[Your waist will automatically start doing 80s steps! Celebrate and dance like crazy for the legendary "megaton voice" Ali Ollie Woodson, who saved The Temptations from their dark ages!] Hey hey hey, all 30 million funk addicts across the country! How's it going, are you still eating plain white rice fueled by basslines? It's your funky & groovy man, Funky Dave Monroe—the kind of guy who hears even the keystrokes on his keyboard clicking away like a 16-beat snare! Out of nowhere, a question. Have you ever experienced a moment where "the vocals were so thick and massive, the elastic in your sweatpants snapped the instant you heard them?" Let me confess the honest truth. Yesterday, while crammed on a rush-hour train, I took a blast of Ali Ollie Woodson's vocals straight through my earphones, and before I knew it, I was nearly breaking out into a full snake dance while clinging to a strap. The cold stares from the salaryman next to me? Non-stop—no way, brushing off stuff like that with delay effects is the true funk way. …

[Did a Sweet Disco Classic Transform into Muddy-Water Blues? The Night Cheap Whiskey Flows Because of Eddie 9V's New Single "Rock Your Baby"] The angular ice in a glass of cheap bourbon clinks in the dead of night. With a sidelong glance of worry for the antacids in the drawer, I was searching for a record to drop the needle on when some incredible news flew into my ears. Atlanta’s own young soul guitar slinger, Eddie 9V, had just dropped a new single covering George McCrae’s massive 1974 hit, "Rock Your Baby." I nearly dropped my glass, and in a frantic attempt to catch it with my knee, I thoroughly walloped my thigh. There is nothing quite as tragic as a man in his fifties writhing in agony alone in the middle of the night, but this was a shock fierce enough to blow even that pain away. …

【The Man Who Created the Dawn of Explosive Funk! Early The Gap Band Member Ray D. Rowe Departs for Heaven at 90—Sending Love to the Groove That Never Stops】 Hey everybody! It's your groove-addicted party person, Funky Dave Monroe! This morning, as I was soaking in some funk on my usual packed commuter train, I was grinding my hips so hard to the baseline without realizing it that the salaryman next to me gave me a cold, double-take look and said, "Um, you're bumping into me..." But hey, once the 16-beat is lodged in your hips, nobody can stop it! ...Or at least, that's the usual high-energy pitch I'd love to drop, but some news has flown in from Tulsa, Oklahoma, that'll tighten the chest of every funk head out there. …

【When a Disco Monument is Drenched in Mud, the Finest Southern Soul is Born—Eddie 9V Unleashes a Roar Full of Duane Allman’s Spirit on "Rock Your Baby"】 In the silence of the deep night, an ice cube clinks against cheap whiskey. Pulling something out from the back of the record shelf at this hour—should it be a dusty disco single, or something soaked in the smell of mud, Southern Soul? Tonight, we’ve received news so exhilarating it feels like taking both of those things, skipping the compromise, and drinking them straight down with a shot of bourbon. Atlanta-born blues prodigy Eddie 9V. This man has dropped an absolute bomb. He has taken "Rock Your Baby"—the sweet, melting disco anthem by George McCrae that topped the US and UK charts in 1974—and completely dismantled and rebuilt it into a gritty slab of Southern Soul and blues. …

[Your right hand naturally laying down a 16-beat! Nile Rodgers teams up with Venezuelan pop duo LAGOS for an explosive late-night groove drop!] How’s it going, funk addicts, disco maniacs, and all you beloved party people out there across the country who catch the whites of their eyes and start stepping the moment a four-on-the-floor beat drops, brothers and sisters?! It’s your writer, Funky Dave Monroe! The moment I laid eyes on the news this morning, my right wrist started aggressively moving up and down. Yep, it began carving through the air in search of the essence of rhythm guitar, like it had just met its long-lost twin. That’s right—none other than the head honcho of Chic, the living legend who has sprinkled his funk magic on countless historical masterpiece albums, **Nile Rodgers**, has deeply teamed up with the Venezuelan pop duo **LAGOS**! That’s it from the field… nah, the real show starts right here! Get comfortable (well, ideally stand up and start stepping while you listen)! …

[Warren Haynes Invades with the Blues Against a 64-Piece Orchestra!? The Master of Soulful Sorrow Talks a New Frontier of "Improvisation and Roaring Sound"] At a perch in the deep of night, the ice in a cheap glass of whiskey makes a clinking sound. Gazing intently into the glass, a man thinks: "Life doesn't always go the way you want, but as long as you've got the pentatonic scale, you'll somehow get by." But what if a "64-piece full orchestra" was waiting right behind him? The moment you bungle a single-note string bend, 64 pairs of chilly glares would pierce your back... Just imagining it made the writer break out in a cold sweat on the commuter train and want to get off at the next stop. Yet, there is a man who pulls off such a terrifying blunder—no, such a sublime challenge—with a smile. None other than Warren Haynes, the undisputed titan of Southern rock and blues rock. …

【Hips Swinging on Their Own! Celebrating the Birthday of Motown's Hidden Mastermind Paul Riser, Sr.! A Funk-Addicted Writer Ascends to Heaven Due to Exquisite Arrangements】 Hey everybody! Are you surrendering your bodies to the funk beats tonight too? It's your funk-addicted party person, Funky Dave Monroe! I'll make a confession right off the bat: this morning in the middle of a packed rush-hour train, I was hit by the groove of the strings pouring out of my earphones and almost started busting out irregular steps to the swaying of the train. The salaryman next to me gave me a cold stare, but this is no time to care about that! Because today is the ultimate day to celebrate the birthday of Paul Riser, Sr., the legendary arranger who supported that very Motown Sound! ### Behind Every Great Track Is This Man! The Super Brain of the Funk Brothers …

[The "Too Rock for the Blues, Too Blues for the Rock" Problem—Eric Johanson Unleashes His Angry and Soulful New Album The Open Bayou] Sipping a glass of cheap whiskey in my study late at night, I sometimes find myself wondering. Why on earth are people in this world so obsessed with neatly labeling everything? "You're a bluesman," "You're a rocker," "You're just a middle-aged guy who drinks too much." That last one is a personal tragedy declared upon me just last week by the landlady of my neighborhood izakaya, but there is a man facing a similar—no, far more serious—identity crisis. That man is Eric Johanson, who channels the gritty spirit of Louisiana into his guitar. When I came across the lament he recently vented on social media, I couldn't help but slap my knee in agreement. He revealed that promoters and music industry folks have been hitting him with the exact same line for years. …

【My hips are swinging on their own and I can't get any work done! Bathe your soul in the groove at the birthday celebration of immortal soul titan Otis Redding!】 Hey everyone, how's it going? Still diving deep into a sea of beats tonight? It's Funky Dave Monroe, your resident funk and soul groove addict! Out of nowhere, I have a confession to make. Right now, as I type on my keyboard, I'm grinding my hips intensely. The cafe staff are giving me extremely suspicious looks like, "Isn't the amplitude of that guy's fidgeting a bit abnormal?", but I can't stop. There's no way I'm stopping! That's because September 9th is the birthday of the legendary soul singer the earth is proud of—**Otis Redding**, otherwise known as "Big O"!…

[Roaring Amps and Weeping Pickings! The Night Eric Steckel's New Album 'Sandstorm' Knocked a Middle-Aged Guitarist Off His Feet] Late at night, sipping cheap bourbon, I sometimes wonder: when did the volume of the world's guitars become so "well-behaved"? Digital amps connected to headphone jacks out of fear of disturbing the neighbors. Clever simulators lined up on pedalboards. Of course they're convenient. I don't have the hobby of blasting a Marshall full stack at midnight and having the landlord call the cops on me (though if it's about the time I had to write an apology letter once, that's a different story). But we creatures addicted to the blues will have our joints dry out and squeak unless we occasionally bathe in the raw, stomach-punching roar of a real amp. There is a man who unleashed a fierce sandstorm upon just such a parched, desert-like heart. He is the American blues-rock guitarist, Eric Steckel. Released via SPV Recordings, his new album 'Sandstorm' is simply irresistible. …