Sly Turns Over A New Leaf

I read a fantastic article today by the music journalist Alexis Petridis. It's about the legendary musician Sly Stone (so of course today's image was inspired by that) and how when he interviewed him a decade ago it didn't go well but now aged 80 the singer is happier to look back on a wild and pioneering career.
The original interview back in 2013 was one of the weirdest experiences of Petridis's journalistic career with negotiations to bring Stone to the phone taking weeks, calling repeatedly at the appointed time only to be met by an answering machine: "You called. Or did you? We'll call back" it said, with no option to leave a message. Eventually, Stone picked up the phone and told him to f*ck off - he wouldn't do an interview unless he was paid in advance. The following day he spoke for 20 rambling minutes about about forming a band made of musicians with albinism, before excusing himself to go to the toilet and then getting his archivist to call back asking if Petridis knew the royal family, as he had a plan to earn money teaching their children.
On this occasion now aged 80 and in very poor health, after decades of drug abuse from which he finally got clean in 2019, the experience of interviewing him couldn't be more different. He is now too ill to talk in person and the interview is conducted via e-mail but no one asks for cash and his thoughtful answers arrive in Petridis's inbox with 24 hours.
He has completed an autobiography named after one of his biggest hits, Thank You (Falettinme Be Mice Elf Again) something Petridis would once have told you was no more likely than Sly Stone being appointed US secretary of the treasury.
He says he can no longer make music now but he can still hear it in his mind and that he'd always wanted to tell his story, partly because not everyone knew his side of the story on the some things but that the time wasn't right and that was only when he got clean in 2019 that he felt he could let the process start.
And it is such a remarkable story. He formed the Family Stone in 1966, but initially, it looked like the ideas he had were too advanced: a racially integrated band playing music that existed somewhere on the cusp of soul and the burgeoning psychedelic rock movement. They encountered prejudice on tour and their debut album, A Whole New Thing, flopped. He knew the music worked but didn't know if some people would get it. He poured everything into the songs and knew music people liked it, but not everyone was a music person. The song Dance to the Music came out as a simpler version, and he says more people seemed to understand it.
It was the first of a string of incredible singles - Everyday People, Stand!, Hot Fun in the Summertime, I Want to Take you Higher and Family Affair that turned Sly Stone into one of the most influential figures in soul music.
His influence would ultimately cause the Temptations to transform themselves from the authors of My Girl into the makers of Cloud Nine, Psychedelic Shack and Ball of Confusion and clear the path for Parliament - Funkadelic; whose uncompromising way of handling things paved the way for other Black artists, including Stevie Wonder, to take control of their own careers. Now, he says he was "never annoyed" when he saw other artists changing their sound to something more like his own. "I was always happy if someone took the things I was doing and they liked them enough to want to do them on their own. I'm proud that the music I made inspired people." And what utterly glorious music it is!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3JvkaUvB-ec