ࡱ> 130G bjbjff - ]  :HHHHs u u u u u u t u @u s HHs s s HHs s s s s s H @\<.s- Fs PRIVATELive Review: George Clinton and the P-Funk All-Stars by HYPERLINK "http://ezone.org:1080/ez/authors/goldman.html"Mitch Goldman Showbox, Seattle, WA 6/18/97 I knew there was no way I would make it through an entire P-Funk show on a weeknight, and I was right. Their legendary headline sets frequently exceed the three-and four-hour mark, and this aging rock fan just wasnt prepared to stand in the smoky Showbox ballroom until 2 in the morning. Fortunately, the two hours I did catch contained plenty of the P-Funk magic. Hitting the stage a little after ten, the core band, minus Funkmeister of Ceremonies George Clinton, started into a slow groove instrumental. With two bass players, two keyboardists, four guitarists (including long-timers Gary "Doo Wop" Shider and Michael "Kid Funkadelic" Hampton), two keyboardists, two female vocalists, two rappers, and a drummer, the Funk Mob barely needs Clinton; they generate plenty of funk without him, as evidenced by the opening "One Nation Under a Groove". But mid-song, the caped funkmeister made his grand entrance, and while he doesn't do much other than loom over the proceedings (and add some vocals), George's enigmatic presence lends true charisma to the show. "One Nation" went on and on, putting the Seattle crowd into a kind of hypnotic funk groove. Call and response vocals made the event interactive, as the mostly white, alterna-rock audience sang the lines with as much funk and gusto as the band themselves. Unfortunately every song went on for over ten minutes, and while this works great on classics like "One Nation", it's totally uncalled for on newer, weaker material like "Summer Swim" and "Underground Angel". "Swim" in fact featured not one but two lengthy audience sing-alongs. With all the Mob knows about funk, they could learn a thing or two about pacing. But I have no quibbles with the stretch of four killer Funkadelic tunes that opened the show; the slow funk of "One Nation", the blues of "Red Hot Mama", the urgency of "Hit It and Quit It" and the sublime ecstasy of "Cosmic Slop" (with its "spacepeopleuniversal love" intro). Michael Hampton's soloing on "Slop" was incredible and harkened back to the old P-Funk days when Hampton and Eddie "Maggot Brain" Hazel were the twin guitar-slingers of 70's funk. (I wish I'd stuck around long enough to hear Hampton's version of "Maggot", a classic instrumentalproviding of course they even played it!). After an hour plus of killer Funkadelic, things slowed down with some new tunes, but things picked up with the Parliament dance-floor hit "Flashlight". The heavy bass and infectious chorus turned the Showbox into one huge mass of funk. Unfortunately (pacing again, George!), the slow and tedious "Dope Dog" brought things to a halt again. And at that point, two hours into the show, I had to give up the funk. A shorter show with a faster pace would greatly improve the P-Funk aesthetic. Or just an earlier starting timesome of us can't funk all night long like we used to. PARTIAL SETLIST: (10:05-12:05): Intro-> One Nation Under A Groove Red Hot Mama Hit It and Quit It Cosmic Slop Summer Swim Underground Angel Flashlight US Custom Coast Guard Dope Dog HYPERLINK "http://ezone.org:1080/ez/copy.html"Copyright 1997  Back for more HYPERLINK "rocknroll.html"Live Reviews   ABC|}~di  ִּߠߠߠߠߖߠߓ{xpjTU0JjU jUjUhmHnHCJ05B*CJOJQJ6B*CJOJQJ6B*CJ0OJQJB*CJ0OJQJ0JB*CJ$OJQJjB*CJ0UB*CJ0jB*CJ0UB*CJOJQJ B*OJQJjCJU jU,? > $$T=$dd$$? >        jU0J6+0P/ =!"#$%Dz=cJAJAJA= DyK yK \http://ezone.org:1080/ez/authors/goldman.htmlDyK yK Fhttp://ezone.org:1080/ez/copy.htmlDyK Frocknroll.html) [>@>Normal 1$ddB*CJhmH nH <A@<Default Paragraph Font>O>Definition Term B*BOBDefinition ListhB*(O( Definition6,O,H1$@&5B*CJ0KH$(O(H2$@& 5B*CJ$(O(H3$@& 5B*CJ$O$H4$@&5B*(O(H5$@& 5B*CJ(O(H6$@& 5B*CJ0O0Address 6B*4O4 Blockquote hhB*OCITE6$O$CODE CJOJQJ$X@$Emphasis6(U@( Hyperlink>*B*8V@8FollowedHyperlink>*B*0O0Keyboard5CJOJQJjOj Preformatted0  # ~= z9!v%B*CJOJQJZOZz-Bottom of Form!$1$$d<CJOJQJhmH nH TOT z-Top of Form"$1$&d<CJOJQJhmH nH $O1$SampleOJQJ W@A Strong50OQ0 Typewriter CJOJQJ$Oa$Variable6,Oq, HTML Markup<B*"O"Comment<     B}    XXX8@J( t?Dp0 TB  c $Vd~?TB  c $Vd~?B S ?  $t$t5>T_ (8D`g"{u^g7 @ c j  >Tm A P  mitchgo.C:\WINDOWS\TEMP\AutoRecovery save of pfunk.asdmitchgoC:\My Documents\pfunk.htmlmitchgoC:\My Documents\pfunk.html@ P@GTimes New Roman5Symbol3& Arial?5 Courier New"Ah F F %2B 1C:\PROGRAM FILES\MICROSOFT OFFICE\OFFICE\html.dotpfunkmitchgomitchgoOh+'0X    ,8@HPpfunkffunmitchgoitc html.dot mitchgo3tcMicrosoft Word 8.0@q@DՋp@0s ՜.+,D՜.+,@ hp  ad business unitdB   pfunk Title@nv _PID_GUID _PID_HLINKSHTMLDocumentEncoding GeneratorAN{18ACC0A5-F229-11D0-A00E-00A024A85A2C}Ady,rocknroll.html"5#http://ezone.org:1080/ez/copy.htmlA.http://ezone.org:1080/ez/authors/goldman.html  windows-1252ingMicrosoft Word 97d !"#$%&')*+,-./2Root Entry F].s4Data 1Tableurlmon.dllWordDocument-SummaryInformation( DocumentSummaryInformation8(CompObjj  FMicrosoft Word Document MSWordDocWord.Document.89q