There are many songs named Funky Road. If you search on Internet you’ll find so many, but no one is named Phat Funky Road. Why Phat? Because in this new track I blend Funk ideas with Rock and harder rhythms. Well, not so hard, not exactly my style, but I consider it hard, since I’m a Classical artist.

Phat Funky Road

More Funk, I love Funk, yes… why not? seems the new trend of latest years. In Phat Funky Road You’ll find something reminding you Funk Rock, Funk Metal or similar.

Funk Rock is a fusion of Funk and Rock. Many instruments may be incorporated into the music, but the overall sound is defined by a definitive bass or drum beat and electric guitars. The bass and drum rhythms are influenced by Funk music but with more intensity, while the guitar can be Funk or Rock influenced, usually with distortion.

Funk Metal is a subgenre of Funk Rock that fuses elements of Heavy Metal and Funk. Allmusic has claimed that, “Funk Metal evolved in the mid-’80s when alternative bands like the Red Hot Chili Peppers and Fishbone began playing the hybrid with a stronger Funk underpinning than Metal.”

As I said, not exactly my style, but since I like all kinds of music genres I could not refuse the temptation to try, considering also all the positive emails I’m receiving about my Funk experimentation (like Funk in Nature).

Saying more about Funk music, I would like to write few big names that have been able to blend Funk music with harder rhythms, like Rage Against the Machine, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Living Colour but the list is very long so I suggest you to make a deep search about the topic.

Funk Music is still very popular, after all these years. This song is a great tribute to this genre. While I composed it having in mind Funk Music and its variations, I created a blend with other styles and modern ideas. The cocktail of music notes resulting of this blend is refreshing and sweet, with natural landscapes coming in mind and beautiful sceneries.

Funk in Nature

Funk is an American music genre that originated in the late 1960s when African American musicians blended soul music, soul jazz and R&B into a rhythmic, danceable new form of music. While Funk de-emphasizes melody and harmony and brings a strong rhythmic groove of electric bass and drums to the foreground, if you want to create a unique blend with modern ideas you have to re-introduce melody someway, and the flute melody is a perfect way to do this, considering how this instrument has been considered a great player in the 70s.

Like much African-inspired music, Funk typically consists of a complex groove with rhythm instruments such as electric guitar, electric bass, Hammond organ, and drums playing interlocking rhythms. Funk bands sometimes have a horn section of several saxophones, trumpets, and in some cases, a trombone, which plays rhythmic “hits”.

In my track I used the well known Clavinet sound, one of the typical Funk instruments, used very much to give a strong rhythmic fingerprint to the recordings.

A Clavinet is an electrophonic keyboard instrument manufactured by the Hohner company. It is essentially an electronically amplified clavichord, analogous to an electric guitar. Its distinctive bright staccato sound has appeared particularly in Funk, Disco, Rock, and Reggae songs.

Talking about the “natural” part of the track, New Age, Nature Music, Easy Listening and Relaxation Music, all are good terms to explain how Funk in Nature develops and distinguish itself from the rest of the piece.

There are many images coming into mind while listening to the music, sweet natural landscapes, beautiful sceneries, green valleys, brilliant rivers and blue skies. You can close your eyes and see all of this, relaxing and enjoying the unique blend of melodies and rhythm.

I can add that there is also some “Celtic flavour” in the blend, making it even more unique.