I'm in a P-Funk groove and have some questions...

Can anyone point me to a discography that lists both Parliament and Funkadelic issues together and chronologically. I want to see which albums came first that were released and/or recorded in the same year. Found a few nice sites, but nothing that lists releases of both bands together chronologically.

With the members of each group being essentially the same, were the two names meant to explore stylistic differences or really just a way to have juggle two record contracts? I know the musical differences that are cited between the two, but to my ears there are as many Funkadelic songs that sound like Parliament as there are the other way around. Were the bands marketing towards different audiences? Did either one really have a fanbase that the other didn't?

What were the general recording practices of P-Funk? It's amazing how live-in-the-studio some of the studio stuff sounds, but I'm sure there was a decent amount overdubbing involved. Did they generally lay down a rhythm track and build via overdubs, or were more fleshed out performances tracked?

I may think of more...

[Edited 6/18/11 13:45pm]

Great questions. You're going to get a LOT of good responses here. Many Funk Mob die hards here. Some here (like my pal P-Dogz) has had the honor of knowing and playing with P-Funk also.

To my ears (since Funkadelic became the afterthought of the "then" Parliaments), Funkadelic started sounding a bit like the R&B styled Parliament in the mid 70's. I guess by "Tales" and

"Let's Take It..". But the mid to late 70's Funkadelic records still had some rock joints that you

couldn't hear on the Parliament records.

George has also said that some of the cuts for both groups started to sound similar because they

were recording so much with the same musicians and at the same time.

Most of the R&B people I knew LOVED Parliament. These same people also thought "Knee Deep" and "One Nation" were recorded by Parliament also. But when you tried to turn them on to the heavier rock sounds of Funkadelic they were not trying to hear it. Most of the white musicians that I know that didn't like Parliament as kids, now LOVE Funkadelic. Go figure.

Shows you how brilliant the marketing of P-Funk's ideas were back then.

SPYZFAN1 said:

George has also said that some of the cuts for both groups started to sound similar because they

were recording so much with the same musicians and at the same time.

Thanks for the responses. Would also like to know if anyone has published a sessionography. That would be really interesting too.

Imaginative said:

SPYZFAN1 said:

George has also said that some of the cuts for both groups started to sound similar because they

were recording so much with the same musicians and at the same time.

Thanks for the responses. Would also like to know if anyone has published a sessionography. That would be really interesting too.

This site will help you more and then some....

http://www.duke.edu/~tmc/pfunk.html

silverchild said:

This site will help you more and then some....

http://www.duke.edu/~tmc/pfunk.html

Thanks, actually been on that site and it's the best I've found so far. Still doesn't have all of the answers I seek.

SPYZFAN1 said:

Many Funk Mob die hards here. Some here (like my pal P-Dogz) has had the honor of knowing and playing with P-Funk also.

While I've been a fan of P-Funk since about 1974, have been to several dozen concerts, have most of their catalog, and have spoken to various members (though not George Clinton) over the years, I can't say that I "know" any of them on a personal level, and I've never had the opportunity to actually "play" with any of them (although I'm sure there may be some here that have).

silverchild said:

Imaginative said:

Thanks for the responses. Would also like to know if anyone has published a sessionography. That would be really interesting too.

This site will help you more and then some....

http://www.duke.edu/~tmc/pfunk.html

That's the site I was going to recommend also. It's the one I always rely on to be the most complete online reference.

Documentarys like this do a good job breaking it down also

http://www.pbs.org/indepe...music.html

That documentary rocks.

I like the independent lens Documentary also, when I recently checked out the Tales Of Dr Fubkenstien I felt it was more detailed, it seemed to spend more time with each indivisual album. They are both fun to see. I can't seem to find the VH1 documentary that has George and Bootsy talking about seeing a real UFO. Here is a pretty good Unsung documentary on Bootsy

Speaking of the P-Funk thang...this cut has been on repeat for days now! The "middle" Funkadelic stuff (post-Cosmic Slop and pre-One Nation) just rocks.

silverchild said:

Speaking of the P-Funk thang...this cut has been on repeat for days now! The "middle" Funkadelic stuff (post-Cosmic Slop and pre-One Nation) just rocks.

My bad P-Dogz. I knew you've gone to many shows but I thought you jammed with some of them. My apologies.

SPYZFAN1 said:

My bad P-Dogz. I knew you've gone to many shows but I thought you jammed with some of them. My apologies.

No apologies required. I was just happy to have been referred to as someones "pal", lol.

To answer one of your questions a lot of tracks would start of as jams performed live, then later they would lay them down in the studio, some of them without lyrics or a song concept, later to be over dubbed with lyrical content and a song concept. Other songs were oldies from The Parliaments doo wop era transformed into modern funk numbers. There was no one set way to come up with a song, it was an all of the above, live in the studio, over dubs, remakes, improvision etc. The thing about P Funk is that everyone wanted to be a part of it, Bootsy described a competitive but fun atmosphere where everyone would want to get their thang on the record.

Cool to see the interest for everything P-Funk!

Check out this book:

Funk: The Music, The People, and The Rhythm of The One

BY Ricky Vincent

Here's a link to it on Amazon:

http://www.amazon.com/Fun...amp;sr=1-1

It's a great book and has quite a bit of info on P-Funk. Including info on pretty much all their albums up to the time of the book's release. Plus all around great info on Funk music and it's artists. Highly recommended.

[Edited 6/19/11 14:01pm]

Bookmarking Thread so I can get back to it.

Bfunkthe1 said:

Cool to see the interest for everything P-Funk!

Check out this book:

Funk: The Music, The People, and The Rhythm of The One

BY Ricky Vincent

Here's a link to it on Amazon:

http://www.amazon.com/Fun...amp;sr=1-1

It's a great book and has quite a bit of info on P-Funk. Including info on pretty much all their albums up to the time of the book's release. Plus all around great info on Funk music and it's artists. Highly recommended.

I have this book and it is excellent