3 Classic Funk Songs From 1967 That Are Guaranteed To Make You Get Up and Dance

The thought of dancing to a funk song isn’t a radical idea. However, not all funk is the same. There are some tunes so funky they’ll even inspire the stiffest wallflowers to move. Head to the dance floor, and shake it like a Polaroid picture. So whether you feel like it or not, these three classic funk songs from 1967 are guaranteed to make you get up and dance. And if these deep grooves give you the stinky face, then you may understand why they call it funk.

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“Funky Broadway” by Wilson Pickett

Dyke & The Blazers recorded “Funky Broadway” in 1966. Then, months later, Wilson Pickett released his version, recorded at FAME Studios in Muscle Shoals, Alabama. The track features an example of soul music’s transformation from melody-driven tunes to more insistent grooves. The repetitive arrangement echoes the song’s description of cities with the same street names, club names, and similar types of crowds. “Name of the street, now, huh. Funky, funky Broadway.” Speaking of similarities, if you’re like me, then you’re dancing to this groovy jam.

“Cold Sweat” by James Brown

In “Cold Sweat”, there’s a woman who has cast such a spell over James Brown that he can’t avoid the sweats when she’s around. Perhaps as spellbinding as this hypnotic classic. Though groove is crucial to funk, the horn section is the star of this tune. Inspired by “So What” from Miles Davis’s masterpiece Kind Of Blue, Brown’s arranger, Pee Wee Ellis, transforms Davis’s slow motif into a hard-hitting riff. It propels the song as much as Brown’s desperate and sweat-soaked wails.

“Memphis Soul Stew” by King Curtis

Say you want to learn how to make funk, but you don’t know where to begin. “Memphis Soul Stew” opens with King Curtis revealing his exact recipe for Memphis soul. And if you are at all familiar with Memphis soul, then you know how deeply funky it is. Curtis was also a prolific session musician. And he was busy in 1967. He recorded the iconic tenor saxophone solo on Aretha Franklin’s definitive cover of Otis Redding’s “Respect”. One of many classic recordings to feature Curtis. But returning to “Memphis Soul Stew”, the track reaches its peak funk when Curtis calls for half a pint of horn before he blows two bars of swinging sax.

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