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Who invented Funk music (and rap for that matter)?

usernameusername 71 Posts
edited January 2013 in Strut Central
Funk was/is a prison term (in the black community) for a unpleasant odor, possibly sex related. But what musicians were responsible for its sonorous incarnation? Was it Dyke and the Blazers (who JB derived his sound) or some earlier conglomeration of gospel soul jamaican? And regarding rap music (now called hiphop), was it The Last Poets? Rudy Ray Moore? Red Foxx? Lord Buckley? Fatback (king Tim), Pigmeat Markham? Or the commonly thought SugarHill Gang?

I double down on Clarence Reid

  Comments

  • HarveyCanalHarveyCanal "a distraction from my main thesis." 13,234 Posts
  • fishmongerfunkfishmongerfunk 4,154 Posts
    this is the one that set it all off:

  • The_Hook_UpThe_Hook_Up 8,182 Posts
    HarveyCanal said:

    This.
    We can argue all day about who first gave us soul/R&B...but when it comes to funk, a syncopated, on the one/jerk backbeat...NOLA owns that shit. No argument. It's that second line thing.
  • LaserWolfLaserWolf Portland Oregon 11,517 Posts
    We had the funk discussion years ago.
    I tried to make the case that Cold Sweat was the first true funk song with the unrelenting single chord riff.

    HC made a stronger case for Professor Longhair's Big Chief with some crazy off kilter drums.
    Harvey can you post that again?

    As for the first rap song I second Leo Sayer.
  • usernameusername 71 Posts
    The_Hook_Up said:
    HarveyCanal said:

    This.
    We can argue all day about who first gave us soul/R&B...but when it comes to funk, a syncopated, on the one/jerk backbeat...NOLA owns that shit. No argument. It's that second line thing.

    and yet, the last two lines fail to mention funk music (historian's error perhaps). if this is so, and I have no reason to doubt you, what early audio recordings indicate this sound origin? meters? are we talking the black car ribs/Arawak tribes?what recordings follow this lineage?

    looking for the genealogy of funk music? thanks for your indulgence.

    Clarence Reid is half african/native american from the south and part german.
  • The_Hook_UpThe_Hook_Up 8,182 Posts
    I would say Professor Longhair and his tunes "Big Chief"(first recorded in the early 50s, I believe) and "Misery" ('57) have the funk thing going on for an entire tune. Sure there are bits and pieces in some intros, bridges, turn arounds, but from my limited knowledge of NOLA records, I'm thinking those are 2 of the earliest recorded examples with a tune based around a pronounced funky groove.
  • HarveyCanalHarveyCanal "a distraction from my main thesis." 13,234 Posts
  • usernameusername 71 Posts
    The_Hook_Up said:
    I would say Professor Longhair and his tunes "Big Chief"(first recorded in the early 50s, I believe) and "Misery" ('57) have the funk thing going on for an entire tune. Sure there are bits and pieces in some intros, bridges, turn arounds, but from my limited knowledge of NOLA records, I'm thinking those are 2 of the earliest recorded examples with a tune based around a pronounced funky groove.

    thanks. i sense a ragtime influence in professor longhair (a little too fast for funk)
    and when and with who do the heavier drums enter in?
  • HarveyCanalHarveyCanal "a distraction from my main thesis." 13,234 Posts
    username said:
    The_Hook_Up said:
    I would say Professor Longhair and his tunes "Big Chief"(first recorded in the early 50s, I believe) and "Misery" ('57) have the funk thing going on for an entire tune. Sure there are bits and pieces in some intros, bridges, turn arounds, but from my limited knowledge of NOLA records, I'm thinking those are 2 of the earliest recorded examples with a tune based around a pronounced funky groove.

    thanks. i sense a ragtime influence in professor longhair (a little too fast for funk)
    and when and with who do the heavier drums enter in?

    With James Black, the dude playing drums on Big Chief.

    Then there's this from 1964...



    And this from 1965...



    Which is actually a cover of this from 1953...

  • usernameusername 71 Posts
    LaserWolf said:

    As for the first rap song I second Leo Sayer.

    pigmeat markham Here come the judge/the trial (1968)
  • The_Hook_UpThe_Hook_Up 8,182 Posts
    username said:
    LaserWolf said:

    As for the first rap song I second Leo Sayer.

    pigmeat markham Here come the judge/the trial (1968)

    MC JACK DEE, 1967
  • HarveyCanalHarveyCanal "a distraction from my main thesis." 13,234 Posts
  • usernameusername 71 Posts
    The_Hook_Up said:
    username said:
    LaserWolf said:

    As for the first rap song I second Leo Sayer.

    pigmeat markham Here come the judge/the trial (1968)

    MC JACK DEE, 1967

    nice.thanks.

    clarence reid/blowfly rapp dirty (1958-1965 era)
  • HarveyCanalHarveyCanal "a distraction from my main thesis." 13,234 Posts
  • usernameusername 71 Posts
    HarveyCanal said:

    all work much appreciated.
  • The_Hook_UpThe_Hook_Up 8,182 Posts
    MC LIL B
  • skelskel You can't cheat karma 5,033 Posts
    Mozart invented funk, evidenced by a two page fragment of a long-hidden manuscript discovered in a Viennese vault in 2011.
    At the top of the first page, in Mozza's own hand (and authenticated by Prof Jurgen Schweinhund) is the legend "On Der Ein".
    A recent first live rendition by the Berlin Phil amazed listeners by revealing a heavily syncopated cello section where pizzicato stylings provided a rhythmic pulse eerily reminiscent of 'The Funky Drummer'.
    Incidentally, notes in the margin of the manuscript have been restored, and include the phrases 'gutt gott' and 'hah'.

    Aborigines invented rap over 40,000 years ago during their southward expansion from the islands of New Guinea to the still-connected Australian continent.
    It is believed that the didgeridoo performed a dual role in providing a beatbox-like rhythm as well as a banal drone eerily reminiscent of current rap (cont. P 94)

    FACT.
  • batmonbatmon 27,574 Posts
    white folks created funk and rap.
  • SPlDEYSPlDEY Vegas 3,375 Posts


    Earl Palmer invented Backbeat drumming heavily influenced by fellow Nola drummers. Which naturally evolved & was elevated by dudes like Smokey, Clyde, Clayton, Jabo, Pretty Purdie and so forth..



    - spidey
  • Controller_7Controller_7 4,052 Posts
    Gutt got.

    Haha
  • SPlDEYSPlDEY Vegas 3,375 Posts


    Coco La Roc & DJ Kool Herc

    - spidey
  • vintageinfantsvintageinfants 4,538 Posts
    lucille bogan's 'shave em dry' is the OG 'my neck, my back' by khia
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