2024 – New Rising
Publishing
By Phillip
Smith; Jan. 22,
2026
Original source : phillycheezeblues.blogspot.com
In my teens, I was completely obsessed with George Clinton’s world of P-Funk, and listening to anything from that family of funksters I could get my hands on: Parliament, Funkadelic, Bootsy Collins, Brides of Funkenstein, Parlet, Eddie Hazel, etc. The Funkadelic album Uncle Jam Wants You was my gateway record, and from there I worked forwards and backwards. Funk was a rare music commodity in Northeast Arkansas. My source for hearing this intoxicating sound on the radio was through a couple of Memphis radio stations: WDIA, and K-97. I knew very little about the band members themselves and what I did know came from magazines like Rolling Stone, and Billboard. When Dawn Silva’s autobiography crossed my path to read, I was truly excited. She quickly drew me into her world, fearlessly peeling back the layers of rock-and-roll glamor to share her experience as The Funk Queen. In detail, she narrates her life-story as a singer whose high levels of resilience helped her overcome the many hurdles thrown her way. This five-part book consists of fifty-one chapters, five hundred forty-four pages, and over three hundred glamourous photographs. Silva masterfully steers the reader along the linear path of her life defined in five parts: (1) The Early Years, (2) Sly and the Family Stone, (3) Parliament-Funkadelic, (4) The Gap Band ~ The Eurythmics, and (5) Ice Cube ~ The Platters ~ Dawn Silva.
The history Silva shares of her family, along with vivid childhood memories she recounts of growing up as an Army brat intuitively lay the foundation of the strong woman she would become and need to be. It was a golden-ticket moment for her to be asked to join Sly & the Family Stone. There was a mutual respect, and when Silva needed help, it was Sly who came to her rescue breaking her free of the Black Panthers. Eventually it was time for her to leave that band due to Sly’s turn to the dark side of drug abuse. In 1977 Silva began anew as a member of the P-Funk organization, where she rose through the ranks and landed co-star position of the legendary George Clinton creation The Brides of Funkenstein, sharing the spotlight with Lynn Mabry. Silva’s on-the-road stories with P-Funk and Brides of Funkenstein are filled with chaos, kinship, treachery, and abandonment. By 1982, she was touring and recording with the Gap Band, which led to a relationship with their lead singer Charlie Wilson. That would eventually turn rather toxic. She really went through some horrible times, and my empathy grew with every word I read about this period of her life. A glimmer of hope peaked its head around the corner during her time on tour with Annie Lennox and Dave Stewart of The Eurythmics. This drama-free connection definitely gave her a little break from the insanity which hovered in earlier times. Yet sometimes no matter how loud one yells the “No Whammy” catch phrase from Press Your Luck, the “whammy” finds its way back. I love her stories of touring Brazil with the Platters and of meeting B.B. King. Reading her account of the 1996 Mothership Reunion Tour with Parliament-Funkadelic was interesting to me, as I damn sure made a point to catch that tour: in Memphis at the Beale Street Music Festival and then again in Coralville, Iowa at Pi Fest. The show in Coralville still marks my favorite P-Funk show out of the eight I made it to over the years.
Despite what people were telling Silva about Funk music being a dying market, she listened to her heart and forged ahead. “Mother Wit is all you got, you got to trust your funk!”, lyrics from The Brides of Funkenstein’s 1979 cult classic album title-track “Never Buy Texas From a Cowboy” had rung so very true. Pulling her resources together, she formed Silva Sounds Music Incorporated with five others to record and distribute an extremely funky album of her own in 2000, called Dawn Silva Presents All My Funky Friends. The record was critically acclaimed and sold over 200,000 copies globally.
The Funk Queen Dawn Silva: An Autobiography is quite engaging from start to finish. I absolutely love it!
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For more information about Dawn Silva and to order the book, visit https://www.dawnsilva.com