Notes from Gen on George Clinton/Maggot Brain connection and Funkadelic's Process connection

From Genesis..
Timothy Wyllie's name for some time during his MANY years in The Process was "Father Jesse". They'd move around various chapter houses. Timothy did most of the layout of The Process magazine ( all by hand and typeset,letterpress, NO computers then). George used to hang out in the coffee bar and got into a lot of the ideas. It was a radical system of persona(ity) change that was not racial in any way. George is a VERY smart guy. So he got involved intellectually and asked for permission to use some De Grimston text on the album back cover. It suited both parties. Process got to huge new, more black, market and George got some radically hip writing. It was the era of Black Panthers, Weatherpeople and so on. Cross fertilising of antiestablishment concepts and collectives.




Psychic TV were playing in Tokyo ( late 1991) under sponsorship of PANASONIC at PAN HALL. We heard Funkadelic were playing nearby nite before our gig so went along. PFunk played 4 plus hours and were great, including Maggot Brain. We were in the dressing room waiting for George to be introduced and we(me) wrote "FATHER JESSE & FATHER MALACHI say hello" with a Process symbol next to it on his dressing room door. In the end we had to go to a meeting before George came off stage. He came to OUR gig next nite though as a result of my cryptic message. He saw us after we came off stage and first words he said were " You are the ONLY band I've ever seen that plays non-stop on stage as long and longer than ME!" (we'd playe 6plus hours!!! So we became friends and stayed in touch. Then the "OF COURSE FACTOR", one of our key TOPY people in Denver became a roadie for George Clinton to me and Lady Jaye would be in the VIP list every concert they played in Bay Area until we moved to New York. Lost track after that with first and stuff....Djin loved George. How he bascally just wanders about the stage looking fabulous and conducting the musicians...yet his charisma holds the audience spell bound everytime.

Excerpt from Process Mag issue #5 "On fear" which appeared as liner notes to Funkadelic's "MAGGOT BRAIN."

Fear is at the root of man's destruction of himself. Without fear there is no blame. Without blame there is no conflict. Without conflict there is no destruction. But there IS fear: deep within the core of every human being it lurks like a monster, dark and intangible. It's outward effects are unmistakeable. It's source is hidden.

It can be seen on one level in furtive embarrasment, argumentative protest, social veneer and miserable isolation. It can be seen on another level in the mammoth build-up of war machines in every corner of the world. It can be seen in the fantasy world of escapism known as entertainment. It can be seen in the riot-torn streets and campuses. It can be be seen in the squalor of ghettos and the prestigous elegance of "civilized" society. It can be seen in the desperate rat race of commerce and industry, the sensational slanderings of the press, the constant back-biting of the political arena, and the lost world of the helpless junkie who has passed beyond the point of no return.

The tight-lipped supression of the rigid moralist reflects it, as does the violent protest of the anarchist. But more starkly and tragically than anywhere else, it manifests in the pale grey shadow of the ordinary person, whose fear clamps down on all his instincts and traps him in the narrow confines of the socially accepted norm. Afraid ethier to step down into the darkness of his lower self or to rise up into the light of his higher self, he hangs suspended in between, stultified into an Alien pattern of nothingness.

But to a greater or lesser degree,and manifesting one way or another, all human beings are afraid. And some of us are so afraid that we dare not show our fear. Sometimes we dare not even know our Fear. For Fear itsef is a terrifying concept to behold.