I Want to Take You Higher_ The Life and Times of Sly & the Family Stone - Jeff Kaliss [62]
In 1998, Joel Selvin released Sly & the Family Stone: An Oral History. It presented a collection of interviews with Family Stone veterans, Stewart family members, and business and personal acquaintances of Sly, though the man himself did not share any thoughts with Joel. "Most of the people interviewed for this book have never spoken about their experiences before and many of the others have never publicly discussed some of these matters," ran Joel's introduction. "It's easy to understand their reluctance."
Alas, some of them became more reluctant after the publication of Joel's book. Jerry counted himself among the several people less than pleased with how they'd figured in Joel's handling of the story. Jerry stated to this author, in 2006, "I am not going to have any kind of negative comments to make about Sly & the Family Stone, because I've already been misquoted so much.... Everybody's been bit so much. So you are coming along at a time when I have scars on my heart." "That's the dirty laundry, the trash," said Greg about Joel's book. "And that's not what [the group] was about, really."
In 1999, documentarians Nina Rosenblum and Dennis Watlington were engaged by New York Times Television to create a film about the careers of Sly and Jimi Hendrix, which took its title, The Skin I'm In, from one of Fresh's lesser known but more soulful tracks. Reflecting on the project, director Nina allows that the view through her lens was rosier than that through Joel's glasses. "We really think that Sly Stone was a complete unadulterated genius ... the likes of Rembrandt, Michelangelo, Mozart," she avows. As for Sly's diversion from artistic purpose, "He was like a reed, so in touch, as great artists are, with the times he lived in," says the filmmaker. "When things get repressive, [artists] really suffer, and I think he really suffered. The times went one way, and he went a different way.... Now, everything that that generation won is with us, in terms of civil rights and women's rights and understanding-the world will never be the same. But I think Sly paid for it.... He was taken away from us."
Among its many high points, the film, now available in the form of a director's rough cut, included footage shot at brother Freddie's Evangelist Temple Fellowship Center in his hometown of Vallejo, affiliated with the Church of God in Christ. His mother, Alpha, who had carried her family's connection to that denomination from her native Texas, spoke to the filmmakers from one of the temple's pews, bedecked in her Sunday finery, just a few years' before her and her husband K. C. 's passing. "Freddie came home [to Vallejo], and I was so glad," she testified. "I thought he might draw Sly. And maybe someday he will." She remembered that Sly, her older son, "just really was good in church ... people would be hollering." Flashing forward, she commented, "I don't know what happened to him. It has to be the drugs." The Skin I'm In also featured input from music teacher David Froehlich, ex-manager David Kapralik, Bobby "The Swim" Freeman, and Billy Preston, as well as every member of the Family Stone except its leader. "The production company tried every which way [to reach Sly], but it wasn't to be," admits Nina. "We went to Beverly Hills, we tried to stake it out, we went to his front gate, we rang the bellnothing. His family tried on our behalf, but it was difficult for them, too."
Dennis Watlington, the African American author and filmmaker who conducted most of the documentary's interviews, secured the Stewart family's input. "He came from the church, so when he showed up, they knew he was one of them, from them, by them, so we had much more access than we would ever have had," Nina points out. On camera, Jerry and Greg made reference to the deleterious effects of drugs, and record exec Steve Paley pointed out that Sly "loves being the Howard Hughes of his generation,