After leaving
the Ohio Players
-- upon signing to
Mercury
-- and prior to joining Funkadelic for
One Nation Under a Groove
,
Junie Morrison
recorded a trilogy of albums for
Westbound
, Funkadelic's original label. A talented arranger, songwriter, singer, and keyboard player,
Junie
handled everything but the horn and string arrangements on his records -- those were done under the supervision of
Johnny Trudell
and
David Van De Pitte
(with help from
the Detroit Symphony Orchestra
string section). This set includes all of
's tracks from the
When We Do
Freeze
, and
Suzie Super Groupie
albums, and also features two non-album tracks and five single edits or mixes. In encountering the tunes after so many years, it is amazing to hear the similarities between
Sly Stone
-- the musicality and tight arrangements, the underlying backbeat funk underlying the in-your-face rhythms, and the place of texture in the melodic construction of any tune. Just check out "Walt's Third Trip" or "Johnny Carson Samba" for examples. His psychedelic chops were plentiful too, as evidenced by the title track of
.
Lenny Kravitz
ripped off this cat's bag wholesale on his album. "Cookies Will Get You" is something
Frank Zappa
might have written had he any concept of the funk. In all, with the exception of a couple of stinker ballads here that are included only to show
's "diversity" (and he couldn't write a ballad for sh*t), this is a stellar comp. Fans of
P-Funk
Sly
as well as
Rick James
' punk funk will be right at home here in the court of the sophisticated but nasty funk. ~ Thom Jurek