(Source: Far Out / Spotify)
Sly Stone remains one of the most elusive people in music. He is a man surrounded by so many mysteries that many people assume he died rather than keep a low profile. His hits also include many experiments, addictions, and arguments with band members. Despite the books and countless interviews with people close to him, his story is elusive. Understanding his psyche and mindset throughout his career is nearly impossible.
Questlove is experiencing this situation as he is putting together a Sly Stone documentary and is having trouble getting everything finished. The problem is that he wants to rise above the celebrities that surround him and show the more human sides of himself.
“Sly’s story is everyone’s story,” he said. “He is the first black star of the post-civil rights era. His success was different from that of Chuck Berry or Ray Charles, the artists who couldn’t stay in the hotels or eat in the restaurants where they performed. The question is: What happens when you get everything you want?”
He goes on to explain why his story is so hard to grasp: “It’s a difficult story. I want to get rid of the troubled drug-addicted genius. We never ask ourselves, ‘Why do we calm ourselves down with cocaine? Why is this person addicted to sex? Why does this person get drunk so often?’ There’s a lot of explaining to do, especially for black artists.”
We don’t know why Sly Stone acted the way he did; we only know the consequences of his actions. In 1970, Sly took a lot of drugs and was not himself for much of the year, to the point that he stopped going to shows, became unpredictable, and drove a wedge between himself and the band.
Thanks to this statement, he made one of the band’s most polarizing records of all time. In response to Marvin Gaye’s What’s up?, Sly Stone wrote There is an uprisinga much darker and deeper sounding record. Sly did most of the album himself, and while many people didn’t like it because it was far from what they expected from the band, others considered it a masterpiece.
Cynthia Robinson, one of the band’s founding members, said she liked the album. “A lot of people think Uprising a dark album,” she said, “but it wasn’t. It just reflected what was going on at the time. Sly always tried to write something positive.”
While there are many questions about the album and its placement in The Family Stone’s catalog, one of the most confusing songs on the record is the title track. The song “There’s a Riot Goin’ On” is listed on the record’s track listing, but does not exist as a piece of music. There is a second of silence that defines the song before the next one plays.
When Sly Stone was asked about the song, he was blunt. He justified the silence as a call for peace and concluded, “I did it because I felt there shouldn’t be any unrest.”
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