Funkadelic: Free Your Mind And Your A** Will Follow (2LP, 45rpm) [ORG MUSIC]

Why you'll love it

Org Music spreads this one across two 45 RPM discs in a tip-on gatefold, mastered straight from the analog tape. The album reached No. 11 on Billboard's Black Albums chart, and its title later gave En Vogue the name for their 1992 hit "Free Your Mind."

This edition

• 2LP set
• Cut at 45 RPM
• Mastered direct from analog tape to lacquer
• Tip-on gatefold jacket
• Stereo mix
• Remastered

About the album

George Clinton's Detroit crew had already made a racket with their debut, so for the follow-up they went further out. Recorded at United Sound and two other Detroit studios, Free Your Mind opens with a title track that fills a full third of the album, a churning, feedback-soaked sermon about salvation starting from the neck up.

Eddie Hazel's guitar howls, Bernie Worrell's keyboards bubble and swirl, and the band slides from heavy psych to gospel to doo-wop without signalling, while Billy Bass Nelson's bass and Tiki Fulwood's drums keep the bottom end loose and heavy. "Funky Dollar Bill" pokes fun at money, "Friday Night, August 14th" is a sweaty party, "I Wanna Know If It's Good to You?" became a Hot 100 single, and "Eulogy and Light" sets a twisted take on the Lord's Prayer and the 23rd Psalm over a backwards track.

Clinton's mix of heavy rock and deep funk here laid the groundwork for the whole P-Funk empire to come. Half a century on it still sounds like it was beamed in from somewhere east of Detroit and slightly north of Saturn.

Also at Kops: more Funkadelic on vinyl · browse 70s Soul On Up

Tracklist

Listen

On Westbound / Org Music (cat# WB-2001), a reissue of the 1970 album.