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Sounds Like It Got A Three On It, Though

Yes, that dude is hurtling through space crotch first on the outside of a flying saucer without a space helmet.
And yes, he is wearing silver pumps.

Now,
everyone knows that on December 15, 1975, Parliament released Mothership Connection


And, naturally, we all know that Parliament is 

The. 
Funk. 
Band. 
of funk bands, and also the better half of P-Funk, the conglomeration of 70's Funk bands made up of members from the seminal bands of P-Funk, namely: Parliament and Funkadelic (both lead by the musical genius George Clinton). 

And it goes without saying that Mothership Connection is the Everest of that Himalayan genre we call Funk, and gave us the very anthem of groovey: "Give Up The Funk."



Even the exceptionally blocky clouds of Nepal agree: Parliament rocks.


I won't even insult you by mentioning that the album's A-side famously opens up with a perfect concept-album first song, called "P. Funk (Wants to Get Funked Up)," featuring the radio-invading space DJ, Lollipop Man.

And if only I had a dollar for every time I heard someone reference the third verse of that song, where a vocalist says: 
Well, alright. Hey I was diggin' on y'all's funk for awhile
Sounds like it got a three on it though, to me.

BUT WAIT!!


What the fuck does that line, which has such currency in the idiom of our daily (or even hourly) speech, even mean?!!

Well, since you asked...

Debates have raged as to whether the "having a three on it" refers to having a rhythmic emphasis on the third beat of a musical phrase, having a 3-out-of-ten on a scale of musical quality, or something that can only be understood with the help of mind-altering psychedelics like LSD. 
(It's true - debates between these positions have actually raged! Look at the link!!)


Me? You want to hear my - little-old-my - theory about the meaning of that lyric? Really? Wait, did you just say you really do? Wait, did you just say that I'm the greatest blogger that ever lived? And that you came all the way through the labyrinthine porn-strewn tubes of the interwebs just to hear my take on these specific song lyrics? Well...gwarsh!...then I guess I'll give the people what they want!


Am I really the best blogger ever?!

Ahem...

I think that, given P-Funk's predilection for talking about Funk music itself, "having a three on it" here quite undoubtedly refers to the emphasis of the third beat of a musical phrase. But it's no mere universal comment of milquetoast erudition, arbitrarily passing judgement on the emphasizing of the third beats of musical phrases in general. Rather is it a self-referential remark about various musical phrases of this song in particular

*Lighting calabash pipe*
Allow me elaborate:

Yes, this song goes totally M.C. Escher, hand-drawing-itself, Rick-and-Morty style mindfuck when the vocalist of the verse refers to the music of the preceding hook, treating the music(ians) of the hooks as competitors with the music(ians) of the verses. Like the Coliseum of Rome, this song entertains us by pitting its gladiators, the two different sections of the song, against one another for our entertainment, ardor, and evolutionary lust for the warm slickness of blood.

The first funk musician.


And so, after the hook of the song lets loose a volley of attacks that raise the crowd to an almost incontainable frenzy of death-lust ("
Make my funk the P. Funk/I want my funk uncut/Make my funk the P. Funk"), the verse can only hope to recover by taking careful and deliberate aim at its crafty foe. 

This is why the third verse is nothing other than a passive-aggressive dig at the music(ians) of the preceding hook. It's an insult meant to imply that their groove is musically inferior. 


Now check this: The verses of this song are sung by two vocalists, and have a groove with a bass and kick drum emphasis on the "1" of the phrase, but not the "3." 
These Verse Vocalists are our Juba and Hagen, the heroes who we are rooting for in the ring of musical competition. 
The hooks, sung by a vast chorus of vocalists like the lions and tigers and beasts of Caesar's torturesome crowd-pleasing bouts, all have bass and kick drum emphases on both the "1" and the "3." 


Remember Juba and Hagen?


"Sounds like it got a three on it though," comes at the beginning of the third verse, from a Verse Vocalist who wants to amp himself into a Maximus by dissing the music and musicians of the preceding hook as being musically inferior to HIS groove - the groove of the verse. 

Now where to land his David's blow against the Goliath of his foe, the hook? What can he critically compare in order to show that his groove is superior? As seen above, the fundamental and obvious difference between the two grooves is that one has emphases on the "1" and "3," and the other has an emphasis only on the "1" or the downbeat.

Thus, our champion vocalist criticizes by saying 

"Well, alright. Hey I was diggin' on y'all's funk for awhile
Sounds like it got a three on it though, to me." 

Oh ho ho, you Napoleon! You Alexander! You incomparable conqueror of the musical theater of war! Was ever there a slier, more cunning way of saying that, during the preceding hook, he was listening and thinking that he didn't care for the emphasis on the "3"?!

This five point palm exploding heart technique of a lyric, naturally, devastates the hook musicians, and the rest of the song is literally just audio of them all moaning from the evisceration of their musical confidence, as well as their literal viscera.



But I'm sure you knew that already...

Comments

  1. Love your style, Stof! You should write more often! I'm a fan.

    Great work!

    ReplyDelete

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