Sly Stone: soul music's groundbreaking, elusive superstar
Stone was the multi-instrumentalist frontman for Sly and the Family Stone -- rock's first racially integrated, mixed-gender lineup.
He "passed away peacefully, surrounded by his three children, his closest friend and his extended family," after a prolonged battle with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and other health issues, Stone's family said in a statement.
"While we mourn his absence, we take solace in knowing that his extraordinary musical legacy will continue to resonate and inspire for generations to come," it added.
With his vibrant on-stage energy, killer hooks and lyrics that often decried prejudice, Stone became a superstar, releasing pivotal records that straddled musical genres and performing a memorable set at Woodstock.
But he retreated to the shadows in the early 1970s, emerging sporadically for unfulfilling concert tours, erratic TV appearances and a flopped 2006 reunion on the Grammy Awards stage.
An effervescent hybrid of psychedelic soul, hippie consciousness, bluesy funk and rock built on Black gospel, Stone's music proved to be a melodic powerhouse that attracted millions during a golden age of exploratory pop -- until it fell apart in a spiral of drug use.
Over the course of five years, his diverse sound cooperative left an indelible impact, from the group's debut 1967 hit "Dance to the Music" and their first of three number one songs, "Everyday People" a year later, to the 1970s rhythm and blues masterpiece "If You Want Me To Stay."
For many, Sly was a musical genius creating the sound of the future.
It was "like seeing a Black version of the Beatles," funk legend George Clinton told CBS News of his longtime friend's stage presence.
"He had the sensibility of the street, the church, and then like the qualities of a Motown," Clinton added. "He was all of that in one person."
Huge influence
The Rock & Roll Hall of Fame inducted the band in 1993, saying: "Their songs were more than danceable hits -- they were a force for positive change."
But Stone struggled to contain the forces and pressures that came with fame. He slid into addiction. He missed concerts. His musical output, once bankable, became erratic.
The music, though, proved extraordinarily influential, laying the groundwork for Prince, Miles Davis, the Red Hot Chili Peppers, and OutKast.
By 1973, the band imploded.
Asked why by talk show host David Letterman a decade later, the elusive star was cryptic: "I couldn't make all the gigs, is what happened."
Multiple drug-related arrests followed. By 2011, he was homeless and living in a van.
In his 2023 memoir, Stone acknowledged he was lost in a deluge of cocaine and PCP, but that he finally went clean in 2019.
Drugs gave him "confidence" and energy, he wrote.
But he regretted "the way I let drugs run my life," he added.
"I thought I could control them but then at some point they were controlling me."
- Family affair -
Sly Stone was born Sylvester Stewart on March 15, 1943 in Denton, Texas. His parents moved the family to San Francisco's suburbs, and built ties with the Church of God in Christ.
He was a musical prodigy; by age seven, Stone was proficient at keyboards, and by 11, he played guitar, bass and drums. He sang gospel in church with his sisters and joined high school bands.
Stone studied music at California's Solano Community College, worked as a disc jockey and became a songwriter and record producer. He played keyboards for Marvin Gaye.
By 1966 Sly and the Family Stone had emerged, with brother Freddie on guitar and vocals, and sisters Rose on keyboards and Vaetta on background vocals.
White musicians Greg Errico on drums and saxophonist Jerry Martini joined them, at a time when such integration was rare.
Their first album fell flat. But when influential music executive Clive Davis urged Stone to make a more commercial record, the band stormed up the charts in 1968, with "Everyday People" reaching number one.
"We got to live together," Stone belted out.
It was a period of tumult in America, with civil rights showdowns, Martin Luther King Jr's assassination and anti-war riots.
"I was scared. At the time it was almost too much all at once," Stone, who is survived by a son and two daughters, once told an interviewer.
In 1969, Stone and his band released the album "Stand!" It was a commercial triumph including the summer smash of the same name that became a touchstone for Black empowerment.
That year, they played a frenetic post-midnight set before half a million people at Woodstock.
More than a generation later, the 2025 documentary "SLY LIVES: AKA, the Burden of Black Genius" shed light on one of soul music's groundbreaking figures.
"Sly opened the floodgates for all musicians of color," music producer Terry Lewis said in the film, "to just do whatever they felt like."
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France 24
6 hours ago
- France 24
Funk icon Sly Stone, leader of Sly and the Family Stone, dies at 82
Sly Stone, the driving force behind Sly and the Family Stone, a multiracial American band whose boiling mix of rock, soul and psychedelia embodied 1960s idealism and helped popularize funk music, has died at the age of 82, his family said on Monday. Stone died after a battle with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and other health issues, a statement from his family said. "While we mourn his absence, we take solace in knowing that his extraordinary musical legacy will continue to resonate and inspire for generations to come," the statement said. Stone was perhaps best known for his performance in 1969 at the historic Woodstock music festival, the hippie culture's coming-out party. His group was a regular on the US music charts in the late 1960s and 1970s, with hits such as "Dance to the Music," "I Want to Take You Higher," "Family Affair," "Everyday People," "If You Want Me to Stay," and "Hot Fun in the Summertime." But he later fell on hard times and became addicted to cocaine, never staging a successful comeback. The confident and mercurial Stone played a leading role in introducing funk, an Afrocentric style of music driven by grooves and syncopated rhythms, to a broader audience. James Brown had forged the elements of funk before Stone founded his band in 1966, but Stone's brand of funk drew new listeners. It was celebratory, eclectic, psychedelic and rooted in the counterculture of the late 1960s. "They had the clarity of Motown but the volume of Jimi Hendrix or The Who," Parliament-Funkadelic frontman George Clinton, a contemporary of Stone and another pioneering figure in funk, once wrote. When Sly and the Family Stone performed, it felt like the band was "speaking to you personally," Clinton said. Stone made his California -based band, which included his brother Freddie and sister Rose, a symbol of integration. It included Black and white musicians, while women, including the late trumpeter Cynthia Robinson, had prominent roles. That was rare in a music industry often segregated along racial and gender lines. Stone, with his orb-like Afro hairstyle and wardrobe of vests, fringes and skin-tight leather, lived the life of a superstar. At the same time, he allowed bandmates to shine by fostering a collaborative, free-flowing approach that epitomized the 1960s hippie ethic. "I wanted to be able for everyone to get a chance to sweat," he told Rolling Stone magazine in 1970. Disc Jockey to Singer Born Sylvester Stewart in Denton, Texas, he moved as a child with his family to Northern California, where his father ran a janitorial business. He took the show business name Sly Stone and worked for a time as a radio disc jockey and a record producer for a small label before forming the band. The band's breakthrough came in 1968, when the title track to their second album, "Dance to the Music," cracked the Top 10. A year later, Sly and the Family Stone performed at Woodstock before dawn. Stone woke up a crowd of 400,000 people at the music festival, leading them in call-and-response style singing. Stone's music became less joyous after the idealistic 1960s, reflecting the polarization of the country after opposition to the Vietnam War and racial tensions triggered unrest on college campuses and in African American neighborhoods in big US cities. In 1971, Sly and the Family Stone released "There's a Riot Goin' On," which became the band's only No. 1 album. Critics said the album's bleak tone and slurred vocals denoted the increasing hold of cocaine on Stone. But some called the record a masterpiece, a eulogy to the 1960s. In the early 1970s, Stone became erratic and missed shows. Some members left the band. But the singer was still a big enough star in 1974 to attract a crowd of 21,000 for his wedding to actress and model Kathy Silva at Madison Square Garden in New York. Silva filed for divorce less than a year later. Sly and the Family Stone's album releases in the late 1970s and early 1980s flopped, as Stone racked up drug possession arrests. But the music helped shape disco and, years later, hip-hop artists kept the band's legacy alive by frequently sampling its musical hooks. The band was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 1993 and Stone was celebrated in an all-star tribute at the Grammy Awards in 2006. He sauntered on stage with a blond Mohawk but bewildered the audience by leaving mid-song. In 2011, after launching what would become a years-long legal battle to claim royalties he said were stolen, Stone was arrested for cocaine possession. That year, media reported Stone was living in a recreational vehicle parked on a street in South Los Angeles. Stone had a son, Sylvester, with Silva. He had two daughters, Novena Carmel, and Sylvette "Phunne" Stone, whose mother was bandmate Cynthia Robinson.
France 24
8 hours ago
- France 24
Sly Stone: soul music's groundbreaking, elusive superstar
Stone was the multi-instrumentalist frontman for Sly and the Family Stone -- rock's first racially integrated, mixed-gender lineup. He "passed away peacefully, surrounded by his three children, his closest friend and his extended family," after a prolonged battle with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and other health issues, Stone's family said in a statement. "While we mourn his absence, we take solace in knowing that his extraordinary musical legacy will continue to resonate and inspire for generations to come," it added. With his vibrant on-stage energy, killer hooks and lyrics that often decried prejudice, Stone became a superstar, releasing pivotal records that straddled musical genres and performing a memorable set at Woodstock. But he retreated to the shadows in the early 1970s, emerging sporadically for unfulfilling concert tours, erratic TV appearances and a flopped 2006 reunion on the Grammy Awards stage. An effervescent hybrid of psychedelic soul, hippie consciousness, bluesy funk and rock built on Black gospel, Stone's music proved to be a melodic powerhouse that attracted millions during a golden age of exploratory pop -- until it fell apart in a spiral of drug use. Over the course of five years, his diverse sound cooperative left an indelible impact, from the group's debut 1967 hit "Dance to the Music" and their first of three number one songs, "Everyday People" a year later, to the 1970s rhythm and blues masterpiece "If You Want Me To Stay." For many, Sly was a musical genius creating the sound of the future. It was "like seeing a Black version of the Beatles," funk legend George Clinton told CBS News of his longtime friend's stage presence. "He had the sensibility of the street, the church, and then like the qualities of a Motown," Clinton added. "He was all of that in one person." Huge influence The Rock & Roll Hall of Fame inducted the band in 1993, saying: "Their songs were more than danceable hits -- they were a force for positive change." But Stone struggled to contain the forces and pressures that came with fame. He slid into addiction. He missed concerts. His musical output, once bankable, became erratic. The music, though, proved extraordinarily influential, laying the groundwork for Prince, Miles Davis, the Red Hot Chili Peppers, and OutKast. By 1973, the band imploded. Asked why by talk show host David Letterman a decade later, the elusive star was cryptic: "I couldn't make all the gigs, is what happened." Multiple drug-related arrests followed. By 2011, he was homeless and living in a van. In his 2023 memoir, Stone acknowledged he was lost in a deluge of cocaine and PCP, but that he finally went clean in 2019. Drugs gave him "confidence" and energy, he wrote. But he regretted "the way I let drugs run my life," he added. "I thought I could control them but then at some point they were controlling me." - Family affair - Sly Stone was born Sylvester Stewart on March 15, 1943 in Denton, Texas. His parents moved the family to San Francisco's suburbs, and built ties with the Church of God in Christ. He was a musical prodigy; by age seven, Stone was proficient at keyboards, and by 11, he played guitar, bass and drums. He sang gospel in church with his sisters and joined high school bands. Stone studied music at California's Solano Community College, worked as a disc jockey and became a songwriter and record producer. He played keyboards for Marvin Gaye. By 1966 Sly and the Family Stone had emerged, with brother Freddie on guitar and vocals, and sisters Rose on keyboards and Vaetta on background vocals. White musicians Greg Errico on drums and saxophonist Jerry Martini joined them, at a time when such integration was rare. Their first album fell flat. But when influential music executive Clive Davis urged Stone to make a more commercial record, the band stormed up the charts in 1968, with "Everyday People" reaching number one. "We got to live together," Stone belted out. It was a period of tumult in America, with civil rights showdowns, Martin Luther King Jr's assassination and anti-war riots. "I was scared. At the time it was almost too much all at once," Stone, who is survived by a son and two daughters, once told an interviewer. In 1969, Stone and his band released the album "Stand!" It was a commercial triumph including the summer smash of the same name that became a touchstone for Black empowerment. That year, they played a frenetic post-midnight set before half a million people at Woodstock. More than a generation later, the 2025 documentary "SLY LIVES: AKA, the Burden of Black Genius" shed light on one of soul music's groundbreaking figures. "Sly opened the floodgates for all musicians of color," music producer Terry Lewis said in the film, "to just do whatever they felt like."
LeMonde
8 hours ago
- LeMonde
Funk master and innovator Sly Stone has died at 82
Funk master and innovator Sly Stone, whose music drove a civil rights-inflected soul explosion in the 1960s, sparking influential albums but also a slide into drug addiction, has died, his family said on Monday, June 9. He was 82. The multi-instrumentalist frontman for Sly and the Family Stone − rock's first racially integrated, mixed-gender lineup − "passed away peacefully, surrounded by his three children, his closest friend and his extended family," after a prolonged battle with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and other health issues, his family said in a statement. "While we mourn his absence, we take solace in knowing that his extraordinary musical legacy will continue to resonate and inspire for generations to come," it added. With his vibrant on-stage energy, killer hooks and lyrics that often decried prejudice, Stone became a superstar, releasing pivotal records that straddled musical genres and performing a set that enraptured the crowd at Woodstock. But he retreated to the shadows in the early 1970s and his personal struggles ultimately led to the group's disintegration. He emerged sporadically for unfulfilling concert tours, erratic TV appearances and a flopped 2006 reunion on the Grammy Awards stage. An effervescent hybrid of psychedelic soul, hippie consciousness, bluesy funk and rock built on Black gospel, Stone's music proved to be a melodic powerhouse that attracted millions during a golden age of exploratory pop − until it fell apart in a spiral of drug use. Over the course of just five years, his diverse sound cooperative left an indelible impact on American and world music, from the group's debut hit "Dance to the Music" in 1967 and their first of three number one songs, "Everyday People" a year later, to the 1970s rhythm and blues masterpiece "If You Want Me To Stay." For many, Sly was a musical genius creating the sound of the future. It was "like seeing a Black version of the Beatles," funk legend George Clinton told CBS News of his longtime friend's stage presence. "He had the sensibility of the street, the church, and then like the qualities of a Motown," Clinton added. "He was all of that in one person."
