"Flash Light" by Parliament

[A Thug Named Slickback]

This 1977 hit was not Parlaiment/Funkadelic's biggest hit, but I think that it has certainly become their signature song. "Flash Light" is a classic record in the history of funk, if you ask me.

This song is all about a groove: There are no real distinct verses or choruses and it doesn't really matter, anyway, because the record really centers on the synthesized bassline and the hot keyboard action. George Clinton and Bootsy Collins worked together on this hit.

Hot 100: #16 R&B: #1(3 weeks)

[620 Soul Train]

Yeah you'd think it was their biggest hit. I know that Salt N Pepa used that sample in their underground rap hit "I'll Take Your Man". Otherwise I really do not care for this song for it's still overplayed.

[mst3k]

Now... I lay me down to sleep...

JAM!!

[irock]

One of the greatest funk hits ever! I've always loved it. George Clinton is a genius. This and Atomic Dog are his greatest masterpieces.

[Deleted]

Such a jam! Love it.

[B-Boy]

I love it.

[Soulsista]

Funktastic!

[Agent Yoncé]

Them at their greatest. Absolutely love the bass in this stone cold classic.

[Live Your Life]

Classic.

[Deleted]

#58 on Pitchfork's 200 Best Songs of the 1970's

Just a few years before Star Wars introduced the Force into popular culture, George Clinton’s Starchild character came to Earth to spread the Funk. After Clinton’s Mothership landed, Starchild’s unfunky nemesis emerged in the form of Sir Nose. On 1977’s Funkentelechy and the Placebo Syndrome, Starchild, already strapped with the Bop Gun, pulls an indefensible weapon from his arsenal: the Flash Light. The ritualistic chant echoes like a funky intervention: “Most of all he need the funk/Help him find the funk.” Sir Nose is transformed, finding the spirit of Funkentelechy, and everyone dances into the night, to a wordless celebratory chant that Clinton remembered from a Bar Mitzvah he attended as a teenager: “Ha da da dee da hada hada da da.”

The band’s first R&B #1 is where Parliament period, peaks, both mythologically and musically. Written by bassist Bootsy Collins and sung by Clinton, the song’s musical core belongs to the band’s keyboard maestro Bernie Worrell, who played every note on the song save guitar and drums. About those notes: Worrell played the bassline on the song through three interconnected mini-Moogs, and those extra-terrestrial note bends, the rising and dropping chromatic lines and that warmly electronic timbre is one of a handful of musical elements in pop history that created a distinct “before” and “after.” Without that bassline, the next 20 years of club music, synth-pop, and gangsta rap would sound incredibly different. It’s quite the equation: the narrative peak of the decade’s pre-eminent black comic series and Worrell’s E=mc2 of electro-funk add up to one of the 1970s’ most joyous devotional to rhythm and dance. –Eric Harvey

[🇯🇲 lucy88 🇯🇲]

I love old school funk music! Music back then was super fun!

[Deleted]

[disman00911]

One of the best 70s funk songs ever.  One of George Clinton's best songs.

[back2blk]

So good.

[mst3k]

May 7, 2006 0:42:35 GMT -5 mst3k said:

Now... I lay me down to sleep...

JAM!!

Sixteen years later, my opinion remains the same.

[Private Dancer]

Love it!