This is a great week. I hope everybody's doing
all right out there. We've got Danny Badrosian
from Parliament Funkadelic on today. It's a big
week. And he's finished his new book, Make My
Funk the P -Funk. And you'll get a review of
that. A brief review. I don't want to spoil much.
But there's a brief review at the end of this
episode. I sat down with him. We talked for over
an hour. We talked about everything from his
upbringing to writing these books and... It's
awesome. I can't wait for you to hear it. But
there's some other cool stuff going on in our
universe that I want to mention really quick
before I give you that interview. Cody Shade
Harrell's got a new single out. And Danny and
I actually talked about Cody because he, like
Danny, is somebody that just went out and made
his own dreams come true. And you'll get what
I mean there when you listen to this interview.
If you're new to this show... Welcome. I hope
you go back and check out some of the older episodes.
I imagine that there's probably some new listeners
with this episode here. So welcome to the show.
Last week I had Taylor Hollingsworth on. That
was a great, great talk. I really enjoyed talking
to him. Check that one out. Once you're done
with this one, hit that subscribe button. The
other thing I want to mention is friend of the
show and previous guest Jonathan Spencer is...
In the number one show on Hulu right now, Murdoch,
Death and the Family. It's the number one show
on Hulu. His episode comes out today. He plays
Jerry. He's another reporter. I can't wait for
everybody to see it. He announced the role on
this podcast, which I thought was pretty cool.
You want to go check that episode out. It was
the episode back in season one with Slightly
Famous Somebodies. It was a really fun one. Pretty
crazy. room we had going that night. So check
out that show on Hulu. I'm excited to check it
out myself. I haven't quite, it hasn't actually
come out yet at the time that I'm recording it,
but it'll be out by the time that you're hearing
this. So check that episode out without any,
without any more delay. Here's my talk with Daniel
Bedrosian from Parliament Funkadelic. Enjoy.
We're on overeducated and underemployed. I'm
here. with Daniel Ben -Rosian from Parliament
Funkadelic, and also he's a historian and an
author and artist and all the things, man. He's
a modern renaissance man, if you will. Thank
you. And first, we've known each other a little
bit for a long time. I was working at a record
store when your solo album came out in 2005,
and I ran the local section there. So we have
known each other for... Going on 20 years now.
Over 20 years. Yeah, yeah. And we've always never
been like close friends or anything like that,
but I've always fucked with you and I'm super
excited to talk to you about all this, man. Oh,
likewise. First question I ask everybody. I think
this is going to be a weird answer for you. Okay.
What's the first song you remember loving as
a kid? Wow. Wow, that's a cool one. That's a
good question. Because I started my musical journey
as a classically trained. pianist my parents
were both concert pianists and they ran a piano
school so if i'm going to be honest i would probably
say that it was izu joy of man's desiring by
j .s bach i don't know for some reason that appealed
to me when i was very young that's one that i
remember struck me with a bullet there's a few
like that Moonlight Sonata by Beethoven was another
one. These were like things I had heard as a
kid and never really knew what they were until
I was old enough to play them. And then one that
my father played, it's three, I'm going to have
three, but they're just all in my memory from
that era. One my father played at a recital,
the Piano Toccata by Cacciatorian, and it just
changed the way I thought about performance.
Yeah, so those were probably my earliest song
memories. And you were playing piano at four,
right? You were probably exposed to these songs
by playing them or maybe hearing somebody play
them and then being told to play them. Yeah,
hearing my parents or my sisters or my peers
playing them and hearing them at recitals, like
the older kids in the recital or the adult students
or my parents playing them at a recital. And
then being like, that's one I'd like to learn.
And if I was so young that I couldn't do it,
my mother would either give me a reduction until
it was time for me to get the real thing. And
yeah, so that was definitely like my memory of
that. It was through like concert recitals and
stuff and people's lessons because the piano
studio was in the home. I was hearing, and my
sisters, we were hearing, I don't know, three
pianos at a time almost all day. You'd hear the
two students, my parents, two students, and then
one of us would be practicing at any given time.
So there were three pianos playing at all times.
So that creates a kind of mashup, too, of you're
hearing three different pieces of music at almost
all times of the day. That changes your perception
of sound in a lot of ways, too. So growing up
in that kind of an environment, was there, like,
pressure for you to play? Or was it just, that's
just what everybody was doing, and that's just
the culture, and that's... More the latter. It
didn't seem like there was pressure. When it's
your parents and they're telling you to do it,
they're just, it's just. Especially at four.
It's like going to school or do your homework.
It's all the stuff you know that you are supposed
to do. And because it was the family business,
I didn't really know any other alternative. And
how about this? Dozens. if not tens of kids,
if not more, were coming into the, or sometimes
hundreds maybe at the peak, were coming in and
out of my house all week long just to play the
piano. To me, it wasn't just like the family
thing. It was like almost everybody I knew did
it. Until I, especially since I'm starting at
four, you're not even in like real public school,
primary school or anything yet. You're just,
everything around you is. And then by the time
I went to school, I was like, oh, everybody doesn't
play piano. I thought everybody played piano.
That's what everybody did. So it wasn't like
a pressure thing. And I do remember like a period
in fourth grade where I was like rebelling in
a way. And I remember like the only conversation
I had with one of my parents about it was my
father saying something like. You don't have
to do this if you don't want to or something.
But I remember that feeling like, no, I have
to do this. You know what I mean? And again,
not from a pressure standpoint, just from a,
I don't want to let them down, and I don't want
to let myself down, and I don't want to regret
it. And I keep hearing all these adults talk
about, I took piano when I was little, and then
I stopped, and I never stopped regretting. And
I was like, oh, God, okay. let me just keep playing.
I think this is the right thing to do. So that's
what I did. That's right. And you were, but you
were also not like pretty naturally good at it
at a young age, which makes it, that makes it
easier. Right. Yeah. To stick with it and to
want to do it. And you were winning competitions.
Yeah. Were you competitive about it? I was the
drive. Yeah, I was definitely competitive. We
had at a certain point. In the early 90s, the
group lesson theory got really big in music lesson
circles. So they would do five of us, girls and
boys, and all the same age. So let's say we're
all in second grade. And now we're all in a group
lesson. We start on our private thing, and then
they put us all in the room together, and we
start openly competing in things like our flashcards
and note recognition, theory stuff. And it starts
being like, we're timing you guys. So and so,
these three in one line and these three in another
line. Girls versus boys or some other combination.
And each one gets to the front and they have
to say the name. They have the same flash card
and one of us is going to get it faster than
the other. We stay at the front. The other one
goes to the back. And it was very competitive.
And it was even that competition even spread
to recitals where like where you were sitting
in the recital was. was basically set by your
ability. So, you know, if you're one of the first
five, you're at the beginning of your elementary
sort of level, mostly young kids. But as you
get to the back, that's the older and the more
experienced. So if I was after my competitor,
like my rival, that meant I was doing better
than them. If I was before them, I was the underdog
trying to get up. So, yeah, I was super competitive,
especially at those young age. I was very, like,
second, third, fourth, fifth grade. And you were
competing against people that were older, like,
much older than you. Sometimes, definitely. Was
anybody using the word, like, prodigy at the
time? Not really, only because I had two sisters
that had three and six years on me, respectively.
And my oldest sister was definitely very good.
My middle sister was really good. They were starting
to diverge into different sort of styles of playing
and like what they preferred and things. And
so I think because I had them in front of me,
it was just like a legacy thing. They weren't
going to play favorites. My parents were really
good about being unbiased because the other students
would always play this, oh, you're the teacher's
kid, the teacher's kid. I don't know if that's
what I'm saying. You think that makes it better?
My father's finding out that y 'all are saying
this, and he's giving me harder pieces on purpose.
Oh, they think you got it easy? Here, play this.
And it'd be like a 16 -year -old piece, and I'm
like 10, you know what I mean? So it'd be like,
oh, man. I definitely didn't get any kind of
special. There was definitely no nepotism. It
was like the opposite. It was the opposite, yeah.
It sucked in that way. But it was amazing. Yeah,
I mean, it did well for you. For ability. Yes.
And yes, I did compete against older kids, especially
in theory competitions. They would have these
music Olympics where it was like you go in a
different room. Every room is, one room is ear
training and one room is sight reading. One room
is rhythm and one room is melody and one room
is harmony. And there was a bunch. And you had
to, one room was performance and one room was,
there was so many different things. So you had
to go in each one of these and you would get
a different score or a different ribbon based
on how well you did. And you were competing.
It was the gamut of ages. So it was like there
were kindergartners in there and there were high
schoolers in there. So yes, you were competing
against other ages. Yeah, definitely. So at what
point did you start to listen to music other
than classical music? Right away. My parents
had a pretty cool knowledge of non -classical
music. For instance, we played in the church.
So choral music, gospel music, spiritual music,
I heard that all the time. My father was the
choir director at a local church. It was a gig
for him. My mother was the organist. And so we
had to take part in these choirs every Sunday,
rehearsals every Wednesday. And two services
every Sunday. So I was like ensconced in that.
Maybe not so much the religion part of it, but
just the gig, the job. And the community of it.
Yeah, community. Definitely the community. And
the tradition. But my father was a very diverse
music director. And he incorporated so many different
things. And we also did these ecumenical councils
where like all the churches in the community
would come together. And so I learned. Everything
from like the Catholic masses, the Pentecostal
gospel music, the Baptist music, the UCC music,
congregational and Methodist and Lutheran. And
I sang in all those choirs. So that was also
a training ground. But like for enjoyment, my
mother and father had a few things that they
really liked that were non -classical. Now, my
father first, because 99 % of his... was classical
records. He has an incredible classical vinyl
collection, like insane, like the best versions
of every opus by the best orchestras, usually
out of print, first editions, first prints. He's
got thousands, if not tens of thousands of these.
And that's super impressive, because so many
of those things have gotten bad releases over
the years, too. Yeah, oh yeah, there's tons of...
So being able to find the good ones. The right
ones, yeah. But in addition to that, he had some
Miles Davis records. He introduced me to Ray
Charles very early on, and he introduced me to
James Brown music very early on, and he took
me to my first James Brown concert when I was
eight at the Lowell Auditorium in Lowell, Massachusetts,
and that changed my life. That was my first...
I had seen other concerts. I had seen the Beach
Boys at the beach when I was like six. So I had
seen them before that. But it didn't move me.
But the James Brown show really moved me. Because
by that point, I was already listening to jazz.
I was already listening to R &B. I liked Motown.
And then I heard James Brown, and I was like,
oh, wow. My mother, on the other hand, listened
to Harry Belafonte, The Beatles. She had first
editions of all their albums. and Bob Marley
and the Neville Brothers. Okay, yeah. So my first
sort of introductions to funk were through James
Brown, Ray Charles, Neville Brothers. Those were
like the funkiest things I was hearing first.
But that was at a very early age, and I even
took a liking to world music very early on. Being
Armenian, we had the Armenian picnics we would
go to. We would see the Armenian bands playing.
So that was obviously a huge influence on me
from the very beginning. But I also was really
into West African music. I was really into Peruvian
indigenous music. And I was hearing all this
stuff in Boston, just on the street. People,
they'd have world music ensembles just playing
on the street. And then in Lowell, Massachusetts,
which is closer to where I was born, they would
have the Lowell Folk Festival every year. Yeah,
yeah. And Lowell... And it's Twin City, Lawrence,
where I was born. At one point in America, we're
the most diverse cities in all of America. That
was where, like, literally all the immigrants
got dropped off and they worked in the textile
factories. Because before 1920, all of the clothes
in America were made in Lawrence, Massachusetts.
Unless you sewed your own, which people did,
too, on the farm. But all the manufactured textiles,
sheets, clothing, drapes. were all made in Lawrence,
Massachusetts, where I was born. So the immigrants
flocked there. It didn't matter if you were German,
African, Syrian, Indonesian, everybody went there.
So it really became known as the immigrant city.
Now, by the time I was born, that had all changed.
It's very much a Spanish -speaking city now.
It's 99 % Spanish -speaking. Did you grow up
speaking Spanish, too? I learned it in school.
Okay. Okay, so it was like part of the standard
curriculum? Yes, it was part of the standard
curriculum. I did three years of standard Spanish.
But spoke Armenian in the house as a kid, spoke
a lot of words that I thought were Armenian and
I found out later were Turkish because my family
survived the genocide under the Turks and they
lived under Turkish dominance for 500 years.
So they all spoke Turkish too. So I was speaking
like mixed Turkish and Armenian, Turko -Armenian
or whatever in the home. My mother spoke Latin.
She spoke French. My mother was a bit of a polyglot.
My father was a polyglot. My grandparents, my
aunties all spoke four or five languages. Because
they lived in Lebanon where you had to speak
Arabic, French, Armenian, and just know a bunch
of different... So you're hearing like three
songs at a time and three languages at a time.
All that stuff. And having a pretty diverse community
around me allowed for... I got introduced. One
of the first bands I played in was a Puerto Rican
folk band. So I was hearing this stuff all over
the place. There was all kinds of influences
from different music that was changing the way
I thought about listening to music. And Chick
Corea was a big early influence on me. He was
from Chelsea, Mass. So he was from right down
the street. And somebody had given me his Return
to Forever Fusion albums when I was really young
on vinyl. And that changed my life. So, yeah,
that stuff is insane. And all of this was like
the backdrop before my introduction to P -Funk.
But I also got introduced to P -Funk at 11. And
by the time I'm 11, that became my favorite band.
That was it. I was like, I finally found the
thing that encompassed all these other things
I really liked. So, yeah, that was how that happened.
You're the second guy I've had on here who, like,
so I've had. Cody Shade Harrell on here before,
and what happened with him is he grew up listening
to R .L. Burnside's music, all that stuff. He
just starts going to the Hill Country Picnic
up in North Mississippi every year and hangs
out with them. Now he's the bass player for Cedric
Burnside. Wow, check that out. And tours all
over the world with him and stuff like that.
You really do, like, when you see something that
you love and you set your sights on it. Anything
is fucking possible. Anything is possible. Exactly.
And I told myself from 11, I said, I'm going
to be the keyboard player for P -Funk when I
grow up. And my parents, who were always supportive
of me. Sounds like absurd now. Yeah, I know.
It does. And my parents who were working musicians,
they never said that's stupid. They never said
that'll never happen. But my mother, the only
thing my mother said was, Danny, aren't they
a lot older? And the kind of, this is crazy,
I think about this now, and my mother always
talks about it, how as each particular little
stride that I had made towards, like, communication
and greater relationship with these guys, including
George specifically, each time, I remember my
mother said, she told friends and family, she
said, okay, he got to go to the show. That's
good, before George passes on, because he's not
young, and this, keep in mind, This is like 35
years ago. Right, right. Yeah, yeah. So before
he retires or passes on, it's good that Danny
got to go see them. And then I had the opportunity
where I won this contest where you make the bed
sheet for George. He used to wear these big bed
sheets. And there's a lot of artists in my family,
fine artists. And so I have some. And for a long
time, before I discovered P -Funk, my dream job
was to be a comic book artist. So I had been
drawing my whole life. I designed this thing
with all the iconography of P -Funk all over
it and lyrics. It was very colorful, and it won
the contest. And he's like, you can deliver this
to George Clinton in Providence, Rhode Island.
He's going to wear it. You get your pictures,
and you get to hang out with the band backstage
the whole night. I was like, dream come true.
And how old are you at this point? 16. 16, OK.
So dream come true. So I do that. I meet him.
My mother's like, OK. He met him. So that's where
it's going to stop. So then I start getting to
know the band a little better. And by the time
I get to college, I'm still going to the shows.
I'm front row. Now keep in mind that very first
time I met them, I drop off my demo. I have the
wherewithal to drop music off to the guys. And
so they knew, oh, he not only was smart enough
to give us this, but it actually sounded like
something that we could do. Like he got like
that P -Funk, whatever that is, that feel, that
ooga booga, it's in him. That stank. Yeah, that
stank. So they liked what they heard. But they
first started having me come to the shows. And
I would, because I had keyboards. I was a keyboard
player. I would provide keyboards and do like
technician gigs, like supplemental technician
gigs for the keyboardists in the band. And keep
in mind, at this point, I'm like 19, 20. And
you're in college. And so can we back up just
a little bit here? Yeah, sure, sure. Because
a couple of things you said kind of stick with
me. Like your goal was always from a young age
to do what you ended up doing. Yeah. But you
still go to college, get a degree in history,
Middle Eastern studies. Yeah. And what was like
the motivation? And I'm wondering if having realizations
like, oh, these words that I thought were Armenian
are actually Turkish because of genocide and
oppression. and imperialism, whatever you want
to call it. It's beyond genocide, but that's
what it culminates in. Yeah, the long term. But
the cultural, I think that's one thing that people
don't think about a lot. Sure. And I feel like
realizations like that probably were part of
why you wanted to learn more about that history.
Yeah. Armenia is in the Middle East. It's a West
Asian country, even though a lot of people try
to... put it in Eastern Europe, not in Europe
at all. It's in the Middle East. It's in West
Asia. A lot of times today, they say the Middle
East is an imperialistic term. It's a colonial
term. So now they're calling it, they use MENA,
which is Middle East, North Africa. I don't see
how that's any different. But West Asia, it tends
to be like the common nomenclature. It's weird
to call them two separate continents anyway.
I know. Like a lot of people call it Eurasia.
So anyway. But be that as it may, being Armenian
is intrinsically being an indigenous inhabitant
of the Middle East, of West Asia. My genetic
history goes back in the Middle East 40 ,000
years. So I'm as indigenous of a Middle Easterner
as you can possibly be. Now, just a little bit,
not to get too much into the history, but the...
We can get into anything you want to get into.
Okay, cool. The Armenians lived in the Middle
East and West Asia for thousands of years. The
Turks arrived in the 1000s AD. So they're latecomers.
It's kind of like the Europeans arriving in the
New World. It's like the best kind of comparison.
And the Armenians are unfortunately the Native
Americans in this story. So it's like a thousand
years. It's about 900 years of oppression under
the Turks that unfortunately continues to this
day with colonialist tendencies and still tearing
down remnants of what was left of the Armenians,
et cetera, et cetera. Yeah. Being Armenian, being
raised Armenian, being raised by genocide survivors,
because my grandfather and my aunties were genocide
survivors. So it wasn't some ancient... Obviously,
massacres had occurred for thousands of years,
but it wasn't this ancient thing that I was told
about going down the line. This was taught to
me by the people who raised me. People who lived
it. Yeah, exactly. They have this whole thing
about... I never learned about generational trauma
until I met my wife, but... She started asking
me questions, and it was like, she kind of discovered,
like, Danny, you have, like, goo gobs of generational
trauma. And there's all these books written about
it with reference to the genocide. If you are
raised by or grew up with one survivor, you have
this much generational trauma. I was raised by
three survivors. So just a massive amount of,
and they weren't afraid to tell you what happened.
And at age five, they weren't afraid to scare
the shit out of a five -year -old boy. who is
otherwise American and knows nothing but semi
-comfort. And my parents at least made our life
as good as they could. And we didn't know anything
about hardship, not that kind of hardship. So
I felt like it was my duty because this was the
kind of thing that was brushed up under the shelf.
put away and denied for so many years. I thought
that it was important for me on a cultural level
to major in the history of my people and the
general peoples of the Middle East. I couldn't
just do Armenian studies because the college
I went to didn't have the Armenian studies chair.
If I could have gone to say Harvard or a better
school or a school in Boston or a school in like
Detroit or LA, I could have done Armenian studies,
but it was just too expensive. I ended up getting
admitted into the University of New Hampshire.
My family lived in New Hampshire by that point,
so it was an in -state financial situation. Out
-of -state was extremely expensive. The difference
between the other school I'd gotten into. It's
like triple tuition. Exactly. It was at the time,
and keep in mind, this is 99. It was like $29
,000 a semester. Or if you were in -state, it
was like $9 ,500 a semester. So $9 ,500 is way
better than $29 ,000. So that's what I did. I
did the in -state option. I paid my own way.
And to me, when I was, first of all, when I was
speaking to the guidance counselors in high school,
and then when I was speaking to the advisory
people in college, they had all had a unanimous
answer based on my training. They were like,
music major is the obvious choice, but why don't
you tell us a little about what you've done so
far? And when I told them, they were like, the
BA in music will be all review. Are you trying
to get the BA or are you getting the master's
or the doctorate? I'm like, I can't afford a
master's or a doctorate. Not right now, at least.
I said, I'm trying to get the BA. They're like,
you might want to choose something else, Mr.
Bedrosian, because you got this 18 years of classical
training. A lot of these guys. I've just began
their ear training or their performance, or they've
been doing performance for four years. Like you
could teach all these classes. Exactly. That's
what they were saying. So it was like, this is
stuff you've not only learned, you learned it
a long time ago. Unless you really want to go
back and review, or if you want to do some peer
tutoring on top of it, this might not be the
major for you. So I decided history because I
always had a keen love. of middle eastern history
i like the idea of writing about history and
so i did the colloquium which is like not all
history majors do it but it's the kind of thing
you do if you want to become like a degree holding
historian or the historian that writes about
history it's really boring like No, I have a
master's in history science. Oh, wow. Okay, so
history colloquial is very boring, but I'm glad
I took it now. It was probably my least favorite
course in college, but I'm glad I took it now
because it taught me so much about what I just
wrote, for instance, because it teaches you how
to write monographs, history books, legitimate
in the Chicago style with footnotes and end notes
and all that. And different historical approaches,
too. Yes. Oh, yes. The idea of either accepting
or denying historiography based on source material,
based on legitimation, all that kind of stuff.
Like, it made sense to me then, but I didn't
really care about it. It took 25 years for me
to be like, oh, I've got this training that they
drilled into me that I've never forgotten. I
might as well utilize it in this. in this kind
of way. And I will say this, as strange as it
sounds, getting the history major, getting the
Middle Eastern Studies degree at UNH provided
me with a wealth of wisdom in my touring life.
Because not only was I aware of cultural norms,
and not even just in the Middle East, anywhere
in the world, just because of my historical knowledge,
because it was something I gravitated towards
as a youth, just knowledge of historical cultural
norms in different countries has allowed us as
a band a little bit of degree of comfort and
fluidity in navigating certain... kinds of travel
and certain kinds of hospitality situations and
certain kinds of transportation situations and
little things and even little things that you'd
be like oh okay and that makes me think about
things like especially it probably wasn't as
much of an issue once you were joining them and
in the meantime you're getting this you're getting
your degree your history degree and you're also
traveling down here yeah pretty frequently yeah
Work with George, and you were doing recording
with him. That was the beginning of my studio
career, yeah. It was my studio career with George.
Luckily, I had been, besides having gigs since
I was a preteen, I had started working in major
professional studios back when professional studios
existed. Major professional studios as a producer
from age 17. So, like, I had already done...
By the time I'd met George, I was already starting
to work in these studios. Were you doing session
work? Yes, but I was also producing full -length
albums. Because I had, I guess you could backtrack
and say from 98 to 03, I had what eventually
became an 18 -piece funk band called Sweet Mother
Child up in Boston. And we recorded six full
-length professional studio albums. It's the
only music of mine which has not... been reprinted
or digitized. So it's an interesting side note.
And it was a great band. In fact, my wife discovered
this music like a year ago. And she's like, why
haven't you ever played this for me? I'm like,
the band you're in when you're in high school
and college, you're not necessarily like wistful
about the quality necessarily. But I will say,
comparably to all the other bands we were playing
with, we were very high quality. And we could
stand our own against adults. any given day.
But we were definitely kids. So I look back at
it the same way I think that George looks back
at his very earliest records by the Parliament.
It's like, oh, we couldn't sing. We couldn't.
Because you're just thinking about you as a kid.
But whenever I go back and revisit those records,
it's very rare. But when I do, it's like, oh,
yeah, we were doing something. So it was a great
training ground for working with George. I had
six albums under my belt, and then I produced
three others for other bands. So I was becoming
a producer of other groups. It didn't matter
if they were punk rock, hip hop, or whatever.
And I was starting to really do this production
thing, so it allowed me the wherewithal to have
some kind of lucid abilities in the studio with
George and with the guys in P -Funk when I would
come down to what was at the time the studio
in Monticello, which is very close to here. I
only flew into Tallahassee. We immediately left
Tallahassee and would go to Monticello. So Tallahassee
was just the place where the airport was. And
then we were going to this country town in the
middle of nowhere. And I was like, what are we
doing? And they live down a dirt road, way in
the woods, way off a highway. Because you have
to go to like the most remote part of the most
remote town in North Florida to find this studio.
Yeah, I would work there. Start hearing banjos.
Yeah, exactly. Which for me was big culture shock
coming from the north. Sorry. I definitely cut
my teeth on a lot of the work with George, like
that studio stuff in those early days. And it
was definitely a huge learning experience because
it was preparing me for my eventual road job.
I had done some road work, but the studio thing.
bracketed between my early road work, teching
when I was still in college, to when I got hired
on full -time on the payroll. And you start,
but you're dedicated to finishing your degree.
George even said, finish school. Finish school.
I would come to the shows, front row, drop off
my newest album, my newest music. I'd go backstage
with George. Me and George would be singing.
the rest of the night. So they closed the dressing
room down. We got to go. We got to get out of
here. He pulled me on the bus. We go singing
on the bus because I knew all the really old
songs by like the parliaments. And he was blown
away that this 17, 18 year old kid knew these
songs. Like, how do you know this stuff? He's
like, my band doesn't even know this stuff. And
so that blew his mind. And I was Boston Danny
for years. And then when they invited me down
to Monticello, they were like, oh, he can play
too. He's a player. And I was doing everything
from programming to piano to drum, live drums,
all kinds of stuff. And singing and writing.
And yeah, they definitely took a liking to me
from a very early point. But I finished my degree
first because I was paying my own way. And George
told me, he said, finish school. So I thought
that was cool. Do you think he saw what you could
become in terms of somebody that could help?
tell his story, protect his legacy, show this
kind of stuff to the world in a way? I think
initially it was just, here's this kid who knows
this music really well. I can't believe somebody
so young knows this really old music. And I don't
think it even had reached like a musicological
level yet at that point. Because then they hired
me as a technician. But my very first gig, I
had to play the whole show. So the technician
thing didn't last super long. There was a period
where I was gigging and teching the whole show.
So it was like being a basketball player. Yeah,
yeah, yeah. It was insane. But I think early
on, it was really a lot like George saw my knowledge,
but the band saw my talent. So it was the guys
in the band, Blackbird McKnight, Billy Bass Nelson,
Bernie Worrell, Gary Scheider, Cordell Mawson.
These guys were like, you know, this guy can
really play. This kid can play. And they would
have me play with them at sound checks. And then
those playing at sound checks turned into me
playing in the show. And then first it would
be. The first show aside, when I had to play
the whole show, aside from that, it would be
like, Danny's going to play on one song, okay?
He was going to play on two songs now. But then
by, man, by June of 04, which means by that point,
I'd been in the band nine months. So by nine
months, I'm doing the whole show regularly, like
every night. And so that was like a growth. That
was like a growing into that, into that situation.
The music program at the University of New Hampshire
wasn't going to teach you anything, but the College
of P -Funk had a lot to show you. Oh, my God.
Yeah, I learned almost as much there as I did
in my classical training. Just so much about
performance and feel and... And paying attention
and how to play, like, I always knew how to play
an ensemble, but, like, the real kind of minutia
of playing an ensemble and following a band leader
and following George, which is a case study all
in itself. Yeah, yeah. And people like Questlove
have said in interviews, like, this is, like,
the hardest band to be in. And I did an interview
last night with my buddy Mr. Christopher on Funkatopia.
It's, like, a Prince -centric. funk show. I've
seen a few episodes. Okay, cool. And Michael
Bland is his current co -host. And Michael Bland
was Prince's drummer in the late 80s and early
90s, new power generation. Like right after Sheila
E, right? Yeah. And Michael Bland even told a
story about how he was asked to fill in one night
and how everybody, he was like, man, even the
audience, people who don't even play music, they
know all the turnarounds and all the changes.
It was just too much for me. He's like a cult.
He's like, everybody, Gary and George are turning
to me, and they're hitting every accent. I'm
like, oh, God, there's just so many moments,
so many events. And it takes a musician to see
what I later pointed out in that interview, which
is that I think the layperson sees the sheen
on the front of like, party, good time, chaos.
But you go right behind that to the band, and
it is like everyone is in. full -on concentration
mode. And if one of them lets up, the rest of
them can feel it. Yeah. Like all these organisms
coming together to become one organism. And it's
strict. And it's more strict than people think.
It's not this just fun, he lets you do whatever
you want. No. Being able to stay in his band
for this many years was not because he just liked
me as a person or because... I like this band
and I don't want to quit. It's because I was
able to not get fired. That's literally what
it is. And a lot of people just can't hang. Even
great musicians. Because it's just, it's a very
hard job. You have to unlearn a lot of stuff
you learned. You have to put into practice theories
that you maybe didn't even know existed until
contemporaneous moments. And you have to really
make those theories work every single time. Like
it has to be perfect every single time, which
goes back to my classical training and helps,
obviously. And Bernie Worrell, who was my mentor,
he was classically trained. And so like to have
the classical training in P -Funk to be the keyboard
player, it's a must in a way. But I also tried
to take it upon myself to learn the way every
subsequent keyboard player played this music
because... there's no kind of end in the variation
to how this music has been played. And if you
can figure out how everybody did it, then you
can put your stamp on it, and then you can fully
say, I understand the canon in a much more comprehensive
way. But it's not an easy band to stay in. What
are some of the things you remember struggling
with directly, especially early on? Yeah, so
in the early days, George would do this thing
where he'd say, turn down and play hard, that's
hard to do, especially when you're looking at
situations where the sound man doesn't want you
to turn down. The sound man wants you to actually
turn up all the way so he doesn't get surprised
later on. So now you're turning down and playing
hard, and it's a different velocity. In a way,
it stuck me in this one thing where... They started
upgrading my speakers over time as I became a
more important member of the thing, and they
started upgrading my rig. Then I had to learn
how to get used to hearing myself so loud. Oh,
my God, I'm so loud. Am I, like, bothering everybody?
And everybody else is hearing it like... They're
not hearing like... But I'm hearing it like...
And I had to get used to that. And I was like,
oh, no, what is this? Some other things, too,
were like... George would do this thing where
we would be in a groove and it's just one line.
And he would have us play that one line, sometimes
for a half hour. And there's something with repetition.
It's no different than if you were forced to
recite a single sentence, a short sentence, like
the bottles on the table. And he's saying the
bottles on the table 800 times. Eventually, the
bottles on the table to you is, it doesn't mean
anything anymore. So you have to find a way.
for this seemingly simple groove, this line that
might only be five notes, to maintain its meaning,
at best evolve into a new meaning equally as
meaningful, if not more, in this half hour that
you're forced to very tight, and if you, like,
I know it's one line, it's only one thing, but
the best, most virtuosic players out there, they
can't do it. Because they'll play it twice and
it'll be different. let alone a thousand times.
You need it to be exactly the same those thousand
times. And if anything, you need to be deeper
in the pocket by the time you're done than before.
Not speeding up, not getting it wrong, not hitting
it wrong once, not hitting it wrong twice or
a hundred times. You have to get it right every
single time. And you have to really be deep in
the pocket every single time. And it takes a
massive amount of concentration. It doesn't matter
if you are naturally good at it or not. I was
naturally gifted. in understanding the pocket,
thankfully. And a lot of it came from my classical
training and being able to study with Bernie
for so long. But a lot of it came naturally.
That being said, you still have to put every
bit of concentration the moment you think about
something else or the moment your mind veers
away from the task at hand. You're screwed. To
be entirely present. Yes, those little weird
things. Anybody else, like your average... to
your best players. They're going to play it so
sloppy two times and not ever think about it
any other. Oh, we play this line now. Both times
they play it, it's not the same. It's almost
like a meditation. Yes, yes. And it's supposed
to compound the meaning as time goes on. You
can't lose meaning. There's a lot. You could
write a whole book just about this one little
concept I'm talking about. And it's just one
of the many theories espoused by the... Parliament
Funkadelic, especially the guys who were still
with us at that time, who've largely passed on,
not all, but a lot of them. And they were like
real proponents of these theories. And not only
is this stuff impactful and important to playing
in P -Funk, a lot of these theories are subjectively
singular to P -Funk. So like you could play in
another funk band, like the Bar Ks or the Ohio
Players, and they don't even utilize these theories.
They're just... playing through, and they're
great. But they're not even doing, it's what
you're going to call dig in, digging in, like
digging your feet into the ground and not moving.
That's a thing that P -Funk perfected. And you
can hear the guys from Kool and the Gang and
Earth, Wind & Fire talk about it. They'll talk
about it in interviews, like those guys were
on the one and stayed on the one forever. I remember
Earth, Wind & Fire, we played with them not too
long ago in Europe. And Philip Bailey and those
guys came out, and they were talking to all of
us in front of George, and they were like, you
guys should have seen George back in the day.
They used to funkadelic. They would come out,
and they'd do this one groove. And he said, they'd
do that the whole night. I was like, oh, God.
And they just, that's it. They'd do all their
songs over that groove and just. And they'd hold
it so hard the whole night that the whole crowd,
including us, would be in a trance. And we would
time it for us to go on because they were always
like the perennial openers. But they were the
openers you almost didn't want to open for you
because everything they did was either so fantastic
or so extravagantly different than what anybody
had heard that it would change the course of
what the show was supposed to be. It's like the
groove. It's almost like getting into quicksand.
Yes. Yeah. You got to just get deeper and deeper
into it. Not move a fucking inch of anything.
Just let it suck you down. And amaze people with
how deep it can actually go. Because people always
think, okay, it's not going to get any funkier
than where they're at right now. And then the
next couple bars, all of a sudden... And all
you can do is just be like... It's just so stinky.
But knowing how to do that, that takes a massive
amount of control. A massive amount of control.
Especially if you're a technically gifted dude
who wants to play... everything under the sun.
And when you're trained in classical and jazz
and you're playing fusion and you're doing all
this stuff, sometimes that stuff is, I don't
know how to put it, not unorthodox, but just
like unheeded or missed by your average virtuoso.
Like they missed that lesson somewhere. And I
consider myself as... Technical is the next guy.
I can be virtuosic. I can do all the crazy things
that people expect from a player at their highest
caliber or whatever. But there's another level
of that, and that's groove and pocket. And for
as many people as I know that can do a diatonic
run in 200 BPM or whatever, for every 10 guys
I know who can do that, there's half a guy that
can hold a groove. Half a guy who can hold it
correctly and do... what is expected of him.
It's a lost art. These people who can do it are
dying off like the samurai. And I have a couple
of peers who are in my age group, where we're
like early to mid 40s, that have learned this
stuff from the masters. There's maybe three or
four of us, if that. Everybody else is old, getting
older, or gone. So it's one of these things that's
been lost to time. And I guess you could teach
it at a university, but it still hasn't been
indoctrinated or included in the sort of intrinsic
learnings and teachings at university level for
music students. What I think is interesting...
Maybe just something I didn't think about, I
guess, is not only have you become the historian
of P -Funk in terms of telling the story, documenting
what happened, but also preserving the ways of
playing and the music in a very fundamental way.
It makes me... I had Baylor Trucks on earlier
this year. Nice. Butch's son. Yeah. And he plays
with Melody in the Brother and Sister tribute
band. Cool. Their goal is to play it as authentically
as they possibly can and to keep their parents'
music alive. Awesome. And I feel like that's
your goal. Yeah. Yeah, very much. When we do,
whether it's work with P -Funk directly, doing
the actual corporate act and rehearsing new old
songs. for the set that have never been included
before and like really bringing back that sort
of canonical flavor or even doing a special curated
set full of music from a specific period. Like
with the book and quite the new book, it's 1975.
So we've been doing these curated sets from 75
using some of the instruments from that period
too. So it's not only just the technique and
the technical, but also the technological as
well. So that's an important aspect of it. Good
time to dive into this book. Sure. Because you
start, to keep the story going, you start not
only playing with P -Punk full -time and touring
around the world with them, but you start also
preserving a lot of the things that you're finding.
Can you tell me just a little bit about how...
Is it wrong to say that you've developed an archive?
Yes, yes, I definitely have. Okay. And, like,
George has... Made me like the band musicologist
and the band archivist. There are a hundred ways
I could tell this, but like the shortest kind
of most concise way is that I'd been collecting
materials, discographical materials, musicological
materials. Probably since you were a kid as a
fan. Yeah, since like seventh grade. And I still
have stacks of papers on this stuff. Notebooks
that were supposed to be like my math notebook.
And there'd be like a page of notes and the rest
of the book is all P -Funk stuff. And never did
I think this stuff would all be published. Being
an author was not my... end goal. It was not
even a part of the goal. I didn't even know that
I was necessarily going to become a writer, even
when I became a history major. And everybody
said, oh, you're a history major. So are you
going to be a teacher or a writer? Or an expert,
where they pull you in. But the expert jobs,
it's like being a musician. You've got to find
gigs left and right. And it's not easy. And it
doesn't pay well. I could be the head of a chair
of a history... studies department at a good
school and make 20 G's less than I make now.
You know what I mean? And have way more work.
It's a ton of work. There's a certain aspect
to that where I was not aware that was how it
was going to go. But... By COVID, it became,
oh, this is going to be one of my goals since
I don't have a job anymore. None of us are working
anymore. I'm going to up the ante on this aspect
of my life, this aspect of my life, this aspect
of my life. And the three big ones were my health.
So I began exercising and running. My classical
because it was always the most important part
of my training. And I just read like crazy six
to nine hours of classical every day. And then
writing. the first book, the authorized P. Funk
song reference, actually putting pen to paper,
if you will, and collecting all these source
materials, new interviews, et cetera, et cetera,
and beginning the arduous process of, again,
five to nine hours a day of writing and interviewing.
So my day was very regimented, extremely long,
and full of all the things I felt like, okay,
now is the time to do this. I actually have the
chance and the time. So that's where... It was
really a desperation, not desperation. You're
in these moments. None of us are working. There's
a worldwide pandemic. Okay, now is the time.
I'm not going to be bothered. Nobody's coming
to the door and nobody's calling. We got a gig
for you. So now is the time to start writing
this stuff. And so that's how it happened. I
was already the band musicologist before that.
But then after that, they started adding archivist
and having me do different things with the tapes.
The reels and all this stuff, like archiving
what all the reels are that George has and getting
a full textual document of all his reels. That's
another thing I did, a non -published job that
I did as an archivist. And then eventually, with
the success of the first book, being able to
utilize my history degree at its utmost and create
this second book, this monograph, Make My Funk
the P -Funk, which is all about the... 50th anniversary
of 1975. It's all about the three albums that
came out that year and how that year is essentially
the paradigm shift, the movement, the sort of
watershed movement that transformed Parliament
Funkadelic into P -Funk, as it were, and stood
as the kind of the middle point between their
status as like the darlings of the underground
Chitlin circuit, still riding in station wagons,
to having a spaceship and a platinum album. And
songs in the top five and like pop success for
the first time. So it's a year that a lot happens.
It's the beginning of their superstardom. It's
not the beginning of their stardom, but it's
the beginning of their like massive superstardom.
And it's a year when you can really track almost
two different entities in one. They were this
way at the beginning of the year. It became this
by the end and it never changed. There was never
any turning back, in a way, to that old book.
So I've got a few questions. So the first book
is kind of just a tome of everything. Maybe it's
almost like a document, if you will. A reference.
Encyclopedic. It's an encyclopedia of P -Funk,
is what it is, essentially. And your approach
to this book is very different. Very different.
Much more, and I haven't, obviously it comes
out today or tomorrow, so I haven't read it yet.
Yep. But from what I understand and from hearing
other talks that you've given, it's much more
of a story. Yes. You're telling much more of
a story. Yep. And something that you said earlier
about your history degree and how that's helped
you guys on tour, especially internationally.
Yeah. How much about... Did you see change in
terms of them having to use things like the Green
Book at the beginning of 1975? At the end of
it, it being a little bit more easy for them
to get around the country. Can you talk about
that? Yes. To your first point, it is very much
more of a narrative. I've actually met a few
people recently, a good friend of mine, his wife.
told me she read the authorized P -Funk song
reference cover to cover. I said, I've never
even done that. I wrote the book. I was like,
really? And he said that she didn't really know
much about P -Funk before, so this was like her
introduction. I'm like, that's a hell of an introduction
because it's the nerdiest. It's just straight
information, cold, hard facts. And this is story
-based. It's definitely narrative. That book
is chronological too, but this chronology is
the kind that you can pick up before bed, read
a few pages or maybe even a chapter if you're
that type of reader, put it down and get ready
for the next day at the same time. Those kind
of before you go to bed reads. This is that good
kind of before you go to bed type of read. Yeah.
And to the second point, you were saying how
the band changed. And a lot of this, there's
a chapter, the first chapter actually, after
all the introduction material, after all the
back matter. There's a chapter on the actual
history of 1975. So it deals with political history,
military history, economic history, demographic
history, technological history, and touches on
important events that shaped the world at large,
including George and Parliament Funkadelic, and
shaped not just their motivations, not just their
insights, not just... their lyrical and musical
framework, but shaped their ability to conduct
their business on a day -to -day level. Like
you said, things like the Green Book, for instance.
There were strides taken towards the accession.
a session into higher echelons for the African
American community in 75 that helped allow for
an album like, say, Chocolate City to come out
in April of that year. And there are events that
transpire alongside it in history that help to
allow for something that would be considered
subversive two years before to be accepted and
even chart two years later. And so I talk about
a lot of that in the book. But I also talk about
how despite the... the accession forward the
sort of movement forward there were still massive
demographic economic blocks on the african -american
community they're stopping them from being able
to achieve how they could at their highest level
if they were allowed to and so it talks about
how strides had been made but there would need
to be further strides made for say such for such
ideals to actually take shape in reality but
for them to take shape in art was why the history
allowed certain things to happen. And it talks
about also that the beginning, the first however
many months of that year, history is very much
shaping what George and P -Funk did. By the end
of the year, George and P -Funk are helping to
shape what happens in history. It doesn't necessarily
flip, but there is a dichotomy that finds itself
on the other side of that through the success
of George. That's, yeah, that's exactly what
I was starting to think about. Their music, I
mean, changed the world as much as it was in
response to the world. Yes, yes, very much so.
So how, as someone who works closely with a lot
of the characters in this book on a day -to -day
basis, I think, so history as like a field. it's
changed tremendously in the last 50 years yeah
so in 1975 like military history would have been
one of the main ways that people just talked
about history period sure and now even to talk
about a band it's the historian's job to put
it all in a context of what's going on in military
technology culture but also how did you put it
in the context of i know these people Right.
So one thing that definitely helps, and I've
said this before, the first book probably, and
I'm not saying this to toot my own horn, I'm
just saying this to show like that these things
happen. The perfect environment has to be made
for such things to reach completion and conclusion.
People always say, oh, Danny, so you always finish
your project. That's such a, because those of
us in the arts, there's always, I want to do
that, but I never will type of thing. It was
the perfect environment, just the right nature
had to be in place for me, for a person, for
a Danny Bedrosian to write an authorized P -Funk
song reference or even make my funk the P -Funk
for that matter. It was the perfect duality of
this is my favorite band of all time. I've been
in this band for almost 25 years. And you put
those two things together and that's how I have...
A musicologist whose favorite band is P -Funk
couldn't have written the first book. A band
member who didn't necessarily fall in love with
P -Funk organically couldn't probably write this
book. I had to have the right combination of
know -how, experience, expertise, talent, and
knowledge and relationships. Much like the first
book, this one has a number of brand new primary
source interviews. In addition to... Knowing
how to place these guys in the context of the
narrative, they have placed themselves in the
context of the narrative through their own words.
Whereas I used the 55 different interview subjects
in the first book, their words were used to contribute
information and not direct quotes. in this book,
are used as direct quotes. So you're getting
from their own words, from George Clinton, Fred
Wesley, all these guys, exactly how it went down
in their words. So you are transporting your
colleagues, your peers. back in time to where
they were when these things happened. And they're
transporting themselves through their own words
and actions. It's more of an oral history kind
of approach. In a way, yes. So it's a mixture
of that narration and the quotes from the actual
primary source interviews interspersed. Whenever
something needs to be exemplified without a cited
source, use the primary source interviews. And
those really drive home the most important points
in a lot of ways. What are some of the most surprising
things that you found when putting together the
P -Funk archive? What are some of the things
that really stood out to you? One of the things
that stood out to me the most is that the general
knowledge of personnel, which goes back to my
first book, but also affects this book. The general
knowledge of personnel is largely erroneous.
And so that There's not a concise consensus on
who did what, which was, again, the impetus for
me writing the first book. But there's three
very major chapters in this book that deal with
exactly the same subject matter, and it's the
chapters on the three albums in question. So
each album gets its own dedicated chapter, which
are, of course, all about legitimate, personnel
-important... documentation of personnel, an
important sort of back matter of those albums.
And so for those to be legitimized, you have
to take a number of really important steps as
an historian. And yeah, that part of the process
is of uber importance. And I definitely link
the sort of correctness of the aptitude for getting
this stuff right to And a complete sort of, what
do you call it, like adoration for authenticity,
a complete adoration for getting accurate answers,
accurate results. Yeah. And again, you don't
always get it right. And as time goes on, you'll
find out, oh, this was actually this. But that's
history. That's what history is. The historian
today is writing about... another historian's
book about another historian's book about another
historian's book and that's how this stuff goes
down and you're really just adding your your
hypothetical page to an already existing tome
of massive proportions at best like there might
be like a new primary source that gets uncovered
like i think about when darwin's wife's cookbook
yeah published okay nice because there's A lot
of debate about where his illness came from throughout
his life. Some people thought it was anxiety.
Some people thought he caught some kind of tropical
disease. When the cookbook came out, everybody
realized that's what it was. Maybe he was lactose
intolerant. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Because she used
heavy cream all the time. And he seemed to get
better. But the point is, even then, they're
still just in conversation with these other historians
that have... made these theories that you know
none of it is going to end up being the truth
right capital t right it's all different interpretations
of the same kind of facts yeah it's really rare
that you have like a new source get uncovered
that turns things on its head i will say this
now obviously in the first book there's tons
of that yeah it's every page is that but in this
one because it hadn't been documented in the
first place exactly that i mentioned that recently
too that It's something that this is all new
to the written page. This book, there is also
some new discoveries and some things that have
never been uncovered on the page or off. So there
are some really cool surprises in this book,
some that adhere to personnel, some that have
to do with promotion, some that have to do with
things that even George... George has done tens
of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of
interviews in his life. And to try to get new
organic information out of George, you really
have to know what kind of questions to ask. So
I tried to focus on questions I'd never heard
people ask him with reference to this time in
general. So he was able to give me stuff I've
never heard him talk about. And when you watch
George in my podcast, A Bump by Bump Rundown,
Which you definitely should watch. That's just
how we talk. That's just how we have conversation
in general. I try to keep it focused when we
do the show. But that's just our general kind
of, so we're having these conversations all the
time and there's constantly sort of new things
coming to light. So for there to be brand, after
knowing this man almost 30 years and being his
friend for 30 years, to have like new information
come to light from recent interviews. It shows,
A, how much he's done, B, how good his memory
is, and C, just how much there is to still know.
And so, yeah, we definitely uncovered, not just
through George's interviews, but through a lot
of the other guys too, we uncovered some things
that, A, nobody's talked about before, and B,
nobody's really heard about before. So it takes
both getting the subjects to talk about those
untalked about things and having the reader.
find out, oh, this has never been mentioned before.
There's a lot to that. But yeah, there are a
lot of surprises and stones turned over in this
new book, too. I hope there was at least one
question I asked you that you hadn't gotten before.
No, actually, most of these are really good.
Oh, thanks, man. Actually, all of these are really
good. I was just trying to make a joke. Look,
I've been interviewed many times. I know, you've
been doing a lot of these lately, man. And I
haven't listened to all of them. So I've been
trying. And I keep everyone different, but it's
easy to keep them different because everybody's
questions are pretty different. That's good.
So I try to keep a specificity to my approach.
Yeah, we're definitely talking about a lot of
the nooks and crannies in the historiography,
which I think is important. And I guess that
leads me to one of the last things I really want
to ask you today. I'd love to have you back sometime.
I would love to be back. But how did you stay
objective? The other side of that, where on the
one hand, like you being in the band, being the
big fan is like part of what gave you the authority
and legitimacy to do it. Yeah. But it also like,
how do you avoid being the guy in the story?
Part of it, you weren't there. I wasn't born
yet. For this. I wasn't born yet. That helps.
So that helps. But you do know all these people.
I do, and I do develop a bias based on cult of
personality, familial relationships, work relationships,
decades of working with some of these guys. You
do develop biases. He's your boss. Yeah, and
all these guys are my big brothers. So it can
be difficult. However, I go back to my... colloquial.
I go back to my history analysis, writing about
history. I go back to those courses. There were
two or three really important ones in my history
degree. And they always talked about... They
used to make us write about stuff that was close
to us in order for us to eschew the feelings
of bias and make... the non -biased approach
be the primary approach and have the bias come
in where it's necessary to give a non -analytical
human idolism to the narrative. It doesn't happen
all the time. And I try to keep it, luckily,
even a book like this, like you said, I'm separated
from it by many years. I wouldn't join the band.
for another 29 years. So luckily I'm separated
from this stuff, and it definitely gives me a
less biased approach. Having been a fan of this
stuff, you have to be careful of bias too. I
run into that on here. Yeah, for sure. Like fans
who become musicologists who aren't in the band.
fall privy to just the same kinds of problems
as ones who would be in the band, if not worse
problems, because they're dealing with hearsay,
all kinds of hearsay, that has or has not been
legitimized or delegitimized by the important
people involved. They fall under the same types
of issues. Your best historian has to be careful
of those types of things. So I think it's equal
across the board, but I try to stay... as unbiased
as possible and give a large kind of consensus
based on majority rules, based on accuracy of
intel, based on the number of legitimate sources,
based on the number of sources I can cite that
can back up said. And I think it's really important
that you acknowledge that you have a body. Like
that's the only thing you can do at the end of
the day is like acknowledge. hey, this is a perspective
that's going to be a little bit biased. I'm not
pretending to not be part of this. And that's,
I think, important. Do you know of any other
bands that have the kind of history, importance
in -house? Do you know of any other people that
have stepped into a role similar to yours with
other musicians? The Zappa family. His kids have
done a lot to curate. Although that kind of comes
from directly from the family, which I guess
is a little different. No other pop group goes
as long as this. So this is really setting the
precedent for historiography within a group setting,
a band setting. In a lot of ways, we're treading
new ground because this book represents the first
monograph in P -Funk. historiography. Yeah. So
there are memoirs out there. There are autobiographies
out there. There are biographies out there. And
there is an oral history. However, at this point,
it leaves out a large portion of the history
since it was written. Yeah. And there are books
that deal with Pifang history in a more cursory
way. And the historical approaches have changed
since those were written too, which I think...
Just the fact that you put all of 1975 in context
in this book and in all of the ways that you
talked about earlier is something that like those
books would have never, those books wouldn't
have done. No, no, that wasn't their intention.
That wasn't their goal, nor was it even like
an idea yet. And that was almost like standard.
Yeah. It's almost like if you're writing about
this time, you have to put it all in context
before you launch off. And I also wanted academia.
George and myself have been very dedicated to
academia enveloping P -Funk history a little
bit more because now we're at 70 years, and academia
has only been flirting with this concept for
maybe about 10 years. Yeah, yeah. With what do
they need, what does academia need to further
the proponents of P -Funk historiography? In
said academia, what do they need to further the
legitimacy of P -Funk historicity and historiography
in academia? What they need is more books. What
they need is more monographs. They need more
actual history books. So this is going to be
the beginning of a series of what I call yearbooks,
for lack of a better word. Books about different
years in P -Funk history and what makes them
important. And really just touches on the...
puts the microscope in on a moment and says,
this happened and this happened and it changed
the world. Yeah, yeah. And both these books are
on a typically academic publisher. Sure, yeah.
I feel like that helps with creating legitimacy
for universities. These are things that I think
are important, maybe not always important. Sometimes
they're abused. But I do think you're doing it
the way that it needs to be done in the systems
that are built in order to get this shit into
the curriculum. And I'm trying to do it in a
way that George never wants it to be gestated
in a way where it becomes sterile. You know what
I mean? Because it can happen very easily with
any art form. And you look at how some academia
has co -opted jazz into... Something it necessarily
wasn't. So you have to be very careful to maintain
a historiographical approach that maintains authenticity
and doesn't dust the dirt off of it because the
dirt is an important part of it. Yeah. So it's
about not cleaning it. It's about presenting
it as it is to the academics. This is what it
is. Take it as it is at its purest. cleanest,
and still historiographical form. The world's
a messy place. It's a messy place. It's got to
be messy. Yeah. Is there anything else you want
to say about this book? Because I feel like,
dude, you and I could talk for hours and hours,
but people are going to get bored. We should
probably... Yeah, that's cool. I would say it's
available everywhere books are sold. Yeah. You
can get it direct from the publisher. That does
help me, but you can also get it from Amazon
and a review on there helps me big time too.
Especially because then it says verified purchase.
Exactly. That's a nice thing about there. It's
already at number three or four on the R &B sold
charts for Amazon, which is great because it
hasn't come out yet. So I would recommend to
people get it everywhere books are sold. Please
recommend it for your local brick and mortar
stores too, like Barnes & Noble or Books A Million,
because they already have the book. They just
need to place it in their brick and mortar. So
if the Kansas City Barnes & Noble doesn't know
that they should put it there, they won't. But
if somebody comes in and says, hey, you guys
should have this great book, they'll put it in
there because they've already got it on back
order. In addition, I highly recommend, because
with the first book, this was very successful,
and I always tell everybody, highly recommend
that you recommend it for your local public library,
university bookstore, or school library, depending
on what age you are, because all three of those
became big proponents of the first book of the
Authorized P -Funk Song Reference, and now the
Authorized P -Funk Song Reference is in libraries
all over the world. I would like very much for
the same thing to be true of Make My Funk the
P -Funk. So I just recommend everybody... Recommend
it for your local libraries. If you read it and
you like it, write a review. Hell yeah, man.
And the podcast that you do with George, I think,
is really something special. Yeah. And it's been
a really nice companion piece to the book. Everybody
should check that out as well. Bump by bump rundown.
I hate sending people to another podcast. No,
I'm just kidding. Maren retired, so you've got
room now. Nice. Bump by Bump Rundown, yeah, it's
George's, and it's attached to his Patreon as
well, which people, if they love P -Funk, they'd
love his Patreon. The cool thing about the Patreon
is you're constantly putting out unreleased songs.
Oh, yes. And this is part of the archiving process,
too. Exactly. As you're archiving this stuff,
you're releasing unreleased stuff all the time.
Exactly, stuff that never seen the light of day,
which the fans love. And then I highly recommend,
if you're trying to figure out, because I'm always
doing new stuff, Matt. Got like the comic books,
the books, the albums, the poetry books, concerts,
curated sets, lectures, book signings. And so
the best place to probably check out what I have
coming up is I have a little podcast, Danny on
Everything. And it's not just my stuff, but I
do interviews with famous folks, with important
folks in the P -Funk and other places. and concerts
that you can't see anywhere else. And I also
promote all my stuff. It's probably the easiest
way to find out where I'll be next and what I'll
be doing. And you're doing book tours and all
kinds of stuff coming up. All through the end
of this year and all through next year. Man,
I'm so excited to read this book. Thank you,
man. I can't wait. I want to tell you the way
I first ever heard George. Yeah. It's silly,
but I was probably not much older than 11. Yeah.
And I watched PCU. Yeah. And PC, and still, dude,
that movie's still pretty funny. Like, in fact,
in some ways, it aged remarkably well. It did
age remarkably well. Because I saw it not too
long ago. I was like, oh, it's still pretty good.
Yeah, it still is, man. And I just, yeah. I've
been a fan ever since I've seen him. Like, my
aunt and I have seen him in the past, seen y
'all in the past. Yeah. Where does that drive
to play? And you hinted at it at the beginning.
You're backstage and you and George are just
singing all night and they can't get rid of you.
Is that where it comes from, these three -hour,
four -hour shows, these playing all night? Yeah.
You just get stuck in the quicksand, huh? Yeah,
it's like that. And it all comes down to the
boss and his love for it. He's still very excited
about what he does. And his favorite thing to
say is, we're just getting started. We're just
getting started. He always says that. And if
you work with him, you really feel that because
he's still the 15 -year -old kid that started
the parliaments. He's still that 15 -year -old
kid excited about the next venture. He's always
excited about the next venture. So yeah, that's
where it comes from. It comes from the big guy.
There's no replacing a George Clinton because
his infectious energy is what drives this thing
more than anything else. So it's really special.
Man, congratulations on making your fucking dreams
come true. Thank you. And I hope that these books
keep coming out, man. I hope you keep doing these.
I'm really excited. These are the books I like
to read. These are the kinds of books I read
on a regular basis. Nice. I think there's like
a big audience for stuff like this. Make my funk
the P -Funk. Daniel Bedrosian, pick up the book.
Pick up the authorized P -Funk song reference.
I'll have pictures of that and links to everything,
links to the podcast. Danny, it's been fucking
awesome, man. Thank you. Thank you for having
me. I appreciate you. Hope you enjoyed my talk
with Daniel Bedrosian, good old Danny. That was
awesome. One of those opportunities that I just
can't believe came my way. Thanks, Danny, again,
for doing that. His new book is amazing. And
just like I feel like Danny had to acknowledge
that. He was going to have some level of bias
writing a book about the band that he's in. I
am going to have a little bit of a bias towards
my review, a positive bias towards the review
of the book that somebody I know wrote. I don't
really interview people on this podcast that
I'm not a fan of, so there's always going to
be that inherent bias a little bit in the way
I talk to them and the things that we talk about.
I do think Danny avoided getting too self -reflective
in the book. He's talking about a time and a
place in the band in this particular book that
he was not there for. The way that he puts the
band in the context of everything going on in
1975, the way he interjects both archival material.
And interviews with the people that were there
is a really amazing format and unique way that
I haven't really come across. Just not quite
the way he does it, at least in terms of music
history books. You know, the first book really
was like an encyclopedia. And I really do encourage
people to pick that one up. It's something I
go to frequently when listening to Parliament
or Funkadelic or anything. part of that whole
thing but this new book really is a book you
can sit down and read I read it in it was less
than two days it may have been less than 24 hours
it was less than 30 between when I picked it
up and when I finished it couldn't put it down
it was great it really makes you feel like you're
there in a way that that a really good novel
can Capturing the vernacular of the people that
he interviewed and having all the archival material
to reference really painted a rich picture. And
I think picking that year in the first place
was really a great choice for Danny. There's
a reason he picked that year and was transformative,
not just for the band, but I think for a lot
of culture. And check it out. I don't know a
whole lot else to say about the book without
getting into spoiling it for people other than
I think that it set an example for the way that
books in the history of music can be written.
But it's also, as Danny pointed out, the window
for the kinds of books like this being written
is closing for some artists because you do have
to be able to sit down with some of the people
that were there. and have those conversations
and interview them. Thanks for listening, y 'all.
Check out Make My Funk the P -Funk by Daniel
Bedrosian. There's a link to grab it from the
publisher in the description. Thanks for tuning
in. We'll catch you next week.