It’s been a milestone year for George Clinton. In 2021, the Godfather of Funk celebrated his 80th birthday and 50 years since the release of Funkadelic’s seminal masterpiece, “Maggot Brain.” The progenitor of all things funky returned to the stage for a select number of dates across the country and ventured into the world of painting. George Clinton is indisputably one of the most prolific and influential artists of our time. We had a chat with Mr. Clinton to discuss his upcoming return home to New Jersey and more!
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
Johnny: Mr. Clinton, thanks so much for meeting with me today, it’s an honor. You’ll be returning home to Newark, NJ with Parliament-Funkadelic on March 18 at the New Jersey Performing Arts Center. What kind of influence did the city of Newark, and your surroundings in New Jersey have on you and the nature of your work in the early days?
George: Well, you know anybody from Jersey is going to be about Jersey. Not just Newark, but everything around Jersey. Once you’ve been in Newark, you can survive anywhere. Laughs
I love having come by way of Newark, Plainfield, Paterson, Passaic, Montclair… As a group we used to play all the Chitlin Circuit clubs. Then we got a hit record in ‘67 so we had the chance to play all the pop and psychedelic clubs in the early ‘70s. We had a chance to see all kinds of music, Jersey was the place. I just love Jersey!
Johnny: Would you say the music scene was vibrant in NJ when you were growing up?
George: When we first started, it was doo-wop. But right after that, rock ‘n’ roll came out and was on TV and on “Dick Clark.” We used to have what we called “balladeer” groups from Branch Brook Park. The 4 Seasons lived over there, The Monotones, all this was happening in the late ‘50s – early ‘60s. Jersey was just loaded. We started in grade school at Avon Avenue Elementary. We used to practice in the boys’ playground.
Johnny: The day before the show, the music room at Avon Avenue Elementary and Plainfield’s Passaic Street will be named in your honor. How does it feel to be recognized by the community for your contributions to music?
George: I try to be cool, but hell yeah you got to like that. Especially coming back to Newark, I used to walk around in a daze, singing Parliament to myself when no one was around, to hear what it sounded like. We used to practice in the playground, and we had sweaters from Phil’s Sporting Goods with Parliament written on them. We were 15 years old.
So yes, it feels good coming back, and everybody wished us well doing it. In the ‘70s when “Mothership Connection” came out we played the school stadium and Symphony Hall. This time, after hip-hop has revitalized the funk, it’s good for people to know that we’re still out here doing what we said we were going to do when we left Newark.
Johnny: You’ll be joined by Questlove, Vernon Reid, and Nona Hendryx at NJPAC on the 18th, can you tell me a little bit about how this particular collaboration came to be?
George: That’s funny, because you know I’m a barber too, I used to do hair. I used to do Patti Labelle and Nona’s hair when they were Patti Labelle and the Bluebelles. Years later when they became Labelle, we had the same costume designer, Larry Legaspi. Questlove’s father was a doo-wop singer that I knew from years ago. Questlove has so much history, I watched him over the years, it’s nice to have him. Vernon, we go way back, we’ve worked together a long time.
Johnny: Will they be sitting in on the whole set, or select songs?
George: Whatever they want to do!
Johnny: A P-funk live show explores so many different musical genres from rock, to hip-hop, to soul, to metal, it’s all funky, and the set is different every time. Can you tell me how you go about crafting a setlist? Is it carefully planned and discussed before or is there a degree of improvisation and spontaneity to the band’s choices?
George: It’s when I see the audience. Our audience varies. We have fans my age, and we have fans because we worked with Kendrick Lamar, fans because we worked with Red Hot Chili Peppers, fans of hip-hop from all over the place, Dre, Cube, Snoop, so I have to look out into the audience and say, “Which one of our fans is here tonight?” We can play on both sides of town. I have to go out there and see who’s dominating, that way I can call the list out. I don’t ever call the list out until I get on stage and see who’s out there.
It’s just how you introduce them. You don’t want to give anyone a heart attack who’s 75, 80 years old, because you go out there playing “Alice in My Fantasies.” Laughs Unless you’re in Hampton, VA, where all the fans like that are my age. They’ll jump around at anything we do that’s crazy!
The age group of who is into you changes. We worked with Kendrick Lamar and all of a sudden you get young kids saying, “What? My brother used to like you, my dad, my grandfather.” You get a new set of kids.
Johnny: “3GP Bangerz” is out and features a lot of contributions from the newest incarnation of P-Funk, which includes some of your kids and grandkids, can you tell us a little bit about who they are, what they do and what the newest generation of Parliament is bringing to the table?
George: I have four grandkids in the band. Garry Shider who was diaper man in Parliament-Funkadelic, his son Garrett plays guitar and sings. Our trumpet player Bennie Cowan’s son, Benzel is the drummer. It’s basically the grandkids of the group itself, and their friends. They’ve been in the group about 5 years, and they’ve been killing it. We’ve got the DNA still up there doing all that, and the band is still Funkadelic. We’ve got Mike Hampton and Blackbyrd, so we can slide into “Maggot Brain” and “Standing on the Verge” or “Alice in My Fantasies.” When you merge them together, you get something wild up there. A brand-new version of P-Funk.
Johnny: You were on an extensive tour right before the COVID-19 pandemic hit, and have performed a handful of dates across the U.S. since your return to live music. Can you tell me about any changes or adaptations you had to make or have noticed since returning to live performance and touring?
George: We were doing a retirement tour, but when the pandemic came we weren’t able to finish it. So, we had to sit down for a minute. Luckily, I had another love, which is painting. I got into that, and I’ve been doing it for the last year. We had another thing we just bumped into where I performed with a DJ and a couple of musicians in Miami, and that worked so well. We got a brand-new thing here!
Johnny: I usually ask people if they took on any new hobbies or activities to keep busy during lockdown restrictions, but it seems you’ve been doing quite a bit of painting. Can you tell us a little about what sparked your interest in painting, and the role art has had in your life?
George: You see this hat? (George points to a hat he’s wearing depicting various Parliament-Funkadelic album covers.) The Funkadelic lifestyle and cosmology is like a backdrop for a culture for 30 years. I didn’t do those album covers, but you have to know about art just by looking at those covers by Pedro Bell and Overton Loyd… me, like everyone else, I was interested. I’ve been reading those albums, I’m still not finished reading them, there’s so much stuff on there. But it makes you want to doodle; people who see that think they can do it too. People see P-Funk and think they can do it. They go, “what are those guys doing?”
I started doodling my autograph when we did “Atomic Dog.” So, people asked me to sign with the dog for years. Then all of a sudden, I sold an autograph for $15,000! You know I got a new habit! I bought all the canvases in the world.
Johnny: Hendrix and James Brown are often cited as influential to your work with P-Funk, but you’ve also mentioned Sun Ra in the liner notes of your records and Wayne Shorter rose to prominence in Newark when you were growing up. Did jazz have any influence on your work and in what capacity?
George: Oh yeah. Wayne lived right around the corner from me, he lived on Huntington St., and I lived on Bergen. You know Bernie Worrell was a classical piano player. Jazz was a heavy influence on [P-Funk horn players] Fred Wesley and Maceo Parker. Fred was playing with Count Basie.
Johnny: What are you listening to nowadays? What keeps you inspired?
George: This whole trap thing, you know Migos and Cardi B. You have to stay on top of that. Whatever gets on my nerves, that’s what I like.
Do yourself a favor and score some tickets to Parliament-Funkadelic’s upcoming appearance at NJPAC on March 18 here.
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