Wednesday 2/8/23 7pm ET: Feature LP: Sly & The Family Stone – There’s A Riot Goin’ On (1971)

There’s a Riot Goin’ On (sometimes referred to as Riot) is the fifth studio album by American funk and soul band Sly and the Family Stone. It was recorded from 1970 to 1971 at Record Plant Studios in Sausalito, California and released later that year on November 1 by Epic Records. The recording was dominated by band frontman/songwriter Sly Stone during a period of escalated drug use and intra-group tension.

With the album, Sly and the Family Stone departed from the optimistic sound of their previous music and explored a darker, more challenging sound, employing edgy funk rhythms, primitive drum machines, extensive overdubbing, and a dense mix. Conceptually and lyrically, There’s a Riot Goin’ On embraced apathy, pessimism, and disillusionment with both Stone’s fame and 1960s counterculture amid a turbulent political climate in the United States at the turn of the 1970s, influenced by the decline of the civil rights movement and the rise of the Black Power movement. The album’s title was originally planned to be Africa Talks to You, but it changed in response to Marvin Gaye’s album What’s Going On (1971), released six months before Riot.

A commercial success, There’s a Riot Goin’ On topped the Billboard Pop Album and Soul Album charts, while its lead single “Family Affair” reached number-one on the Pop Singles chart. The album was eventually certified platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) for sales of at least one million copies in the US. Originally released to mixed reviews, the album has since been praised as one of the greatest and most influential recordings of all time, having impacted the funk, jazz-funk, and hip hop genres in particular. It ranks frequently and highly in many publications’ best-album lists, including Rolling Stone’s “500 Greatest Albums of All Time”, on which it placed 99th in 2003 and 82nd in 2020.

1. “Luv N’ Haight” 4:01
2. “Just Like a Baby” 5:12
3. “Poet” 3:01
4. “Family Affair” 3:06
5. “Africa Talks to You ‘The Asphalt Jungle'” 8:45
6. “There’s a Riot Goin’ On” (timed at 0:04 on compact disc) 0:00
7. “Brave & Strong” 3:28
8. “(You Caught Me) Smilin'” 2:53
9. “Time” 3:03
10. “Spaced Cowboy” 3:57
11. “Runnin’ Away” 2:51
12. “Thank You for Talkin’ to Me Africa” 7:14
13. “Runnin’ Away” (mono mix single version) 2:44
14. “My Gorilla Is My Butler” (instrumental) 3:11
15. “Do You Know What?” (instrumental) 7:16
16. “That’s Pretty Clean” (instrumental) 4:12

Sly Stone – arrangements, drums, drum programming, keyboard programming, synthesizers, guitar, bass, keyboards, vocals
Rose Stone – vocals, keyboards
Billy Preston – keyboards
Jerry Martini – tenor saxophone
Cynthia Robinson – trumpet
Freddie Stone – guitar
Ike Turner – guitar
Bobby Womack – guitar
Larry Graham – bass, backing vocals
Greg Errico – drums
Gerry Gibson – drums
Little Sister – backing vocals

Friday 7/15/22 1am ET: Live Track Show

Tonight:

Kenny Loggins, Supertramp, Dave Matthews Band, Elton John, Kelly Clarkson, Honeydrippers, Bon Jovi, Sha Na Na, Chuck Berry, Disturbed Featuring Myles Kennedy, UFO, Doors, Rolling Stones, Los Lonely boys with Ronnie Milsap, Bonnie Raitt, Metallica with the San Francisco Symphony, Van Morrison, Duran Duran, Fleetwood Mac, Peter Frampton, Grand Funk, Scorpions

Wednesday 7/13/22 1am ET: Live Track Show

Tonight:

Paul McCartney & Wings, Jethro Tull, Bon Jovi, Al Stewart, John Fogerty, Foreigner, Doobie Brothers, Eric Clapton, Elton John, Neil Young, Ozzy Osbourne, Queen, Rolling Stones, Mavis Staples, Journey, Robert Plant, Joe Cocker, Sly & The Family Stone, Nick Lowe, Nils Lofgren, Eagles, Def Leppard

Saturday 12pm ET: Feature Artist – Sly & The Family Stone

Sly Stone (born Sylvester Stewart, March 15, 1943) is an American musician, songwriter, and record producer who is most famous for his role as frontman for Sly and the Family Stone, a band that played a critical role in the development of soul, funk, rock, and psychedelia in the 1960s and 1970s.

Raised in California as part of a religious family that encouraged musical expression, Stone mastered several instruments at an early age and performed gospel music as a child with siblings (and future bandmates) Freddie and Rose. In the mid-1960s, he worked as both a record producer for Autumn Records and a disc jockey for San Francisco radio station KSOL, where he played an eclectic variety of black and white artists. In 1966, Stone formed Sly & the Family Stone, among the first racially integrated, male and female acts in popular music.

The group would score hits such as “Dance to the Music” (1968), “Everyday People” (1968), and “Thank You (Falettinme Be Mice Elf Agin)” (1969), and acclaimed albums such as Stand! (1969) and There’s a Riot Goin’ On (1971). By the mid-1970s, Stone’s drug problems and erratic behavior effectively ended the group, leaving him to record several unsuccessful solo albums. In 1993, he was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a member of the group.

Monday 10pm: LP Lounge with Willie B

This week on the LP Lounge.  Two more QUAD LP’s.  Sly and The Family Stone and The Staple Singers.

Greatest Hits is a compilation album by American recording group Sly and the Family Stone. It was first released on November 21, 1970, by Epic Records. Comprising five singles and their b-sides along with one additional single and one album track, it includes all of the singles from the albums Dance to the Music (1968), Life (1968), and Stand! (1969), and all of their charting B-sides.

The versions on this compilation are not the single mixes in all cases; some songs appear here in their album lengths and mixes. Mixes sometimes have different timings and differences in vocals and or instrumentation.

Three tracks released as singles in 1969 appear on album for the first time here: “Hot Fun in the Summertime”, “Everybody Is a Star”, and “Thank You (Falettinme Be Mice Elf Agin)”.

Greatest Hits was certified quintuple platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA), having shipped five million copies in the United States. In 2003, Rolling Stone magazine ranked the album number 60 on its list of the 500 greatest albums of all time.

Be What You Are is a 1973 soul album by The Staple Singers. It reached number 13 on the Billboard Top Soul LPs chart. The first single, “Be What You Are”, fared poorly; however, the follow-up, “If You’re Ready (Come Go with Me)”, was a top ten hit, peaking at number nine on the Billboard Hot 100 and number one on the R&B Singles chart. The third single, “Touch a Hand, Make a Friend” charting at number 23 on the Hot 100 and number three on the R&B chart in 1974.

Great Soul Performances with Bobby Jay 7p – 9p ET

I hope you are enjoying your Thanksgiving Weekend. On “Great Soul Performances” this evening, we give thanks by playing all songs that either say, “Thanks,” “Thank You,” or “Thankful” in the title, by artists such as: Sly & the Family Stone, Chuck Jackson, the Impressions, Sam & Dave, Adam Sandler, William Devaughn, Billy Eckstine, the Dramatics, Dickie Harmon & the Autumns, Mariah Carey, the Dave Matthews Band and others. Join me at 7PM ET, 6PM CT, 5PM MT & 4PM PT. We’ll have a lot of fun this evening on “Great Soul Performances” on RadioMaxMusic.Com. Thank You!

Great Soul Performances with Bobby Jay 7pm ET

It’s Spring, but you’d never know when you step outside. Winter just doesn’t want to let go. Nevertheless, I’ve got a good menu of songs for you today on “Great Soul Performances.” You’ll hear from: Barry White, Sly & the Family Stone, James Brown, Little Willie John, War, Ben E. King, Barbara Lewis, the Cadillacs, Miriam Makeba, Little Stevie Wonder, Tavares; (live in concert) and many others. It starts at 7PM ET, 6PM CT, 5PM MT and 4PM PT following the encore airing of this past Sunday’s “Great Soul Performances 2: The 80’s” at 5PM ET. So join me later for a good time with fantastic music on RadioMaxMusic.com.