Recording
Cold Sweat
James Brown
Independently chosen for4 of our lists. Here is what each of them said.
- Released
- 1967
- Label
- King
- On
- Funk, Roots, The Waxonia Desk — The Hundred, and The Waxonia Desk — Where the Accent Moved
- Updated
- 2026-08-29
Analysis
3 sections, the first drop of 2 at 1:09, 40% of the way in.
- Tempo
- 112.3 BPM
- holds throughout
- Dynamic range
- 3.3 dB
- compressed hard — very little between the quiet and the loud
- Length
- 2:51
- measured from the YouTube master
The record, end to end
Click the track to jump · ← → move between sections
- 0:00Apeak0
- 1:12Aliftbar 34
- 2:25Boutrobar 68
Drops at 1:09 (bar 33), 2:22 (bar 67). A drop is a moment, not a stretch — marked on the track above rather than shaded across it.
0:00 · A · peak
sits at the top of this record's range · instrumental · one of 2 stretches of the same music (A)
- Lasts
- 1:12
- Energy
- 100
- Brightness
- 0
- Density
- 70
- drums
- bass
- vocals
- other
a short rise that does not resolve — a fill or a transition, not a build · instrumental · one of 2 stretches of the same music (A)
- Lasts
- 1:13
- Energy
- 85
- Brightness
- 100
- Density
- 100
- drums
- bass
- vocals
- other
the closing fall · instrumental
- Lasts
- 0:26
- Energy
- 0
- Brightness
- 93
- Density
- 0
- drums
- bass
- vocals
- other
Brightness and density are scored against this record's own sections, not against music in general — they say how its parts differ from each other, and nothing about how it compares to anything else.
- drums
- the drum kit, separated from the mix
- bass
- the bass part, separated from the mix
- vocals
- the voice, separated from the mix
- other
- everything else — synths, guitars, keys, strings
Separated into parts by a source-separation model, so each lane is the instrument it names.
- peak
- sits at the top of this record's range
- lift
- a short rise that does not resolve — a fill or a transition, not a build
- outro
- the closing fall
Measured from the YouTube master on . Section labels describe how the energy of the recording moves, not its musical form — a machine can see loudness climb and jump, it cannot hear a chorus arrive. Anything we were not confident enough to state is left out rather than shown with a caveat.
Ranked No. 1 in Funk
The year zero record. Brown moves the accent to the first beat and stops changing chord, and everything in this list plus most of what follows it on this site is downstream of that one instruction to the band.
Picked by Roots
Start here. Brown tells the band to put the accent on the first beat and stop changing chord, and the next sixty years of dance music become possible in about eight bars.
Picked by The Waxonia Desk — The Hundred
The accent moves to the first beat and the chord stops changing. Eight bars that reorganise the next sixty years.
Picked by The Waxonia Desk — Where the Accent Moved
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.