News & Updates — soul/funk

The recently-deceased Clyde Stubblefield, along with Jabo Starks, was one of the drummers in the James Brown band from '65-'70, powering "Cold Sweat", "Ain't It Funky Now", "Say It Loud - I'm Black & I'm Proud", "There Was A Time", "Sex Machine", "I Got The Feelin", "Mother Popcorn", "Get Up Get Into It Get Involved", Bobby Byrd's "If You Don't Work, You Can't Eat", Marva Whitney's "It's My Thing", Vicki Anderson's "Message From The Soul Sisters" and many more. "Starks was the Beatles to Clyde's Stones. A clean shuffle drummer to Clyde's free-jazz left hand"--Questlove Of course, it's his drums...

Best known as a producer of sample-ready '60s records of unique vision, David Axelrod held many chairs in his career, from drummer to composer, A&R man and especially as a recording engineer, arranger and producer. In the late '60s and '70s he created several personal statements with his drum-heavy engineering, polished arrangements, creative use of strings, funky beats and eco-oriented themes. A longtime favorite of hip-hop samplers, his music was a groovy fusion of jazz, rock and soul. His sound and style is unmistakable to the ears. The son of a union activist, he grew up in Los Angeles and...

The original hippy, the mystical eden ahbez wrote a tune called "Nature Boy" and by chance was able to hand it to Nat King Cole who turned it into a mega-hit in 1948. He looked like a hippy long before it was a thing and lived outdoors in Los Angeles. He lived under the "L" of the Hollywood sign and held a job as a piano player in a raw foods store. He was a vegetarian, straight edge and an anti-vaxer and wore a white robe. This lifestyle inspired "Nature Boy", and after the hit by Cole, ahbez became an...

Cosimo Matassa's J&M Recording studio in New Orleans was the home of some of the biggest hits of the early rock & roll era and he helped shape the NOLA sound. A Sicilian-American who was born and raised in NOLA, he was a funky grocer, record & appliance shop owner and a jukebox servicer before he opened the studio in '45, a time when there were few studios in that musical city. Teenaged Allen Toussaint used to hang out there and practice piano, later on often working directly with Matassa. In the '60s he started his label Dover Records to...

Jimmy Sabater, the velvet-voiced Nuyorican singer & timbalista with the Joe Cuba Sextet, was the smooth English-tongued half of his lead vocal duo with Cheo Feliciano. Check out such great tunes as the smash hit "Bang, Bang", and "To Be With You" (a classic bolero, which Jimmy also cut a good disco version in '76). A native of El Barrio, he met Joe Cuba while playing stickball and the two joined Joe Panama's band. Eventually Joe Cuba took it over and transformed it into the popular Joe Cuba Sextette. They started making records in the late '50s but it was...