The Essential Sly and the Family Stone

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Editorial reviews

Amazon.co.uk Review
Long before Michael Jackson and Prince became superstars by fusing rhythmic soul with rock's sense of scale and ambition, a former northern California deejay and producer named Sylvester Stewart took the vaunted musical utopianism of the 60s and forged it into the cross-cultural, ass-shaking, genre-bending groove monster that was Sly and the Family Stone. James Brown may have invented funk, but S&TFS masterfully tooled and supercharged it into mass-acceptance. No mere greatest hits collection (though they're all here in digitally remastered glory), this 35-track, double-disc anthology delves deeper into the handful of seminal albums the band produced before its leaders' long, troubling slide into drug abuse and oblivion. Given the chronological development, there's a sense here that Stewart/Stone's problems paralleled the increasingly militant and hard-edged stance the band took on albums like the uncompromising classic There's a Riot Going On. Propelled by Larry Graham's locomotive bass lines and accented by rousing horns, Sly and company swooped from the heights of 1969's hit-laden "Stand" towards a darker and more unsettling decade ahead. Few bands have soared higher--or fallen as far. --Jerry McCulley

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Customer reviews

review by: date: 2008-02-14 rating:
There's space for even more.
Really great double cd compilation, which succeeds in drawing in all the main S&TFS highlights. I will, however, be very mean and give this only a four-star rating. You'll think i'm being a bit churlish, but it's mainly because of a relatively ungenerous playing time of about 60 minutes per disc. In other words, there was plenty of room for more. There was room for "Sex Machine" from "Stand!", or the remaining tracks from "Riot". Granted, it's absolutely not in the record company's interests to do this, and i will readily admit to being terribly unreasonable. But it's never nice to see that a company is not giving the best value-for-money.

However, in spite of the relatively disappointing running time, this double cd would still probably represent the best overall S&TFS compilation on the market

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review by: Ted Maul date: 2005-07-23 rating:
Superb Sly compilation
This 2CD set is a near-perfect primer for Sly & The Family Stone neophytes,as it contains pretty much all the best music they ever recorded-including most of their undisputed masterpiece There's A Riot Goin' On (Family Affair,Thank You For Talkin' To Me,Africa,etc).
The miracle of this best of is that while this music is of it's time (using Frere Jacques as an intro is an idea that only would have been used in the late sixties) it is also timeless,and in this genre only James Brown,Curtis Mayfield and Parliament/Funkadelic can claim to have as great a back catalogue.

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review by: ipp1 date: 2004-08-11 rating:
let the music take you higher
What a great compilation. Not only are Sly and the Family Stone Phat but it has 35 songs on it. What makes this band such a force in music is not only because of their extremely artistic innovation and eccletic song disparity but the lyrics abilities to be so simple but at the same time seem to tell so much about yourself and human life.
This is the best Compilation I've bought in a long time.


review by: We're all Frankies' date: 2003-05-11 rating:
Another great essential collection-
The on-going Essential-series is pretty much the definitive in best of's- having all the one's you'd expect & a few more obscure tracks to make it more interesting (the joys of a 2CD format). So this one's as great as the previous Cohen & Dylan Essentials & as lots of Sly's releases are only on import (eg Stand!, Life) this is quite handy.

The first disc starts with that early classic stuff, the next step on from James Brown- culled from Dance to the Music, Life and Stand! (where politics entered the spectrum) here are absolute reasons as to why Sly & the Family Stone are considered to be one of the key outfits of the late 60s/early70s. Their influence was as vast as that of Jimi Hendrix- their varied line-up pushed Miles Davis towards the experimental rock/jazz fusion of Bitches Brew, On the Corner & Jack Johnson (Davis also plays on There's a Riot Goin' On & like Sly got lost in coke-inflected abandon). Another great 70s album, Gene Clark's No Other (1974) also displayed Sly's influence- as have bands since- from Magazine (who covered Thank You), Screamadelica-Primal Scream, Arrested Development (who reveresed Everyday People in the early 90s), The Charlatans (who covered Time for Livin' with the Chemical Bros for 1995's War Child project) & any dance act who has gone on about getting high- see I Get High On You or I Want to Take You Higher. That pulsing dancebeat of Dance to the Music (here in digitslly remastered glory) found itself requoted in such records as Magazine's The Light Pours Out of Me (1978), The Stone Roses I Am The Ressurection (1989), Primal Scream's Rocks (1994) & Sebadoh's Flame (1998). Disc One has all the early groovy tracks (M'Lady, Dance) & the burgeoning political consciousness that tied with the era of Civil Rights, from X to Black Panthers to Haight Asbury (prior to all this destructed). Stand!, Everyday People & (especially) Don't Call Me Nigger, Whitey show Sly et al on prime form- the latter pre-empting songs like Rock'N'Roll Nigger and the reclamation of the word 'nigga' by many rap artists (J-Lo using the N-word in the 21st century is certainly not very controversial compared to this). Sonically Don't Call Me...& Thank You are more than pleasing- no Rick James, no Prince, no Paul's Boutique etc without...

Disc 2 focuses on the last two great releases There's a Riot Goin' On (1971) & Fresh (1973)- after that the band split and Sly Stone became one of those tragic casualties (think Arthur Lee, Rick James, Gene Clark, Roky Erikson, Brian Wilson) who got burnt...Most of There's a Riot...is included, easily one of the great albums, from hit single Family Affair to the disturbing Smilin' to the incendiary title track (& the meltdown of Thank You...Africa- which fits somewhere between Can and Parliament). From Fresh we get the previously mentioned Time for Livin', Loose Booty & one of the greatest pop singles ever (perfect, just over 3 minutes long & wonderful on EVERY level)- If You Want Me To Stay (which has been terribly covered by bands like the Chili's & Mercury Rev- it also got a life of its own on the great 70s soundtrack Dead Presidents). Imagine if James Brown had wanted to sound like The Beatles & you're near...

A great compilation, everyone needs a Sly-best of and this is the best one currently available-

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