The tragic story of the final song Sly and the Family Stone performed live
The legacy of Sly and the Family Stone is incredibly difficult to quantify. On one hand, they were among the biggest funk bands in the world. On the other, over time, they progressively fizzled out to virtually nothing.
Those later years of the band created a whole host of untenable positions. Relationships in the family were deteriorating, chart positions were squandering, and Sly Stone himself was descending more and more into the tight grip of drug use. It meant that what once started out as a band of hope, diversity, and solidarity were nothing more than a shadow of their former selves.
However, with that being said, it’s hard to call the break-up of the band in itself the ‘later years’, given that this happened in the mid-1970s and Stone didn’t reach the end of his life for another half a century yet. Surely somewhere, in all that vast swathe of time, there would be even a small shot at redemption?
As it turns out, this was sadly not to be. Throughout most of that period, Stone’s behaviour was erratic, his public appearances fleeting, and his performances even more so. A string of planned comeback gigs at Radio City Music Hall in New York were disastrous, with the frontman mostly turning up late and the venue far from full.
This was a pattern that seemed to repeat time and time again over the years, right the way until 2010, when the band appeared at Coachella for what could be considered to be their final ever full performance. But Stone only lasted the course of five songs, and during their rendition of ‘Dance to the Music’, he jumped off stage and officially left the building.
How was the Coachella show for Sly and the Family Stone?
Stone dipping from live shows was hardly a new occurrence, but that coveted spot at Coachella some 16 years ago now seemed to signal some level of finality as far as the original scores of Sly and the Family Stone went. There had initially been excitement in the air at the prospect of a reunion, but when Stone started lambasting the band’s former manager between songs, the waters were instantly muddied.
That was besides the fact that he was also barely present on the stage, apart from anything. His vocals were lacklustre, and after only five songs, including the big hits ‘Family Affair’ and ‘Hot Fun in the Summertime’, the frontman decided he was done. After playing a few new cuts from his laptop that he was working on, he left the rest of the band to continue on without him.
While they were largely unsurprised by Stone’s erratic antics, the moment somewhat signalled the end for the band as they were. Sure, there was the occasional sporadic performance afterwards, but with not all of the members present, they could hardly be counted as full displays of their former glory.
When Stone passed away in June last year, he was honoured as an icon of the funk genre and a musical hero that could never be imitated. That was quite right, but on the other side of these tributes, there remained the unspoken truth that the frontman’s career could have been worth so much more, with his final years simply mired in tragedy.
