Showing posts with label Rock Out. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Rock Out. Show all posts

Friday, April 14, 2017

Art Ensemble of Chicago's Barnyard Funk


For some bizarre reason, I missed Art Ensemble of Chicago's funky "Rock Out" during my obsessive jazz-funk phase a year or two ago. Like some of the group's blues, "Rock Out" brings a "farmyard" quality of the band doing their best to sound like roosters and other farm animals. While doing this, they pay tribute to an incredibly catchy beat from a James Brown song ("Cold Sweat," according to Paul Steinbeck). As someone who always finds funk music from avant-garde jazz artists to be the most interesting in the genre, this unique number is certainly memorable and indicates how the group always had an ear to R&B and popular music. No surprise, really. How could anyone be married to Fontella Bass and not know a thing or two about popular music?