When your groove is gone, get the funk out

It usually hits in the morning.

I’ll wake up in a fog—heart heavy, thoughts scrambled, like I just left a dream I can’t quite remember but still feel the weight of.

That’s when the funk comes in.

Not the feeling—the fix.

Sometimes, it’s meditation. Sometimes, it’s stillness. But more often than not, it’s music that resets me.

And for the last six months, that music has been coming straight outta 1968–1982(ish).

The deep funk era.

Not the radio hits. Not the wedding reception stuff.
I’m talking about the grooves buried on Side B. The songs you hear and go:
“How was this not a hit?”

You start with the big names—Earth, Wind & Fire, Stevie, Marvin, The O’Jays, George Benson, The Spinners. And anything Quincy was producing at the time.

But once you get past the surface, you realize: these cats weren’t just making music. They were inventing sound.

They pulled from jazz, soul, gospel, swing, rock—and mashed it into something that moved.

There was no sampling. No automation. Just real musicians chasing the perfect take.

The engineers were just starting to experiment with compression, stereo spread, mic placement.
The bands? Tight. Horn sections sharp enough to slice glass.
Drummers who knew how to ride a pocket so deep it felt like gravity itself.

It wasn’t about perfection. It was about feel.

This stuff isn’t nostalgic for me. I was barely forming memories when a lot of it dropped.
But when I play it now? It pulls something out of me that’s older than I am.

It brings me back into my body.
Reminds me that joy doesn’t need a reason.
That groove is a form of therapy.
That the rhythm can carry you when your mind’s still stuck in the clouds.

Here are a few I’ve been leaning on lately. Start here and dig deeper:

• My Love – Earth, Wind & Fire
  
• Fopp – Ohio Players
  
• Love X Love – George Benson
  
• Stomp! – The Brothers Johnson
  
• Could It Be I’m Falling in Love – The Spinners (not obscure, but damn near perfect)
  
• Sweet Gypsy Jane – The Temptations
  

Play ‘em loud.

And if your morning brain’s got you feeling off, let the groove pull you back.

If I’m in a funk, it’s the funk that gets me out of it.