Parliament Mothership Connection released

Mothership Connection Parliament

Released: December 15, 1975 Charted: February 21, 1976 Peak: 13 US, 4 RB Sales (in millions): 1.0 US Genre: funk

Tracks: Song Title (Writers) [time] (date of single release, chart peaks) Click for codes to charts. P-Funk Wants to Get Funked Up (George Clinton, Bootsy Collins, Bernie Worrell) [7:41] (2/21/76, 33 RB) Mothership Connection (Star Child) (Clinton, Collins, Worrell) [6:13] (9/4/76, 26 RB) Unfunky UFO (Clinton, Collins, Garry Shider) [4:23] Supergroovalisticprosifunkstication (Clinton, Collins, Shider, Worrell) [5:03] Handcuffs (Clinton, Glenn Goins, Janet McLaughlin) [4:02] Give Up the Funk (Tear the Roof Off the Sucker) (Jerome Brailey, Clinton, Collins) [5:46] (4/24/76, 15 BB, 5 RB, sales: ½ million) Night of the Thumpasorus Peoples (Clinton, Collins, Shider) [5:10] Total Running Time: 38:06 The Players: George Clinton (vocals) Bootsy Collins (vocals, bass, guitar, drums) Bernie Worrell (keyboards/synthesizers) Garry Shider (guitar, vocals on “Handcuffs”) Gary Cooper (drums, backing vocals & handclaps) Calvin Simon, Fuzzy Haskins, Ray Davis, Grady Thomas (vocals on “Handcuffs”) Fred Wesley, Maceo Parker, Michael Brecker, Randy Brecker, Boom, Joe Farrell (horns) Cordell Mosson (bass) Michael Hampton, Glenn Goins (guitar) Tiki Fulwood, Jerome Brailey (drums) Debbie Edwards, Taka Kahn, Archie Ivy, Bryna Chimenti, Rasputin Boutte, Pam Vincent, Debra Wright, Sidney Barnes (backing vocals and handclaps)

Rating: 4.698 out of 5.00 (average of 18 ratings) Quotable: “The greatest R&B album ever made” – Joe S. Harrington, Blastitude.com Awards: (Click on award to learn more).

About the Album: George Clinton launched not one, but two of funk music’s most important bands – Parliament and Funkadelic (often referred to collectively as P-Funk) – in the 1960s. They experienced their greatest commercial and critical success in the 1970s and perhaps never more so than with Mothership Connection. His “ranks were [already] stocked with the very best of his collaborators,” CS including “Bootsy Collins’ grooving bass, Bernie Worrell’s cosmic piano, a hot horn section and nearly two dozen others adding to the funkification of America.” RV This album marked the additions of Fred Wesley and Maceo Parker. The two horn players had previously worked with James Brown and now “elevated an already mind-blowing band into the best funk band of the ‘70s, arguably the best funk band ever.” AMG Joe S. Harrington went so far as to call it “the greatest R&B album ever made” BT saying it is even more “ingenious conceptually” BT than Marvin Gaye’s What’s Going On. While Gaye “expressed urban blight” BT “Clinton’s otherworldly persona and outrageous lyrics” RV combined for the ultimate concept album. BT He loads the P-Funk gang into “a spaceship and blasts off to other galaxies, where it musically interacts with societies that surely found the collective as whacked-out as we did back here on Earth.” CS It “became a definitive statement for the genre and a template that was subsequently sourced by jazz, hip-hop, and EDM artists.” CS Certainly “there’s no questioning this album’s impact, one that is still being felt via rap-induced aftershocks.” AMG Mothership Connection picks up where previous album Chocolate City left off, perfecting P-Funk’s formula of “galaxy-bound cosmic slop.” BT Clinton mixed horns “and more dance-friendly rhythms in a definite JB-influenced direction.” BT The opening song, P-Funk (Wants to Get Funked Up), harkened back to the opening title track from Parliament’s previous album, Chocolate City, laying down a languid synth aura for a spoken-word intro.” AMG The song “steps into second gear though, bringing in Bootsy’s bass, Wesley’s horn, Worrell’s piano, and a chorus of vocalists, it’s fairly evident just how large a step forward Mothership Connection is.” AMG “The second song, Mothership Connection (Star Child), makes the differentiation glaringly evident, most noticeably when the song enters the cosmic, proto-hip-hop ‘swing down sweet chariot’ bridge with its accompanying melody from beyond.” AMG “The funk doesn’t stop there though, with the remaining five songs keeping the tempo laden with dense interweaving rhythms, peaking on Give Up the Funk (Tear the Roof Off the Sucker).” AMG That song alon “makes the album classic.” CS In addition, if “Supergroovalisticprosifunkstication doesn’t get you moving, we advise urgent medical attention.” CS Notes: The 2003 reissue adds the promo radio version of “Star Child (Mothership Connection).”

Resources and Related Links: DMDB encyclopedia entry for Parliament AMG All Music Guide by Jason Birchmeier BT Blastitude.com (Winter 2002/2003). “A Loaded Proposition: Joe S. Harrington Picks the All-Time Top 100…” by Joe S. Harrington CS Consequence.net (9/12/2022). “The 100 Greatest Albums of All Time” by Gary Graff RV The Review (October – November 2001; Vol. 128: numbers 12-23). “100 Greatest Albums of All Time” by Clarke Speicher First posted 7/23/2008; last updated 9/24/2023.