Best Of: Sebastian Stan / Questlove On The Genius Of Sly Stone
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What is this episode about?
From WHYY in Philadelphia, I'm Terry Gross with Fresh Air Weekend. Today, musician and documentary filmmaker Amir Questlove Thompson is back to talk about his newest documentary on Sly Stone and his band The Family Stone. It's called Sly Lives, The Burden of Black Genius. Also, Sebastian Stan talks about his Oscar-nominated portrayal of Donald Trump. In the film The Apprentice, he plays Trump early in his career. The filmmakers received a cease-and-desist letter from Trump's lawyers, And Trump called the filmmakers human scum.
Human scum. You know, our writer received a lot of death threats, a lot of anti-Semitic remarks as a result of that usage of words.
Stan is originally from Romania, born during a communist dictatorship. That's coming up on Fresh Air Weekend.
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This is Fresh Air Weekend. I'm Terry Gross. Today, Amir Questlove-Thompson is back to talk about the life and legacy of Sly Stone. Questlove's new documentary, called Sly Lives, a.k.a. The Burden of Black Genius, is about the impact of Sly Stone and his band Sly and the Family Stone on music and culture. Sly got his start as a DJ and record producer in the early 1960s. formed a multiracial band with his brother, sister, and other musicians, and went on to record hits like Everyday People, Dance to the Music, Family Affair, and Stand. Their music influenced Prince, George Clinton and Funkadelic, The Ohio Players, Earth, Wind & Fire, and many hip-hop artists. The film also covers the problems that came along with fame and drugs that took Sly down.
Questlove is the co-founder of the hip-hop band The Roots, which is the house band for The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon. If you feel as if you just heard him on our show, you did when we talked about his other new documentary focused on Saturday Night Live's music guests and music sketches over the past 50 years. That one's called Ladies and Gentlemen, 50 Years of SNL Music. So let's talk about your slide documentary. I really love this film. I want to start with a song, and it's their first big hit. It's Dance to the Music. It's so catchy, and I'd like you to point out what makes this song special in its moment, which was 1967 or 8?
This is 1968.
Okay. So what makes this song so special in its moment?
Sly will invent the alphabet for which most of pop and R&B or black music will write from for, you know, the next 60 years. Like, we're still writing from his dictionary to this day. And so, okay, we have a four-minute song to make. How many micro-songs can we have in this particular song? In other words, a typical Sly the Family Stone song is... has a bunch of elements that will grab everybody. Like, most songs will just have one specific hook. Like, this is the chorus, this is my hook. Okay, here are my lyrics. Instead, Sly will do a four-bar part that's like earworm. You know, like, that'll grab you, and then he'll do another four bars that will grab someone else. So, you know, lyrically and melodic-wise, his formula is also... The world's funkiest nursery rhyme music.
Look at Everyday People, his number one hit. Everyone knows Everyday People. Everyday People is basically the schoolyard version. The lyrics of that song, the melody of that song is basically schoolyard taunting. There is a black one who doesn't like the... And... His whole thing is like, if it can appeal to a kid, to a first grader, then melodically you have them. And rhythmically... His rhythm section, Greg Rico on drums and Larry Graham on bass. Specifically, Larry Graham's right thumb are probably the two most revolutionary aspects of Sly's music. And that's because Larry Graham is a bass player who used to play in bands without a drummer. So as a result... he would have to hit his bass in a very specific way so that you could feel the rhythm because there's no drummer there. And, of course, once he's in the sly system, he invents kind of a thumping, plucking thing, which I guess most of your listeners would probably be familiar with, the way that the Seinfeld theme sounds, or the way that Flea plays in the Red Hot Chili Peppers, like with his thumb,
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