Apr 11, 2019
The Album: Sly and the Family Stone: Stand! (1969)
When San Francisco’s Sylvester Stewart and his Family Stone
released Stand! in the spring of the 1969, it further
cemented the group’s reputation
as the definitive pop act of the era, whose
multiracial makeup mirrored the band’s multi-musical fluency in
rock, pop, soul and funk. They captured the post-summer of love
optimism of the times in songs like “Everyday People” and “You Can
Make It If You Try” and though those good times wouldn’t last in
the years to follow, for that brief, shining
moment, Stand! thrust Sly and the Family Stone
into the spotlight as avatars for a national feeling of possibility
and positivity. Can it be it was all so simple then?
Stand! was the pick of guest Bhi Bhiman, the
singer/songwriter from Los Angeles (by way of St. Louis). Armed
with an eclectic set of influences, Bhiman's dabbled in everything
from songwriting with The Coup's Boots Riley to collaborating with
comedian Keegan-Michael Key to releasing his most recent album,
2019's Peace of
Mind, as a podcast. Together, we discuss
how Stand! reflected the soon-to-be-dashed
optimism of its time, how the Family Stone doesn't get enough
credit for Sly's sound and ponder how Ike and Tina Turner managed
to rip off "Sing a Simple Song" without catching heat.
More on Bhi Bhiman
More on Stand!
Show Tracklisting (all songs from Stand! unless indicated otherwise):
Here is the Spotify playlist of as many songs as we can find on there
If you're not already subscribed to Heat Rocks in Apple
Podcasts, do
it here!