
Funkadelic: An Interview with George Clinton, Bootsy Collins and Bernie Worrell
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The time is 11:00 a.m. in Lebanon, New Jersey, across the Hudson River from New York City. George Clinton and the P-Funk All-Stars have flown in from Paris, France to play Woodstock ’99 in Rome, New York.
“It’s between Utica and Syracuse, about five or six hours from here, not counting traffic,” says Bernie Worrell. “Bootsy (Collins) has already left Cincinnati. Dawn Silva‘s flying in from San Francisco and I’m trying to get in touch with my guitar player to pick her up. The hotels are so far away from the festival, and it’s going to take about seven or eight hours getting there, depending. After this interview, I’ve got to hang up and talk to George.”
Despite all this hubbub, Worrell is calm, laughing in his easy way about the situation. “Festivals are always crazy,” he chuckles, “We have no information about the stage, our set-up time, or anything. It’s NUTZOID!”
“There’s no official time slot for my band, The Woo-Warriors. George has about two hours, so we’ve got to figure out what we’re going to play on,” Worrell continues, “Besides Dawn Silva (One of the original Brides of Funkenstein), we’re bringing Steve Scales who played with me in Talking Heads. We had an idea to play with the All Stars on ‘Dope Dog,’ then go into ‘Time Was’ from ‘Blacktronic Science,’ I don’t know — I’ve just got to talk to George.”
The name George Clinton looms large. His birthday is the next day, and there’s a special bash in the “Rave Hanger.” The Woodstock concert is on pay-per-view, but Worrell isn’t even worried about that. “Bootsy and I will be at the Rave too,” he says, with just a tinge of ‘what’s next?’ in his voice.
The last time Worrell and Collins were onstage with Clinton was at Central Park in 1996, in the wake of their induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Previously there had been a decade-wide gap. From the late ’60s through the ‘70s, concert stages around the world were visited by Parliament-Funkadelic or “P-Funk,” in their Mothership.
The captain was Clinton, emerging from the smoke and lights as “Dr. Funkenstein.” Bass virtuoso William “Bootsy” Collins was the most charismatic officer on the bridge, with his star-shaped shades. Worrell was the Vulcan on the Mothership, behind an elaborate console of keyboards and synthesizers. This creative trio wrote most of the songs — fueling popular demand for this incredibly expensive show, which competed with KISS, David Bowie, and the many-headed hydra called disco.
Funk continues to galvanize modern music. The original Blasters of the Universe recorded new material for Mammoth Records last spring, and took time out to interview.
“Yeah, we all three — George, Bernie and myself — were all feeling it,” Collins says about the recording sessions. “Let’s face it, this is what we all want to do. As always, I feel a great honor to work with my partner in ‘grime,’ George Clinton.”
“Bernie Worrell — that boy’s got more music and more sound than all the instruments in the world,” says Clinton, for the record.
“I just do my part!” laughs Worrell from back home in New Jersey. “I do whatever the song needs. I’m an architect, an arranger. I go along with each tune.” Worrell laughs easily, he’s an in-demand session player who leads his own group, Bernie Worrell and the WOO-Warriors, with veterans from Clinton’s P-Funk All-Stars, and Bootsy’s Rubber Band. He’s relaxed and friendly — the kind of guy you might meet in a New Jersey barbershop.
“I knew Bernie from my barbershop in Plainfield, New Jersey, around ’60, ’61,” says Clinton. “He used to hide in there from his mother!”
Clinton’s shop specialized in “processing” hair for the local African-American men, who straightened, colored and “pumped up” their locks in the waning days of the ’50s. Places like Clinton’s were also training grounds for “doo wop” singing groups, who specialized in sharp outfits and choreography and replicated bass and horn sounds with their vocal cords.
“We used to call him [Bernie Worrell] ‘Baby Elephant,’ cause he was always real smooth-headed,” Clinton laughs wickedly. “He never had enough hair to pump up. Cora (Worrell’s mother) wasn’t down with that, either.”
“She didn’t want me hanging around with those ‘hoodlums,’ as she called them,” says Worrell. “When I got my hair conked, she switched me right there in the shop and she switched George, too!” Worrell played classical music from the age of four. He took private lessons at Juilliard, and went to the New England Conservatory of Music in Boston.
“Bernie used to play organ for us at our ‘doo wop’ talent shows,” Clinton says. “Man, he’d make us sound like professionals! When he came back from college, we were doin’ rock and roll. He took the funk, and added King Crimson and Emerson, Lake and Palmer. People didn’t know WHAT they were hearing.”
“Me and George Clinton and all of us used to move around,” Worrell reminisces about early Funkadelic, “We lived in Detroit, Toronto and we met Gary and Boogie (true All-Stars, also from Plainfield) up there. That’s before we knew Bootsy.” Clinton tells the story: “Bootsy was funkin’ down in Cincinnati. He’d just left James (Brown). I first saw Bootsy, I said ‘Wow! I didn’t know we had an extra man in the band’ He already looked like one of the Parliament-Funkadelic. When we went to see him play in Cincinnati, when we were playing there one time, we thought WE were on stage!”
“I could tell just from hearing him — I knew it would match — I was watching, listening and putting in my parts,” says Worrell, “He came up to Detroit to record a few months later. ‘Philmore’ was the first song we did with them (on Funkadelic’s America Eats Its Young). Bootsy’s brother, Catfish Collins was in the band too.”
“Yeah!” says Collins, when asked if he knew that Clinton and the Funkadelics were watching that night. “It kinda came out about that and those were the days,” Collins continues: “George inspired us to go as far as we could and [gave us] the best days of our lives.”
When asked what it’s like to work with Clinton now, Worrell has a ready answer: “Same as it ever was and same as it ever was!” He deftly changes the subject. “All the Talking Heads were P-Funk fans and when George just put his hand on Tina‘s stomach, her baby was born the next day.”
“When it’s time to work, it’s really happy hour,” says Clinton about Collins and Worrell. “They show up on most every project, [in] one way or another. It just takes a bit of negotiation — lawyers, well lawyers — they’re the ones that are getting paid by the hour. Bootsy got right on it! It’s not as hard as it seems to get it together, despite the stories you hear.”
“George Clinton has brought together talent, entities, people and situations, and put them all … together,” says Worrell, back on track. “He’s so talented at formulating a concept, and his lyric writing is wonderful. He has vocal ability, too. He’s one of the best second tenors that ever was.
You know how the doo-wop groups in the ‘50s always had a second tenor plus a lead singer? George is a great front man!”
“My best shows are going to be with the WOO-Warriors this summer,” says Worrell, “Catherine Russell, our original lead singer, is with us, and we’ve got one of my proteges, Joseph “Amp” Fiddler (ex P-Funk All Star) on keyboards with me.”
“We’ve got about sixteen songs,” Worrell says about the Mammoth collaboration. “I’ve cowritten three songs, Bootsy’s brought four songs; two of them with Catfish Collins. George is co-producer, too. There’s always an interchange of ideas.”
“We can get out of the city,” says Clinton about the studio in Germantown, on the Hudson River. “Be away from crowds, tum down the lights and have it quiet. We don’t have to have all our different people around.”
Worrell makes a joke about Clinton falling asleep, and continues: “In the studio I’ve learned not to be politically correct. The Creator sends me everything that is happening. Whatever happens after it’s done and if it’s ordained to be a hit, so be it. It all comes from the Creator. If it came from the Creator, how can it not be good?”
“Hits can mean a lot of things,” Worrell starts talking seriously. “Like money, or parties, but no matter what, you’ve got to stay up with the business part. I don’t know what the final thing’s going to be. I’m involved with the business, but just with my stuff. They’ve got the business, but I’ve got the WOO-Warriors!” He plans on playing in Woodstock, New York, the real town, a week or so after the festival.
Clinton is also taping on the West Coast. “We’re recording with Henry Rollins, Flea and the Red Hot Chili Peppers and Rage Against the Machine,” he says, dropping names. “We’re going to pick up where we left off and everybody’s going to be in on the new record.”
When asked about his first vocal group — The Original Parliament, which tours on its own — Clinton doesn’t miss a beat, “Everybody! We just gotta wait for those people who get paid by the hour!”
One CD, Last Time Zone, will be released in October. Gina Hall, photographer for this article, was on hand for the final mixes. Another CD is scheduled for early 2000. Before and after Woodstock ’99, the P-Funk All Stars are in Europe, while Collins has his own studio in Ohio.
“I love doing all sorts of recordings and producing, writing music with different people, and playing different styles of music,” says Collins.
“To tell the truth,” Collins continues, “under any condition, if you got George, Bernie and myself — and the rest of the ‘MOB,’ the Mothership will fly anywhere.”
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