 (twenty-three years ago)

I wonder what Parliament Lights have to say about this?

I just got this. I'm slow.

― Jody Beth Rosen (Jody Beth Rosen), Sunday, 6 April 2003 19:49 (twenty-three years ago)

bass leads?

― chaki (chaki), Sunday, 6 April 2003 20:09 (twenty-three years ago)

to second chaki, bass leads?

The only explanation is the cigarette pack is a HUGE Lemmy fan.

― Anthony Miccio (Anthony Miccio), Sunday, 6 April 2003 21:35 (twenty-three years ago)

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