Have you seen these awesome photos of P-Funk live in 1974? They’re from August 7, 1974 at a place called Place des Nations in Montreal, Canada. P-Funk were the opening act for the band Mahogany Rush.
I first saw them on @Dan.Wooridge fb page (but I think Yves Monast posted them originally).
Here’s the part about pfunk in the review (google translated):
Definitely, anything was to be expected during this evening, which featured the popular band Funkadelic as the opening act. This Detroit band is already internationally known thanks to a few albums and a few hit singles. The other night, there were nine of them on stage: five musicians and four vocalists. Dressed in the most eccentric costumes, the band, led by guitarist Maggot Brain, performed a solid half-hour of funky and somewhat cosmic music. However, their style didn’t add anything exceptional, and very few people in the crowd asked for an encore.
“Very few people in the crowd asked for an encore”. Ouch!
Here’s also the ticket from that night and another review (from the newspaper The Gazette).
Only 15 minutes, but still! The only other show from 1974 that’s out there that I can think of is the Sugar Shack one. You think nothing new will surface, but then all of a sudden..
So it’s a audience recording and was recorded by Tyler Harter. He wanted to save tape for the main act (Mahogany Rush), so he recorded the beginning of the show, paused it, and then recorded Maggot Brain.
Here’s the recording. Got OK to share it.
It starts out with some crowd noise and the band testing their instruments. Bernie talks to the audience and then after a while they start playing Standing On The Verge. The recording stops after around 2 minutes into Standing On The Verge. And then when recording starts back up again with Maggot Brain. After Maggot Brain you can also hear 2 seconds Red Hot Momma before the recording ends.
00:47 Bernie talks to the audience 03:41 Standing On The Verge Of Getting It On
[break in the recording] 05:33 Maggot Brain 15:14 Red Hot Momma (only 2 seconds)
Tyler Harter is also the one that had the ticket stub above. He said that during Maggot Brain the guitar player fell and that they never saw him again for the rest of the show. Tried, but wasn’t able to hear that on the recording though..
The 1972-1974 period of Parliament-Funkadelic (after the OGs left, but before the Mothership) is probably the least documented era. And to me, it’s the most compelling because many of the mainstays who contributed to P-Funk’s commercial peak started around this era (e.g., Bootsy, Garry, Boogie, Ty, Michael, Deb, etc.).
The version of “Maggot Brain” captured on this show sounds like Michael Hampton. It’s the same Gibson L6-S guitar tone from the Sugar Shack show (he repeats a few of the same improvised melody lines as well) and fits the late-summer 1974 timeline of when he joined the band.
Nice I had seen the pix but not the write up nor recording. Dang the guitar player fell out, WTF? Check how the Canadian press basically just blew them off. LOVE this stuff.
Tried, but wasn’t able to hear that on the recording though..
