I Want to Take You Higher: The Life and Times of Sly and the Family Stone (6 page)

The spontaneous sound of radio in that era, long before corporate depersonalization squelched that sound, was intoxicating
to free spirits like Sly. He was thrilled when Tom Donahue and Bob
Mitchell heard the potential in the Viscaynes' "Yellow Moon" and
afforded the single some time on their drive-time playlists.

TV was also learning how to rock out as Bay Area baby
boomers of all races flocked to the tapings of Dick Stewart Dance
Party. Prominent in Stewart's early'60s telecasts, alongside future
Playboy Playmate (and future Mrs. Dick Stewart) Barbara Burrus,
was another hiply attractive and likeable youth with great dance
moves, Sylvester Stewart (obviously no relation to the show's
host), who also appeared on Dance Party with the Viscaynes. Sly also frequented live rock shows at San Francisco's Cow Palace,
hosted by radio jocks Donahue and Mitchell under the aegis of
Tempo Productions.

It may have been at one of these shows that Sly made the fateful acquaintance of the jocks/impresarios. In any case, the DJs, following their ambitions beyond arena shows and the airwaves,
founded a label, Autumn Records, in 1964, and with remarkable
foresight hired the much younger but equally ambitious Sly, who'd
already impressed them as the de facto producer for the Viscaynes.
In Autumn's studio, notes Alec Palao, "He'd be leading the band
on the floor, jumping around, changing the arrangement, directing people. The role of the producer back then wasn't as defined."
And Sly knew his way around a variety of instruments and musical styles. The studio served as a hands-on laboratory for the
twenty-one-year-old Sly to apply his collegiate training in orchestration, to learn the mechanics of taping, microphone placement,
and overdubbing, and to absorb the more subtle craft of songwriting while turning out a marketable product.

Within a year of signing with Autumn, Sly had proved his
worth by creating the label's biggest hit record. Bobby Freeman
had been one of the first San Francisco rockers (after ballad
crooner Johnny Mathis) to place on the charts, with the playful,
Latinized "Do You Wanna Dance," in 1958. There were lesser follow-up hits, but his "C'mon and Swim," in 1964, qualified as a
dance craze. Bobby has credited Sly as the "composer, producer,
and conductor" of the single and associated album. It happened
this way: the veteran singer had been signed by Tom Donahue and
Bob Mitchell to join in their Cow Palace shows, where Sly was providing production and instrumental duties and eventually leading
the house band, in addition to his job in the recording studio. After
one show, Sly engaged Bobby about his onstage movements, liken ing them to a swimmer's. Performer and producer then brought
their brainstorm back to the studio, forging a gold record that
climbed to the number 5 spot on Billboard's pop and R & B charts,
revived Bobby Freeman's career, secured Autumn Records' reputation, and started to bolster the name and bank account of the
multitalented Sly.

"He arranged `C'mon and Swim' with exciting breakdowns,"
comments Alec Palao, in reference to the song's periods of danceinducing percussion, a technique later applied pervasively to disco
and hip-hop. "Maybe to our ears they sound kind of cliched, but
[Sly] turned what could have been a pedestrian record into a very
exciting record. He's on top of the groove, and that's a crucial thing
in any form of music." Alec also attributes the Swim's success to "a
little bit of serendipity: the sudden explosion of focus on ...
North Beach and that whole topless thing, which was a very newsworthy thing at the time." The band for "Swim" was basically Joe
Piazza and the Continentals, with whom Sly had played bass in
North Beach venues and who'd earlier backed the Viscaynes. The
group, including future Family Stone saxophonist Jerry Martini,
mutated into the Condors, backing popular featured act George &
Teddy at North Beach's Condor Club, where Sly himself also
appeared with a group called the Mojo Men.

The Condor began attracting lurid national attention when
cocktail waitress Carol Doda initiated the practice of mounting the
piano, removing her top, and dancing during band breaks. Doda
later took over ownership of the Condor, and the former music
hall was refitted as a flagship of North Beach's tourist-tempting
strip club scene. This reputed revival of San Francisco's Barbary
Coast reputation helped the Swim move onto dance floors everywhere, alongside the tamer Twist and Mashed Potato, and arguably
helped establish alluring go-go dancers, topless or not, as a fixture at many major clubs. The fad flourished in San Francisco until
then-mayor Dianne Feinstein prompted raids and bans in the
1980s. Today the Condor, tamer but still in operation, boasts state
landmark status.

With some of the first big money that "C'mon and Swim"
brought him, Sly helped his father move the Stewart family from
their modest location on the outskirts of the Bay Area to a home
in San Francisco's Ingleside district. Earlier in the century, the
Ingleside, several miles southwest of North Beach and the downtown, was one of several areas where developers had established
written and unwritten "covenants," in effect bylaws enforcing the
image of a genteel white middle-class lifestyle that would exclude
nonwhite residents. As recently as 1958, a cross had been burned
on the front lawn of black judge Cecil Poole's house, who'd managed to buy a home in the Ingleside directly from its previous
owner, rather than through realtors, who wouldn't have helped
him. Poole accounted for the charred cross to his daughter Patti
with the comment, "Some Christian has lost his way." The Pooles
stayed put, and over the next decade, the Ingleside became a neighborhood of choice for middle-class black professionals.

The Stewarts' spacious homestead was located a few blocks
south of the Pooles', on the ovular Urbano Drive, which had been
a popular racetrack before the great earthquake of 1906. Sly moved
along his own multiple career tracks in high spirits, sometimes
speeding between appointments in a Jaguar XKE custom-painted
purple, a reward from Tom Donahue. He appropriated the basement of his parents' house into a base of operations. He continued to perform, as did brother Freddie, in several bands, and to
produce singles for Autumn, as well as waxing several of his own.
Some of this material has been compiled by Alec Palao for Ace
Records (based in his native England) as Precious Stone: In the Studio with Sly Stone 1963-1965, released in 1994. The disc is the
best showcase yet, outside of the Family Stone, of Sly's skill as a
producer and of his understanding and application in songwriting of '60s R & B. Included are early rock collaborations with siblings Freddie and Rose, and with his then-new friend and
keyboard mentor Billy Preston.

It was rare in the early'60s, and evidence of the greater opportunities available in the Bay Area, that a young black man was
given access not only to professional studios (San Francisco's Coast
and Golden Gate studios) but also to working with different kinds
of artists. Sly was assigned several white rock groups, early representatives of what would come later to be embraced by the hippies
as the "San Francisco Sound." The city's music scene was evolving,
alongside the evolution of its counterculture, from Jack Kerouac
and the Beats in the '50s to the starry-eyed flower children of the
next decade. The new generation seemed to want to experiment
beyond the influence of the Beatles-led "British Invasion." But
most musicians weren't as experienced or as confident as Sly.
Charged with devising make-or-break singles with musicians
whose technical range might not allow for much formal sophistication, Sly learned to shape their talents into basic but very effective hooks, licks, and choruses.

Some white rockers, most famously the Beau Brummels, were
in tune with their young black producer. The Precious Stone liner
notes by Alec quote a couple of women who'd sung for Sly at the
Coast studios, back when they were teens in Catholic school. "Here
was this very flashy black man, dressed in Beatle suits and this
weird pompadour," said Catherine Kerr. "He was strange! But he
was always very sweet to us, always very protective. You know,
`Make sure you call your mom!"' Her schoolmate Melinda Balaam
added, "Sly was always smiling. I've never been around someone who was so `up' all the time." In those times, it still would have
been a pretty natural high.

With other rock acts, like the Great Society and the Warlocks
(antecedents of the Jefferson Airplane and the Grateful Dead,
respectively) and the Charlatans, there was friction and sometimes
open hostility. "They had their own ideas, but they didn't have the
chops to back them up," says Alec about such groups. "As far as
[Sly] was concerned, they were amateurs, and as far as they were
concerned, he was Mr. Plastic-Hey-Baby-Soul. But at the same
time, a lot of rock groups benefited from Sly being in the booth,
because of his enthusiasm," not to mention the erudition the producer had absorbed from his teacher David Froelich. "That's why,
when you listen to some of the Beau Brummels' session tapes
[rough cuts], and you hear [Sly], you know he's focusing on getting them to sing right, have a great performance," Alec points out,
"even though the group already had the goods and a style."

In the case of the Great Society, Sly reportedly put the group
and its lead singer, Grace Slick, through two hundred takes of
"Somebody to Love" and attempted to position himself on lead
guitar. Grace ended up taking the song on to another group-the
Jefferson Airplane-and to legendary rock status a few years later.
The Beau Brummels, though, stayed with Autumn and scored the
label's next (and last) national big hits, "Just a Little" and "Laugh,
Laugh," both produced by Sly, with a deceptive sound evocative of
the Beatles even though the Brummels were strictly Bay Area.

Sly's Autumn output was, in Alec's opinion, "more vanilla than
you'd expect." It's revealing to listen to the Brummels' delivery of
Sly's "Underdog" from their debut disc. It's reminiscent of the
Rolling Stones' "Get Off of My Cloud" and far more upbeat than
the Family Stone's version of the tune several years later. Like the
racial makeup of the stellar band he'd later form, Sly created music in different colors, favoring elements from the white side of rock
when it pleased him (and clients like the Brummels), but equally
ready to deploy R & B (as he did on the Family's "Underdog"), and
to meld the two influences with jaunty syncopation, at odds with
standard R & B rhythmic patterns. Sly's youthful and multifaceted
talent is also in evidence on his own recorded performances for
Autumn. His "Scat Swim," one of several follow-ups to Bobby
Freeman's big hit, didn't go very far, but it revealed a jazzy, scatting style of the vocalist perhaps unfamiliar to later fans and probably encouraged by David Froelich. Within the tracks of Alec's
Autumn compilation, you can sense Sly seasoning his chops for
what would be the Family Stone, and in the process helping prepare a couple of the future band members (his brother and sister)
and an important collaborator (Billy Preston) for their work on
major labels.

Some of Sly's early efforts show he was listening closely to, and
borrowing some from, established rockers. His Autumn single
"Buttermilk," says Alec, "was just a rip-off of the Stones' `2120
South Michigan Avenue' . . . and he'd quote `Satisfaction' in other
songs." His gifts as songwriter and arranger and as a tasteful
blender of influences would blossom with the Family Stone, and
he'd later return to producing others. For the time being, though,
Sly wanted to follow Tom and Bob's footsteps in another direction,
spinning discs rather than making them. He wasn't the only
would-be celebrity to have applied a musician's skills to radio.
Waylon Jennings, on KLLL in Lubbock, Texas, and B. B. King, on
WDIA in Memphis, had also proven that they had the ears to
detect potential hits, recognize catchy hooks, and understand what
makes a pop song work. All three of these musicians were also able
to apply their on-air experience to making their own listenerfriendly music.

After training at the Chris Borden School of Broadcasting and
graduating in 1964, Sly filled a slot on AM radio station KSOL,
whose call letters announced its focus on soul and R & B, with
some crossover to pop, aimed at a primarily black demographic.

Sly's speaking voice, like his singing, was strong and sensual,
dipping, like Tom Donahue's, into a baronial lower register. His
manner was hip and masterful, with many moments of humor and
improvisation. Consider this broadcast bit of Sly's wily wisdom,
copping from Shakespeare: "The whole world is a stage, and you
only have a part to play, and if you don't play it right, you get
kicked out of the party." And a warning, now easily assessed as prescient: "The Soul Brothers remind you to be cool," Sly intoned
between hits. "Keep the poison out of the kids' reach. And keep it
out of any fool's reach that might try to use it, you know what I
mean? Keep it out of your woman's reach!"

"I love every one of them," he testified over the fade-out of the
Supremes' rather inane soundtrack single "The Happening."
"Especially Diana [Ross]. And she loves me! That's a gas," he
opined, and after a signifying pause, he continued, "The movie,
not the record." Any self-respecting Supremes fan would have seconded this assessment.

Radio execs and wiser listeners couldn't help but have realized
that Sly knew his music very well. While KSOL hadn't KYA's
national significance as a "break" station, Sly's broadcast presence
there (he had the 7:00 p.m. to midnight slot), and later on the similarly formatted KDIA, bolstered his importance to the Bay Area
entertainment scene, reaching beyond his black target audience to
youth of other ethnicities. "Sly had a specific energy, he was clearly
some kind of star," remembers Ben Fong-Torres, former Rolling
Stone editor, ongoing rock historian, and current KFRC-FM "Classic Hits" radio personality. To the then-teenaged Ben, attending school and helping out in his parents' Chinese eatery in Hayward,
Sly sounded "confident, but not smug ... in kind of an `older
brother' sound, friendly, not coming on to anybody, not `I am the
disc jockey, so I am the king."' The radio DJ's largesse was manifest in "the way he demanded requests and dedications and the way
he talked to kids on the phone," making those conversations audible on-air.