Not really a discussion topic so much as a hasty, desperate way to share some urgent news.
If you don't know Clyde Stubblefield then you don't know James Brown. Clyde is the original Funky Drummer who may be the most sampled artist in music. Hired from his Chattanooga stage band on site by Otis Redding, Clyde followed Redding to Georgia where Brown saw him play and also hired him on the spot. In the following years Clyde drummed on James Brown's most acclaimed hits and sought refuge from his unstable band leader by escaping to Madison, Wisconsin in the 70's. He had played here with Brown and, by his telling, completely on the fly after a gig in New York, flew to Madison to start a life where the Godfather of Soul could never find him. He had played here once and told himself, "I could live in this town." He's been happy here to this day, with family, still drumming in countless local bands but in poor health recently. For an idea of Clyde's mark on modern rock percussion, one only needs to look at the circle of drum sticks, each signed, that is framed outside the percussion exhibit at the Cleveland Rock and Roll Museum. Clyde's stick is at midnight. He's in the hospital tonight with kidney failure. Send him your most positive vibrations tonight and tomorrow. An American original, an American treasure. In an unavoidable postscript to a story that has not ended (and never will so long as Clyde's recordings survive) Otis Redding died in a plane crash into the freezing waters of Lake Monona in Madison in 1967.