page_title: Sly and the Family Stone
section_title: Stand! (1969)
hierarchical_section_title: Sly and the Family Stone / Career / Stand! (1969)
caption_attribution_description: English: The crowd at Woodstock fills a natural amphitheatre with the stage at the bottom. Deutsch: Das Publikum des Woodstock Festivals füllte ein natürliches Amphitheater, an dessen tiefstem Punkt sich die Bühne befand.
context_page_description: Sly and the Family Stone was an American band from San Francisco. Active from 1966 to 1983, it was pivotal in the development of funk, soul, rock, and psychedelic music. Its core line-up was led by singer-songwriter, record producer, and multi-instrumentalist Sly Stone, and included Stone's brother and singer/guitarist Freddie Stone, sister and singer/keyboardist Rose Stone, trumpeter Cynthia Robinson, drummer Greg Errico, saxophonist Jerry Martini, and bassist Larry Graham. It was the first major American rock group to have a racially integrated, male and female lineup.
  Formed in 1966, the group's music synthesized a variety of disparate musical genres to help pioneer the emerging "psychedelic soul" sound. They released a series of Top 10 Billboard Hot 100 hits such as "Dance to the Music", "Everyday People", and "Thank You", as well as critically acclaimed albums such as Stand!, which combined pop sensibility with social commentary. In the 1970s, it transitioned into a darker and less commercial funk sound on releases such as There's a Riot Goin' On and Fresh, proving as influential as their early work.
context_section_description: In late 1968, Sly and the Family Stone released the single "Everyday People", which became their first No. 1 hit. "Everyday People" was a protest against prejudice of all kinds and popularized the catchphrase "different strokes for different folks". With its B-side "Sing a Simple Song", it served as the lead single for the band's fourth album, Stand!, which was released on May 3, 1969. The Stand! album eventually sold more than three million copies; its title track peaked at No. 22 in the U.S. Stand! is considered one of the artistic high points of the band's career. It contained the above three tracks as well as the songs "I Want to Take You Higher" (which was the B-side of the "Stand!" single), "Don't Call Me Nigger, Whitey", "Sex Machine", and "You Can Make It If You Try".
  The success of Stand! secured Sly and the Family Stone a performance slot at the landmark Woodstock Music and Art Festival. They performed their set during the early-morning hours of August 17, 1969; their performance was said to be one of the best shows of the festival. A new non-album single, "Hot Fun in the Summertime", was released the same month and went to No. 2 on the U.S. pop chart (peaking in October, after the summer of 1969 had already ended). In 1970, following the release of the Woodstock documentary, the single of "Stand!" and "I Want to Take You Higher" was reissued with the latter song now the A-side; it reached the Top 40. The band previewed their Woodstock performance three weeks earlier, when they headlined the Harlem Cultural Festival, frequently dubbed, "The Black Woodstock," before tens of thousands of spectators in Mount Morris Park. The full-length television program for which it was filmed never aired.
caption: The Woodstock Music and Art Festival, at which Sly and the Family Stone performed on August 17, 1969.
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