Sly Stone is a revolutionary musician, dynamic showman and dynamic showman since the 1960s and 1970s, with hits such as “Everyday People” and “Stand!” And then “family events” passed away. He was 82 years old.
Sylvester Stewart-born Stone has been in health in recent years. His spokesperson, Callene Donovan, said on Monday that Stone died surrounded by his family in Los Angeles after facing chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and other illnesses.
Formed between 1966 and 67, Sly and Family Stone were the first major group that included black and white men and women, and well embodied an era when something seemed possible. The singer shrieked, chanted, yelled, yelled. The music was a desperate horn blow, a rapid fire guitar and locomotive rhythm, a melting pot of jazz, psychedelic rock, doo-wop, soul, and early grooves of funk.
Sly’s top time was short, almost from 1968 to 1971, but it was profound. None of the gravitational euphoria of the Woodstock era, nor the band bravely dealt with the crash that followed, was better captured. From the early songs that are as exciting as the title suggests – “I want you to be higher”, “Stand!” – in the calm aftermath of “Family Events” and “Runnin’Away”, Sly and the family Stone spoke for generations, whether they like what they have to say or not.
Stone’s group began as Bay Area Sextets featuring Sly on the keyboard. Sly’s brothers, Freddie, and guitar. The sisters are Rose vocals. Drums by Cynthia Robinson, Jerry Martini Horns and Greg Erico. They debuted with the album “A Oll New Thing” and won the title with the groundbreaking single “Dance to the Music.” It reached the top ten in April 1968, the week of the murder of Rev. Martin Luther King, and helped launch an era where the understatement of the Motown Poles and Stax suddenly became another era.
Lined with leather jumpsuits and goggle shades, miles wide smiles and miles hiafros, Slystone led him to set a new pace on the 1969 Woodstock Festival, setting a new pace on the radio. “Daily People,” “I Want You More,” and other songs were the national anthem of community, misfits, and brave and hopeful spirits, and built around catchphrases such as “Different Strokes for Different People.” The group released five top 10 singles. Three of them were No. 1 hits, releasing 3 million-selling albums: “Stand!”, “A Beers A Riot Goin ‘On” and “Greatest Hits.”
For a while, countless performers wanted to look and sound like Sly and family stones. Jackson Five’s breakthrough hit “I Want You Back” and The Temptations’ “I Can Can’t Get Get of You” were one of many songs that mimicked Sly’s vocal and instrumental arrangements from the late 1960s. Miles Davis’ landmark blend of jazz, rock and funk, “Bitch Brew,” was partly inspired, but fellow jazz artist Herbie Hancock named the song after him.
“He spoke, he had a playful way of moving in earnest. He had a look, a belt, a hat, and a jewel,” Questrob wrote in Stone’s memoir.
Stone passed away after a “long battle with COPD and other underlying health issues,” according to a statement released by his family. “Sly passed away peacefully, surrounded by his three children, his closest friends and his extended family. We lament his absence and comfort him to know that his extraordinary musical legacy will continue to resonate and inspire for generations to come.”
In 2025, Questlove released the documentary “Sly Live! (aka Black Genius’s Bad).”
Sly’s influence has endured for decades. George Clinton, a top funk artist in the 1970s, Congress’s Hunkelaeric creator, was a stone pupil. Prince, Rick James and Black Eyed Peas have been one of many performers since the 1980s, and after being influenced by Sly, countless rap and hip-hop artists sampled his riffs, from the Beastie Boys to Dr. Dore and Snoop Dogg. The 2005 tribute record included Maroon 5, John Legend and Roots.
“Sly did so much that he turned my head all the way,” Clinton wrote. “He was able to create a sophisticated R&B that sounded like he came from the act of giging at clubs for years, and in the next breath he was able to become as psychedelic as the heaviest rock band.”
Dreams die, career burns out
By the early 70s, Stone himself had begun a descent that he never recovered, driven by the pressure of fame and the additional burden of black fame. His record company was worried about more hits, but the Black Panthers were pushing him to drop white members from his group. After moving from the Bay Area to Los Angeles in 1970, he became increasingly obsessed with cocaine and became unstable with his actions. The promised album, “Incredibly Unpredictable Sly and the Family Stone” (which Rolling Stone never reported as “the most optimistic of all”) did not appear. He has become infamous for being late or not showing up at concerts at all, and often “waiting hours for other band members who are waiting for hours to see if he will appear,” according to Stone Biographer Joel Selvin.
Separatism and paranoia were set all over the country. As a calendar turn and as a state of mind, the 60s are over. “The possibility was leaked,” Stone later explained in his memoir.
In “Thank you (Falettinme be Mice Elf Agin), Stone warned that “it’s hard for a dying young person to take/it’s hard for them to sell out.” In late 1971 he released “Rows A Riot In Progress,” one of Grimm’s most uncompromising records at the top of the album charts. The sound was dense and muddy (Sly was one of the first musicians to use a drum machine), mood reflexes (“family events”), frightening (“runnin’away”), and despair. The fast and funky pace of the original “Falettinme be Mice Elf Agin” slowed down and grew, “Thank you Africa, Africa, Toalking You For You.”
The title track’s running time was 0:00.
“Muzak with a finger on the trigger,” critic Grail Marcus called out the album.
“Riot” highlighted the extraordinary run of dull, intense hit records by black artists, from “Superstition” by Stevie Wonder Single, to Marvin Gaye’s “What’s Goind” album, where “Riot” was an unofficial response. However, Stone seemed to have left the nightmare he had involved. He was reluctant to play “Riot” material at concerts, softening the mood of his acclaimed 1973 album “Fresh.” This featured a “Que sera sera” cover.
By the end of the decade, Sly and Family Stone had broken, and Sly had released solo records with unfulfilled promises such as “You missed me, I’m back” and “Back on the right track.” Most of the news he made over the next decades was drug busts, financial troubles and accidents at the stage. Sly and Family Stone were led by Rock and Roll of Fame in 1993 and were praised at the Grammy Awards in 2006, but after the early ’80s they released a single album called “I’m Back! Family & Friends.”
He claimed to have hundreds of unreleased songs and collaborated occasionally with Clinton. Clinton said that Stone “opened his eyes just because he wasn’t doing anything and it was clear that no one was thinking about it, so he opened his eyes and shocked you.”
Slystone has three children, including Cynthia Robinson’s daughter, and was married once. In 1974, he and actor Kathy Silva got married on stage at Madison Square Garden, an event that inspired the New Yorker’s 11,000-word story. Sly and Silva soon divorced.
Born musician, born united
He was born in Denton, Texas to Sylvester Stewart, and grew up in Valleyjo, California, and was the second of five children in a nearby religious family. Sylvester accidentally became “sly” when the teacher mistakenly spelled his name “Slivester.”
He loved to perform so much that his mother insisted that if the church congregation didn’t respond when he sang before it, he would cry. He was so talented and ambitious that by the age of four he sang on stage at the Sam Cook Show, and by the age of 11 he mastered some instruments and recorded Gospel songs with his brothers. He was very committed to the races he worked with, so in his teens and early 20s he played in a local band. He played in local bands, including black and white members.
Through his radio connections, he produced several of San Francisco’s top bands, including Grace Society, Grace Slick’s group. Along with early mentor and champion San Francisco Deeja Tom “Big Daddy” Donahue, he worked on rhythm and blues hits (Bobby Freeman’s “C’mon and Swim”) and Beau Brumels’ Beetle-esque “laughing, laughter.” Meanwhile, he had put together his own group, recruited family and local musicians, and settled in Sly and Family Stones.
“All-New Things” was announced in 1967, and soon the single “Dance to the Music” was followed, giving each member an introduction moment when they correctly declared “Brand New Beat.” In December 1968, the group appeared on the “Ed Sullivan Show” and performed medleys that included “Dance to the Music” and “Everyday People.” Before the set began, Sly looked to the audience and recited a short passage from his song, “Ada You Ready.”
“Don’t hate black,
Don’t hate white,
If you get bitten,
I hate bites. ”
Source link
