Sly and the Family Stone mix rock, funk, soul, psychedelia

3 May 1969: Number 15 in our series of the 50 key events in the history of rock musicSly and the Family Stone were the most good-time group since the Lovin' Spoonful. What they did with their fourth album, Stand!, wasn't rocket science – Sly Stone took the live excitement of the Stax Soul Revue, grafted on James Brown's completely functional, rhythm-as-a pure-state funk, and mixed in the heightened airs of psychedelia (the Family were from San Francisco, after all). It's just that no one else ...

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