Daniel Bedrosian, keyboardist and musical director for George Clinton’s Parliament-Funkadelic, released his second book, “Make my Funk the P-Funk” on October 16. In it, the historian and musician, who has worked with Clinton and the collective for over two decades and is part of the group’s Third Generation, chronicles Parliament-Funkadelic’s “meteoric rise” in 1975 from cult-funkateers to influential household names. Through interviews and archival research, Bedrosian has compiled an illustration of the collective’s experience while developing and releasing Parliament’s “Chocolate City,” and Funkadelic’s “Let’s Take it to the Stage,” culminating in their landmark release “Mothership Connection,” which propelled the group to new heights of stardom with the single “Give Up the Funk.”
“I thought it would be not just a good idea to touch on all three albums — because the only way you can truly understand the platinum success of “Mothership Connection” is to see what George and them did right before that — but it’s also important to see the general paradigm shift of P-Funk as it stood in that specific time frame,” Bedrosian told the AmNews in an exclusive interview via Zoom from a tour stop in Honolulu, HI. “No year marks a better year for the paradigm shift that was happening in P-Funk than 1975 because you have the band in the first half of the year still riding in station wagons — they were sort of the underground darlings of the chitlin circuit,” Bedrosian explained, referencing a touring network for Black musicians in the segregated U.S. during the mid-1900s. “The term P-Funk hadn’t even been coined yet, and they were still very much trying to “make it” even though they had been a band by that point for almost 20 years.
“Then by the end of 1975 you see a quarter of a million dollar budget being spent on this “Mothership” tour, you see an entire concept coming to life — coming to fruition — the first platinum record, the highest charting hit so far at that point, and the beginnings of what would be the “Mothership” tour with Jules Fisher,” a Broadway set designer who helped design the iconic imagery that solidified P-Funk’s place in the minds of millions of young, curious fans. “All of that occurs in 1975, and it being the 50th anniversary of said year, I thought it would be a great anniversary project, and not to just deal with those albums, but to deal with everything the band was going through that year, both live and in the studio, but also what the world was going through.” Bedrosian, who studied history at the University of New Hampshire, highlights how the socio-political climate of 1975 affected the art of the time, citing technological advancements and historical events that fueled the changes within P-Funk, and how the audience perceived and responded to the group.
Bedrosian conducted hours of brand-new interviews with figures involved with the collective in 1975, including trombonist Fred Wesley, who is also well known for his work with James Brown. Bedrosian recalled an amusing incident from Wesley, in which Brown heard “Chocolate City for the first,” wrongly attributing the horn playing to Wesley, who wouldn’t join the band until months later. “Fred was like ‘I don’t even know who George Clinton is, I promise you!’” Bedrosian retold. “He said, it’s one of the few things that James later retconned, and apologized for two decades later in the ‘90s.”
As for what else is present in the book, Bedrosian urges fans to check it out. “We uncovered some things,” Bedrosian smiled. “Some new things have very much come to light that have never been disseminated before, so that’s really exciting.” You can order “Make My Funk the P-Funk” at Bloomsbury Press at bloomsbury.com.