This month is Sly September here on Edge of the Line, in honour of 2026 marking 60 years since the formation of Sly and the Family Stone.
The making of There's a Riot Goin' On, started the process in 1970, only four years since brothers Sly and Freddie had merged their bands to form one (contrary to some accounts, that was 1966 – not ‘67). Sly Stone was largely isolated from the Family Stone and recording alone. The group had been catapulted to stardom, largely by their second record (Dance to the Music, 1968).
Riot took until late 1971 to be completed (to the record label’s chagrin), with Sly working at the celebrated Record Plant Studios, in his own home studio, and in his Winnebago. It’s widely believed that Sly played almost everything on the album, and in his memoir he describes a typical process as recording a guitar track, then adding a bassline or organ.
‘Family Affair’ was a rare track on the album to feature Rose Stone on co-lead vocals. Riot was a marked departure from the Family Stone’s live band sound; now members were collaborating with Sly individually and recording over his tracks. Sly used multitracking extensively and recorded live drums over beats programmed on an early drum machine, Maestro Rhythm King MRK-2. ‘Family Affair’ was one of the first hits to use such a machine.
‘Spaced Cowboy’ was another track to use the MRK-2. It might just be the weirdest Sly and the Family Stone song. It might be one of the weirdest funk songs ever. Is it funk? It’s cowboy funk, perhaps. Sly yodels. He yodels! If anyone could make yodelling sound hip, then it was Sly, possibly the coolest man in music.
Yodelling had never been so funky. The drums are minimal, although there are interesting touches, as at 3:20 when an isolated snare-like sound comes out of nowhere. Much of the onus for rhythm is on the bass. It has a rubbery electric sound that contrasts with its brief, sometimes-staccato notes (2:54). The longer notes, in one of the main lines, follow Sly’s yodels and add to the cheer.
Whereas his brother Freddie’s guitar sound was often bright and big, Sly’s is subtle. He plays quiet, wah-wah’d chords and only sprinkles in the occasional dalliances (as at 2:17).
The song has few lyrics (other than “Yodel-ayde-yodel-ayde-a” and the like, if that counts), but the few lyrics do paint distinctly Slyish pictures: “And they said I had a limp / And then they tried to pass around I was a pimp”. By the time of Riot, Sly had given up trying to portray himself and the band as a family-friendly poster band for a united America.
Many of his lyrics on this album seem to hint at Sly’s drug addictions, which had been worsening. In the previous verse, he seems to sing, “Everything I like is nice / That’s why I try to have it twice” (his words aren’t perfectly clear, though a lot clearer than many elsewhere on Riot).
On ‘(You Caught Me) Smilin'’, Sly sings, “You caught me smilin’ again / Hangin’ loose / ‘Cause you ain’t used to see me turnin’ on” and “In my pain, I’ll be sane to take your hand”.
In his memoir, Sly referred to ‘Smilin'’ as an example of why people “said the album was dark”, which wasn’t his intention.
‘Cowboy’, which Sly said the band had “real fun” with, is more optimistic than much of the album, but there may be a tinge of darkness with “I was on my last leg”. That sentiment is hard to take entirely seriously with yodelling coming immediately before and after.
Sly wrote:
“Other people didn’t say dark. They said black instead. But then how did they explain ‘Spaced Cowboy’?”
Sly had always enjoyed hearing yodelling on other records, and a comedian (whose name he forgot) made him laugh doing it, so he tried it himself. As with everything, Sly made it his own.
Top image from Discogs.