Inspired By: Loose Booty

Gleanings from a late night of worry that became a solo dance party

First of all, if you’re unfamiliar with funk music, I suggest you press play and listen…or dance before reading the rest of this piece. Even if you’re vaguely familiar or a funkateer, press play and enjoy.

Sylvester Stewart better known to the world as Sly Stone

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Have you caught your breath yet? As you take your seat, the point has already been made here, really. But, let’s do the work of cultivating deeper meaning, shall we?

Sly Stone is in his eighties now and until QuestLove’s documentary, he was off the grid and actually prefers it that way, living a very reclusive life. But Sly Stone has been a force in the stratosphere for more than fifty years. Even if most have never heard of him, they have been influenced by those who have been influenced by him. For instance, two juggernauts and rare souls by the names of Michael Joseph Jackson and Prince Rogers Nelson were greatly inspired by Sly Stone’s music and persona. His full band, Sly and the Family Stone, emerged on the scene during the era of free love and Woodstock with songs like, Everyday People and Thank You (Falettinme Be Mice Elf Agin).

For me, as a Sly Stone fan, I didn’t know him during his heyday because I was either unborn or somewhere washing my clothes in the toilet (one of my mother’s favorite stories from my childhood). Instead, I learned about Sly Stone because I am in constant pursuit of acquiring cultural jewels and most importantly, I am a Black music fanatic. Now that I’ve studied his discography some, I prefer the music that most might not know much about, unless they are also a fan. Two of my favorite albums, Fresh and Small Talk are otherworldly. In addition, I own Fresh on vinyl as well as a compilation album which features his offspring group, comprised of his sisters, and they’re aptly called Little Sister. Sly’s discography is deep and rich, laced with funky basslines, gospel-tinged chords and vocals.

Of course, Sly started where nearly every Black artist originates - the Black Church. This explains the esoteric nature of his music and the lyrics speak directly to your soul, despite the sparse connection of words. Sly, along with James Brown and George Clinton, is one of the progenitors of Funk, a genre of Black music that could be considered the Blues’ unruly brother. To personify Funk, imagine him sitting in a puddle of his own sweat, putrid, drunk, and revamping Blues licks on a guitar to sound more like a reason to shake your ass than to bemoan your state in the world.

Speaking of shaking asses…

Let me state that life is tight for me right now. Without being in the business of telling all of my business, I will share that Life derailed me for a while, sent grief for me to carry for the rest of my days on Earth, and I have been scratching at the bit and getting to know this Me, the one who looks and feels familiar but changed. A fortnight ago, it was a tense energy in my home. This energy emanated from me. I was stanking up the joint with it because I was deep in thought, zipping mentally from one part of the elephant to the other, trying to figure out which to chew first. In other words, if I’m not metaphorically (or is it colloquially?) clear, I have a LOT to do as I am remodeling my Life. Some days, I know exactly where to start, what to do and how to get there and other days, I just want to sit down in the middle of the mess and play with it like a baby.

New cycles of life are exciting until they’re not because the undoing of the former cycle can be complicated work. Emotional data needs to be cleared, mental resets are constant to the point of being draining at times, and there is residue from the past that functions like stains in expensive carpets. That shit just won’t come out!

So that was the mood of this night. With stiff hips carrying stress and pent up longing for caresses, I needed sound to break up the tension. Because I was not interested in feeding the stale energy, I conjured up Sly. He became the anecdote. The song was Loose Booty from the aforementioned album, Small Talk. It was an anthem for release. From the opening horns to the church choir harmony of the background singers sangin’ BOOTY to the constant chanting of the names of three well-known Biblical characters, each wiggle to the groove unshackled me from the doldrums. So, I danced to this song repeatedly for almost two hours. It was nearly 3am when I tried to bring myself down.

And then, the revelation…

Being something of a church girl myself, I know that praise is a form of trust in a Power greater than yourself or the structures of confinement on this Earth. Praise is done through song and dance. Worship services become a sacred modality to uplift the soul and cast down the weights of living. With each move, we loosen. Even though I was in the sanctuary of my home, this applied during my solo dance party. I remembered that I have the way to get free; to liberate myself from the chock-filled day of Must Dos and noisy ass days that demand so much.

Instead of waiting on Sunday morning and applying the appropriate holy two step, I just need my loose booty to shake the mess out of misery.* Because I know my Bible, I don’t find anything blasphemous (but back then during Sly’s heyday, Black churchfolk did) about Sly’s ongoing chanting of ‘Shadrack, Meshach, Abednego’ but rather, it was reminder to centralize The Creator in this process of undoing and re-becoming of mine. Those three Hebrew boys were spared from that furnace because they had steadfast faith in the One True Deliverer. So must I.

Within the vastness of music, the spirituality should always be present or else it’s hollow and has the potential of binding us to our lower Selves. Ain’t no freedom there in that. This divine gift of hearing sounds from other realms, pulling them down, and mastering them through instrumentation and expression is called an anointing. The anointing comes with a being upon birth and the path of life does not exactly taint the anointing at all because it is pure, yet if not allowed to flourish, it harms the carrier instead because it remains unexpressed. It has to be shared with the world, and even then, there is a burden to hold. Music is a divine phenomenon and the ancestors, both those on the continent and the ones rooted in this American soil; anchored in the Black Church knew this and moved in it.

You see, this is the genius of Sly Stone that is just now becoming evident in its fullest moment. I am grateful for being able to respond to his gifting and even more enthralled with my loose booty that’ll get me free in this hour of my life.

Go dance. And get free.

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*This is a reference to one of my favorite stageplays by Shay Youngblood titled Shaking the Mess Outta Misery.

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Chandra Kamaria is a writer, educator, public scholar and entrepreneur. To support her work, consider becoming a paid subscriber to The Literary Lightworker. You may also contribute by clicking this link: BuyMeACoffee