Funk lord and mastermind of Parliament and Funkadelic, George Clinton has been one of modern music’s major influencers, with funk effecting the likes of house, boogie, electro, and of course hip-hop. A testament to this is Kendrick Lamar’s album To Pimp a Butterfly, a project in which Clinton features on and heavily impacts. He recently spoke to Pigeons and Planes about his opinions and experiences with the Compton rapper.
Having being put onto Kendrick from his grandkids, he was sceptical before their collaborations. “I knew Bitch Don’t Kill My Vibe and thought it sounded silly as hell when I first heard it. It’s a hit record but you have to wonder, “Why the fuck is it a hit record?””
Clinton went on to explain that through their meeting, “[he] realized it’s just his era of communication, and [that Kendrick] had a lot of other stuff to say. He was saying things in brand new metaphors that I knew was going to fuck people up.”
George Clinton says that the pair easily connected and that Kendrick reminded him of himself in his late 20s along with Sly Stone, due to similar enthusiasm about social issues along with his combination of poetry and politics. He also finds his work ethic that alike to Prince, “It’s hard to deal with [so much attention] and still try to be creative at the same time, but he has that in check. The only other person I’ve seen do it like that before is Prince!”
He revealed his favourite track was “Boo Boo!”, otherwise known as the TPAB cut Hood Politics.
He announced that the video for their collaboration Ain’t That Funkin’ Kinda Hard On You? released with Kendrick and Ice Cube as the features will be released shortly; something to keep an eye out for.
Read the full interview here and listen to their track below:
Image: Hype Magazine