vainandy said:

Interesting. Actually, the first time I heard P-Funk's "Bop Gun" was at the skating Rink--and Brothers were gettin down, skating backwards to the groove--"Endangered Species...."


But I think I get what you're saying; the the Isley's had a leaner, cleaner groove--P-Funk was fatter, with alot more going on...just a different feel....









...

Graycap23 said:

Of course, Gray. That's WHY I said "you know that player"!

paligap said:

Do you want some space (P-Funk) in your funk or some pimp (Isleys) in your funk?
[Edited 8/6/09 17:38pm]

For Vainandy.....

Funkadelic -- Who Said A Funk Band CAN'T Play Rock


You mention the true story about The Isleys mixing funk and rock very well. But lets us not forget how P-Funk were doing the same thing.

TonyVanDam said:

Going back to the first FUNKADELIC album.

Timmy84 said:

Rest In Peace to Eddie Hazel. THIS man knew how to rock the hell out on lead guitar. He was just as much as an important P-Funk member as Bootsy Collins & Bernie Worrell.



Eddie's replacement Michael Hampton was no pushover neither. He can play the funk & rock thing as well.

They're both legends and no one is going to remove either from my collection absent the threat of murder.

But If I were forced at gunpoint to lay out the studio recordings of both Parliament/Funkadelic and The Isley Brothers, I'd have to side with the former.

Just in the span of those two, 2-disc anthologies (58 tracks), Funkadelic's "Music for Your Mother" and Parliament's "Tear the Roof Off" show a breadth of quality that very few have or ever will reach (in just the Funk genre, I don't think anyone ever will).

Hell naw, I love 70s funk but I love early 80s funk more. The disco era is what made that transition because many of the funk groups such as The Barkays, Instant Funk, The Isley Brothers, Brick, The Brothers Johnson, Kool and The Gang, etc. were experimenting with disco while it was going on. The tempo was sped up and more danceable, the sound was more polished, the horns were still there but they sounded a lot less like jazz or Vegasy. It was just more of a modern (at the time) sound.

The early years of each decade kinda bleed off the previous decade until the style changes a little. The early 70s funk still resembled the late 60s slightly and when disco came around and changed funk, it was like the 60s were completely over and the 70s had finally arrived. And when the early 80s arrived, the first few years bled off the late 70s style of funk. Without the occurence of disco, a jam like Cameo's "Shake Your Pants" would never have been made. It's that super fast funky danceable style that disco was (not hardcore disco but disco/funk). Bill Summers and Summers Heat's "Call It What You Want" kinda went even further from disco and sounded even more further from the early 70s type funk but it had that fastness of disco. And as the years went by and things got even more modern, there was Midnight Star. None of these jams would have occured if people had never moved away from the jazzy sounds of the early 70s funk.

It's all funk but it's just a different type of funk. I love it all but I definately like post disco funk moreso than pre disco funk.

vainandy said:

Of course you do, because you're a grade-A ass shaker right?

That's exactly what I'm saying. It just sounds more cleaner or polished.

As for the skating rink, they used to play "Flashlight", "Knee Deep", and "One Nation Under A Groove" and they fit right in (although I think if I hear "Flashlight" one more time on the radio these days, I'm going to scream because they have worn it out ). However, they used to break it on down and play "Chocolate City" and "Make My Funk The P Funk" sometimes and when they did, a lot of the skate floor would clear. I mean, they are great songs but they are just too damn slow to play at a skating rink. It brought everyone's high down.

vainandy said:

Now I see why you picked the Isleys.

Damn right! I'm all about having fun and I like to have fun 24/7. Ain't nothing more fun than ass shakin'....well, I can only think of one other thing. Anyway, I love a bunch of shit talkin, ass shakin', drinkin', and partyin'. A lot of folks idea of fun is sitting and bobbing their heads to music, in other words, chillin'. Well, chillin' always bored me. I never was happy with the simple things in life. I like everything big, flashy, and fun.

This is a weird comparison because the isley brothers were funky
but put out butta slow jams while Parliament was strictly funk.
A more appropriate comparison would be Parliament vs Cameo/Barkays/or Slave.
The Isley Brothers vs Confunkshun/Ohio Players.
All great bands.

vainandy said:

Gotcha.

phunkdaddy said:

Actually the only comparison I can see for P-Funk is James Brown and his many JB's incarnations. Those bands were 96% Funk.

The Isleys and Ohio Players is a good comparison.

I wasn't putting the two groups as a whole up to a versus, only the funk from the two groups. That's why I put "Battle of The Funk" in the thread title instead of just "The Isley Brothers vs. Parliament". Both are funk but both were different styles of funk. I was just trying to see which people preferred.

LittleBLUECorvette said:

How about the Gap Band? They were basically doing the same thing in the '80s that the Isleys perfected in the '70s (funk + quiet storm). Also both groups have been heavily sampled by hip-hop acts, not to mention both groups are sets of brothers, and the lead singers (Ron Isley & Charlie Wilson) have already worked with R. Kelly.

Actually, if you are looking to compare similar groups, The Isley Brothers had much more rock than The Gap Band. The Gap Band would be good to put up to a versus with Lakeside or Con Funk Shun.

vainandy said:

That IS true...

Or you could even compare One Way, Skyy, Zapp, or many others because a lot of them were doing basically the same thing in the early 80s....funk with a few slow jams.

Comparing a similar group that had as hard funk as The Isley Brothers would be very difficult because they had a lot of funk jams that were so hard they almost sounded like rock. You couldn't even compare Prince, because when he gets that hard on his jams, they are usually straight up rock jams that wouldn't be considered funk at all such as "Let's Go Crazy", "Bambi", "I'm Yours", or "Why You Wanna Treat Me So Bad".

You know why it's sometimes hard to compare the Isley Brothers to simply funk groups? Because they weren't just funk, these guys were actually around at the beginning of rock 'n' roll or right before rock music became established as THE music genre. They had hits in the '50s through the mid-'60s recording songs later made famous by British groups. They got bigger with Motown and even bigger with "It's Your Thing". The Isleys were putting rock into their music at the same time as Funkadelic (1970-ish). That's the only reason why you put them vs. P-Funk because technically their styles were near similar. But you're right that the Isleys' funk records can also be called rock records. I would go on the record and say THEY ARE ROCK RECORDS.
[Edited 8/6/09 21:05pm]

vainandy said:

Gotcha!
I think the P funk funked a lil harder but i would lean toward
the isleys slightly only because of Ernie on all those jammin
guitar solos.
[Edited 8/6/09 21:18pm]

TonyVanDam said:[quote]

Timmy84 said:

[b]Rest In Peace to Eddie Hazel. THIS man knew how to rock the hell out on lead guitar. He was just as much as an important P-Funk member as Bootsy Collins & Bernie Worrell.
Man, who u tellin'?

Quote: "That's exactly what I'm saying. It just sounds more cleaner or polished."

"Clean" and "polished" as in "opposed to funky"??

Naw, man, to each his own, sure, but funk to me is one thing, that disco invasion being another. And my fonk stanks naaaasty!

Well, I don't like my funk too stanky. If I did, I'd go straight and eat me some pussy.

vainandy said:

C'mon. P-funk took funk to a whole nother level. Isley's did their thang, and had their own sound but they didn't revolutionize the funk the way P-funk did. Isley's were great though

Timmy84 said:

Co-sign. Thread Over.

vainandy said:

it's all about the P-Funk