Sly Stone shook the foundations of soul and turned it into a brand new sound that influenced and liberated musicians as varied as Miles Davis, Stevie Wonder, and Herbie Hancock. His group—consisting of Blacks and whites, men and women—symbolized the Woodstock generation and crossed over to dominate pop charts with anthems like “Everyday People,” “Dance to the Music,” and “I Want to Take You Higher.” Award-winning journalist and bestselling author Joel Selvin weaves an epic American tale from the voices of the people around this funk phenomenon: Sly’s parents, his family members and band members (sometimes one and the same), and rock figures including Grace Slick, Sal Valentino, Bobby Womack, Mickey Hart, Clive Davis, Bobby Freeman, and many more. In their own words, they candidly share the triumphs and tragedies of one of the most influential musical groups ever formed—“different strokes” from the immensely talented folks who were there when it all happened. “Joel Selvin, the veteran music critic of the San Francisco Chronicle, published a thoroughgoing, book-length oral history of the group in 1998 that is as disturbing and chilling a version as you'll ever find of the ‘dashed ’60s dream’ narrative: idealism giving way to disillusionment, soft drugs giving way to hard, ferment to rot.” —David Kamp, “Sly Stone’s Higher Power” Vanity Fair, August 2007 Available for the first time in years, Sly & the Family Stone: An Oral History, is an unflinching look at the rise and fall one of music’s most enigmatic figures.

Sly Stone began recording There's a Riot Goin' On in late 1970 as a follow-up to the commercially successful Stand!. In this brisk, inventive book, Miles Marshall Lewis chronicles Sly's descent into a haze of drug addiction and delirium as he rejects the successful formula - "'Dance to the Medley,' dance to the shmedly" - and creates one of the most powerful and haunting albums to inspire the hiphop movement. Book jacket.

The Stone Siblings have been to Hell and back for each other.... Siblings fight like cats and dogs, and the Stone siblings are no exception. But they would do anything for each other, because that's what families do. The siblings journey to exotic and dangerous locations, filled with lust, suspense, danger, and betrayal as they discover who they really are--while rediscovering where their home has always been. The Family Stone Boxed Set features each character in his/her own book, revealing the trials and tribulations that families and relationships encounter along the way. You will love them. You will hate them. You will call them "family" in the end. Follow the Stone siblings as they find love and adventure and their family ties amid exotic backdrops. The Family Stone box set includes the first FIVE books in the Family Stone Romantic Suspense series, including Jar of Hearts Stone Cold Heart: Jess Stone, former FBI sniper, always felt like the kid who looks in the candy store window but could never afford to go in. But on a humanitarian mission to aid an earthquake ravaged country, finally she finds a place where she belongs, in Colin Davies' arms, and working for Global Humanitarian Relief, her big brother's company. But can the former SAS thaw Jess's stone cold heart? Carved in Stone: Connor Stone has always been odd man out in his family. Not the oldest, not the most charming, he'd had a lock on the youngest until another half-sibling came to live with them, so he raised hell in his youth. Con knows now the only way to redeem himself is with deeds, not words and sets out to prove once and for all he is worthy of the Stone family. When his older brother asks him to take care of business, Con finally will have redemption he craves. Except when Ava Sanchez, his brother's assistant, is threatened, he must choose between saving the girl and protecting his family. Will his choice bring him love or break his heart? Heart of Stone: Riley Stone is the handsome brother, the charming one. Everyone who meets him compares him to his father, which in his mind is not a compliment. But he's never met a woman he couldn't charm, until he meets Di, an acerbic, smart-mouthed, passionate activist who has no time for him or his charm. On the run, in the midst of danger, the blistering passion they share explodes. Can these two opposites find common ground, or will Di smash Riley's stone heart? Still the One: Jack Stone, former Navy SEAL, and oldest Stone sibling is determined to keep his family strong. Family is everything. So he starts Global Humanitarian Relief and Stone Consulting to do some good and keep his family together. But when he has to team up with his old flame, Bliss, on a missing persons case, an evil threatens him, his family and the one woman he could never forget and doesn't want to let go. Can these two former lovers put aside past hurts and heal their hearts? Jar of Hearts: Prickly Keisha Johnson has the hots for Shane Washington. But she’s not about to reveal her inner soft heart to the player pilot and open herself up to hurt, until a favor to their boss sends them undercover and under the covers. Can she trust his sensual attention or will he shatter her fragile heart?

History of rock and roll includes: biographical information on past and present musicians, composers, bands, producers, and record executives; analyses of evolutionary rock styles from before the 1950s to the present, including a list of the most seminal recordings from each style; an album-by-album review of ... the Beatles and Bob Dylan; an audio CD containing twenty notable recordings in rock, with a synopsis of each.

Tony Bolden presents an innovative history of funk music focused on the performers, regarding them as intellectuals who fashioned a new aesthetic. Utilizing musicology, literary studies, performance studies, and African American intellectual history, Bolden explores what it means for music, or any cultural artifact, to be funky. Multitudes of African American musicians and dancers created aesthetic frameworks with artistic principles and cultural politics that proved transformative. Bolden approaches the study of funk and black musicians by examining aesthetics, poetics, cultural history, and intellectual history. The study traces the concept of funk from early blues culture to a metamorphosis into a full-fledged artistic framework and a named musical genre in the 1970s, and thereby Bolden presents an alternative reading of the blues tradition. In part one of this two-part book, Bolden undertakes a theoretical examination of the development of funk and the historical conditions in which black artists reimagined their music. In part two, he provides historical and biographical studies of key funk artists, all of whom transfigured elements of blues tradition into new styles and visions. Funk artists, like their blues relatives, tended to contest and contextualize racialized notions of blackness, sexualized notions of gender, and bourgeois notions of artistic value. Funk artists displayed contempt for the status quo and conveyed alternative stylistic concepts and social perspectives through multimedia expression. Bolden argues that on this road to cultural recognition, funk accentuated many of the qualities of black expression that had been stigmatized throughout much of American history.

With informative biographies, essays, and "music maps, " this book is the ultimate guide to the best recordings in rhythm and blues. 20 charts.

Provides a compendium of knowledge about marriage, family and human relations.