Bootsy Collins birthday - TIMH

Ahh…the name is Bootsy, baby, and he first came to you live from Cincinnati, Ohio today in 1951. His mother named him William Collins but a few years later she decided he looked like a Bootsy and everyone has called him that ever since. Bootsy got lucky; his brother’s name was Catfish (Phelps Collins).

Catfish was eight years older than Bootsy and naturally, as brothers do, all Bootsy wanted to be when he grew up was just like his big brother. Catfish played guitar so Bootsy played guitar. Once Bootsy turned 17 he and Catfish formed a band called the Pacemakers. Bootsy’s big break came just two years later when James Brown’s band quit and The Godfather needed a new backing band.

Bootsy and Catfish joined Brown’s new band, The J.B.’s, in 1970. Brown was looking to modernize his sound and Bootsy was just what the doctor ordered. Despite only being with Brown for 11 months, Bootsy played on two of Brown’s greatest hits, “Get Up (I Feel Like Being a) Sex Machine” and “Super Bad”.

After leaving The J.B.’s, Bootsy played in a band in Cincinnati before moving to Detroit. There he met George Clinton and joined Clinton in his menagerie of bands, most importantly Parliament. He played on almost all of Parliament’s albums through the 1970s. During this same time he formed Bootsy’s Rubber Band which is considered to be part of the same George Clinton universe as Parliament-Funkadelic.

After funk’s heydays in the 70s and early 80s Bootsy has had a lower profile but has remained active. He is a musician, first and foremost, and he latched onto the prevailing musical trends of the times. He dabbled in a bit of New Wave and collaborated with the Talking Heads. He played some techno-funk with Herbie Hancock and messed around with some dance music. He and the Rubber Band became Deee-Lite’s backing band after their hit “Groove is in the Heart” in 1990.

Soon after the Deee-Lite collaboration he joined forces with the extraordinary guitarist Buckethead for some experimental metal. Bootsy also stayed busy playing bluegrass with Del McCoury in the GrooveGrass Boyz. He’s popped up from time to time to collaborate with Snoop Dogg, Chuck D, Bobby Womack, Fat Boy Slim, Bernie Worrell, and anyone else you can think of.

Bootsy may not have invented funk but he is funk. From his style to his manner of speech to his music, Bootsy is funk personified. Bootsy is what you’d get if you mixed Huggy Bear, leaded gasoline and collard greens in a milk jug and left it in the trunk of a 1976 Lincoln Continental for a week.

Parliament – “Give Up the Funk”: