A selection byThe Waxonia Desk
Funk
Five records where rhythm stopped being the setting for a song and became the song. Every rhythm guitarist and every sampler of the last fifty years has been living off this tradition.
- Picks
- 5
- Genre
- Funk
- Years
- 1967–1975
- Curator
- The Waxonia Desk
- Updated
- 2026-08-29
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The picks — selected, not ranked
James Brown / Cold Sweat
1967 · King
The moment the accent moved and harmony stopped being the point. Everything filed under funk since is an argument with the arrangement on this one record.
Also on Funk, Roots, The Waxonia Desk — The Hundred
Sly & the Family Stone / Thank You (Falettinme Be Mice Elf Agin)
1969 · Epic
A bass technique invented to cover for a missing drummer, and imitated for fifty years afterwards. Limitations make signatures far more often than intentions do.
Also on Funk, The Waxonia Desk — The Hundred
Stevie Wonder / Superstition
1972 · Tamla
One man playing nearly everything, at a moment when funk was supposed to be a band sport. The studio turned out not to be the enemy of the group after all.
Also on Funk, The Waxonia Desk — The Hundred
Herbie Hancock / Chameleon
1973 · Columbia
A jazz musician of the first rank deciding that the groove was the interesting problem. The traffic between jazz training and dance records ran both ways, and this is the busiest lane on it.
Also on Funk, The Waxonia Desk — One Subject, Twice Over
Parliament / Give Up the Funk (Tear the Roof off the Sucker)
1975 · Casablanca
Enormous theatre over a bass part of complete discipline. The theatre is what everybody remembers and the discipline is the reason it still works fifty years later.
Also on Funk
About the curator
The people who write the rankings on this site. We keep the lists honest, we argue about the order, and we get asked the same question more than any other: where should someone actually start. These are our answers.