April 16, 2025
Stanley Nelson and Nicole London explain the soundtrack of freedom.
We Want The Funk!, a documentary exploring the Funk genre that defined the 1970s, is now airing on PBS. Set against the backdrop of the post-civil rights Black community, director Stanley Nelson and producer Nicole London remind the world what freedom looks and sounds like.
Funk is just one branch of the massive tree that is Black American music. Contrary to the polished, camera-ready acts that displayed Black refinement and excellence during the civil rights era’s push for acceptance, funk traveled a different path. It knew there had to be a balance. While Motown’s Temptations and Supremes embodied poise and classic glamour on national TV, funk was brewing in the shadows — raw, gritty, and completely unfiltered. It didn’t ask for permission. It showed up loud, proud, and weird in the best way.
Funk was a genre of sonic color, a genre that crossed oceans, a genre rooted in radical joy and inclusivity. We Want The Funk! makes clear that Black art is not just expression — it’s liberation. Recently, Nelson and London spoke with BLACK ENTERPRISE about the documentary and its inspiration.
BE: The film opens by giving a nod to the polished presentation of Motown. What guided your choice in using that particular musical backdrop as a starting point?
Stanley Nelson: We actually started with American Bandstand. We wanted to show that something existed before funk. Motown is wonderful, but it took a bit of the edge off. I think it’s such a great contrast when we cut to James Brown — you see him sweating, doing splits, just going for it.
Let’s talk about the links between gospel and Funk. What parallels were you drawing between the sacred and the sonic evolution of funk?
Nelson: We recognized that there was this transcendent feeling — a collective being taken higher.
Nicole London: It’s very close to a church experience, and we wanted to make that connection.
Afrofuturism has exploded into the mainstream — for example, Children of Blood and Bone. But funk laid that groundwork, visually and sonically, long before. What inspired you to lean into that legacy in the film?
Nelson: A lot of times, people don’t put it all together. It’s a cool moment in the film when someone says, “What if we, as Black people, were just from somewhere else?” Where we don’t talk about the hundreds of years of enslavement and misery. We are from a new cloth.
London: Nona Hendryx talks about how Black people, in order to survive, had to envision a future in the present. We’ve always had to imagine what our next step would be beyond the confines of the existence we’re living in.
Funk broke borders, making its way to England with David Bowie, Talking Heads and Elton John. Then, it gave rise to something entirely new through Fela Kuti. How did you begin to gather all of the extended roots of funk?
London: We always knew we wanted to talk about the Talking Heads. Bennie and the Jets fell into our laps when we spoke to Donnie Simpson, and then Kirk Franklin mentioned it. We could have made the obvious choices, but the serendipity of it was irresistible. Carlos Alomar worked with Bowie and helped flesh out the bridge we wanted to connect. Then we found out he also worked with James Brown and Bowie. That wouldn’t have come up through research.
Nelson: It was really important to show that Fela heard James Brown, fell in love with funk, then went back to Africa and started from the beginning. The roots of funk are in Africa.
You featured Labelle and female members of Parliament-Funkadelic in the documentary. Do you think women’s contributions to funk have been overlooked or underplayed?
London: That could be a whole film by itself. We tried to highlight great examples that show the power and strength of women in funk.
What do you think people take from the film that can apply to today’s social and political landscape?
Nelson: At its core, it’s about freedom — it’s about transcendence. I think that’s what we need today and are going to continue to need. It’s about knowing who we are and not caring what anybody expects of us.
London: Ricky Vincent says it in the film — we’re on this other plane, in this other space. We can take our own joy and keep it for ourselves.
Funk’s story is inseparable from the decline of arts education in public schools. Do you see that loss as a direct hit to the legacy and future of Black artistic expression?
Nelson: One thing Black people are great at is losing something and gaining something out of that loss. We lost something. But we gained something, too — with DJs, scratching, and hip-hop, which is now the prominent form of music today.
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