Defunkt is an American musical group founded by the trombonist and singer

Joseph Bowie Joseph Bowie (born October 17, 1953) is an American jazz trombonist and vocalist. The brother of trumpeter Lester Bowie, Joseph is known for leading the jazz-punk group Defunkt and for membership in the Ethnic Heritage Ensemble. Career Bowi ...

in 1978 in New York City. Their music touches on elements of punk rock,

funk Funk is a music genre that originated in African American communities in the mid-1960s when musicians created a rhythmic, danceable new form of music through a mixture of various music genres that were popular among African Americans in the m ...

, and

jazz Jazz is a music genre that originated in the African-American communities of New Orleans, Louisiana in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, with its roots in blues and ragtime. Since the 1920s Jazz Age, it has been recognized as a major ...

Career

Joseph Bowie is the brother of big band musician Byron Bowie and

Art Ensemble of Chicago The Art Ensemble of Chicago is an avant-garde jazz group that grew out of the Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians ( AACM) in the late 1960s. The ensemble integrates many jazz styles and plays many instruments, including "little ...

co-founder

Lester Bowie Lester Bowie (October 11, 1941 – November 8, 1999) was an American jazz trumpet player and composer. He was a member of the Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians and co-founded the Art Ensemble of Chicago. Biography Born in t ...

. Joseph, who had previously worked as a sideman for various 1970s jazz musicians, founded Defunkt in 1978 with members of a band that had backed

James Chance James Chance, also known as James White (born James Siegfried, April 20, 1953), is an American saxophonist, keyboard player, and singer. A key figure in no wave, Chance has been playing a combination of improvisational jazz-like music and pun ...

. The new group's original focus was on danceable jazz music. Joseph Bowie remains the only consistent member of the group over its history; he has been noted for displaying the influence of far-ranging musicians like

Ornette Coleman Randolph Denard Ornette Coleman (March 9, 1930 – June 11, 2015) was an American jazz saxophonist, violinist, trumpeter, and composer known as a principal founder of the free jazz genre, a term derived from his 1960 album '' Free Jazz: A Colle ...

James Brown James Joseph Brown (May 3, 1933 – December 25, 2006) was an American singer, dancer, musician, record producer and bandleader. The central progenitor of funk music and a major figure of 20th century music, he is often referred to by the honor ...

, and

Joe Strummer John Graham Mellor (21 August 1952 – 22 December 2002), known professionally as Joe Strummer, was a British singer, musician and songwriter. He was the co-founder, lyricist, rhythm guitarist and co-lead vocalist of punk rock band the Clash, ...

. The first incarnation of the group was active in New York City's " No Wave" radical underground music scene, which also included fusion-oriented groups like

Material Material is a substance or mixture of substances that constitutes an object. Materials can be pure or impure, living or non-living matter. Materials can be classified on the basis of their physical and chemical properties, or on their geologi ...

and

Sonic Youth Sonic Youth was an American rock band based in New York City, formed in 1981. Founding members Thurston Moore (guitar, vocals), Kim Gordon (bass, vocals, guitar) and Lee Ranaldo (guitar, vocals) remained together for the entire history of the b ...

. Joseph's saxophonist brother Bryon, bassist

Melvin Gibbs Melvin Gibbs is an American bass guitarist who has appeared on close to 200 albums in diverse genres of music. Among others, Gibbs is known for working in jazz with drummer Ronald Shannon Jackson and guitarist Sonny Sharrock, and in rock music ...

and future

Living Colour Living Colour is an American rock band from New York City, formed in 1984. The band currently consists of guitarist Vernon Reid, lead vocalist Corey Glover, drummer Will Calhoun and bassist Doug Wimbish (who replaced Muzz Skillings in 1992). S ...

guitarist

Vernon Reid Vernon Alphonsus Reid (born 22 August 1958) is an English-born American guitarist and songwriter. Reid is the founder and primary songwriter of the rock band Living Colour, Reid was named No. 66 on ''Rolling Stone'' magazine's 2003 list of the ...

were early contributors. The group's debut self-titled album was released in 1980 and combined the band's original jazz focus with soul, funk, rock, and blues. That album was particularly popular in Eastern Europe and Japan. Their second album ''

Thermonuclear Sweat ''Thermonuclear Sweat'' is an album by the American jazz group Defunkt. It was released in 1982 via Hannibal Records. The group broke up after the release of the album, reforming in 1986. Production The album was produced by Joe Boyd. Aside from t ...

'' followed in 1982. Bowie disbanded the group in 1983 due to a lack of mainstream success, and retired to the island of

St. Croix Saint Croix; nl, Sint-Kruis; french: link=no, Sainte-Croix; Danish and no, Sankt Croix, Taino: ''Ay Ay'' ( ) is an island in the Caribbean Sea, and a county and constituent district of the United States Virgin Islands (USVI), an unincor ...

for a few years. He returned to New York in 1986 and assembled a new Defunkt lineup, with the addition of multiple singers and a large horn section to pursue a new focus on combining 1930s

big band A big band or jazz orchestra is a type of musical ensemble of jazz music that usually consists of ten or more musicians with four sections: saxophones, trumpets, trombones, and a rhythm section. Big bands originated during the early 1910s an ...

and swing music with 1970s funk. This incarnation of the group, with many lineup changes under Bowie's leadership, has released several additional studio albums, starting with ''In America'' in 1988. Their latest album, ''Mastervolt'', was released in 2015.

Musical style

AllMusic AllMusic (previously known as All Music Guide and AMG) is an American online music database. It catalogs more than three million album entries and 30 million tracks, as well as information on musicians and bands. Initiated in 1991, the databas ...

described the Defunkt's music as "some of the most adventurous sounds of the last quarter of the 20th century." ''

Trouser Press ''Trouser Press'' was a rock and roll magazine started in New York in 1974 as a mimeographed fanzine by editor/publisher Ira Robbins, fellow fan of the Who Dave Schulps and Karen Rose under the name "Trans-Oceanic Trouser Press" (a reference to ...

'' has praised the group's later works for "a dynamic rock-funk-jazz concoction of popping bass, neck-melting guitar ..and Bowie's inventive trombone figures and up-close-and-personable vocals."

Discography

*''Defunkt'' (1980) *''The Razor's Edge'' (12"-Maxi-Single, 1981) *''

'' (1982) *''In America'' (1988) *''Avoid the Funk: a Defunkt Anthology'' (Compilation, 1988) *''Heroes'' (1990) *''Live at the Knitting Factory'' (Live, 1991) *''Crisis'' (1992) *''Cum Funky'' (1993) *''Live and Reunified'' (Live, 1993) *''A Blues Tribute to Muddy Waters and Jimi Hendrix'' (1994) *''One World'' (1995) *''Defunkt live in Stuttgart'' (Live, 1996) *''The Legend of Defunkt, Volume 1'' (Compilation, 2001) *''Defunkt – The Legend Continues'' (2001) *''Defunkt Live in Europe'' (Live-Doppelalbum, 2002) *''Journey'' (2004) *''Defunkt + Thermonuclear Sweat'' (2005) *''Mastervolt'' (2015) *''Live at Channel Zero'' (2016)

Members

Current

–

trombone The trombone (german: Posaune, Italian, French: ''trombone'') is a musical instrument in the Brass instrument, brass family. As with all brass instruments, sound is produced when the player's vibrating lips cause the Standing wave, air column ...

vocals Singing is the act of creating musical sounds with the voice. A person who sings is called a singer, artist or vocalist (in jazz and/or popular music). Singers perform music (arias, recitatives, songs, etc.) that can be sung with or without ...

*Kim Clarke – bass *Bill Bickford – guitar *John Mulkerin –

trumpet The trumpet is a brass instrument commonly used in classical and jazz ensembles. The trumpet group ranges from the piccolo trumpet—with the highest register in the brass family—to the bass trumpet, pitched one octave below the standard ...

*Kenny Martin – drums

Former

Ronny Drayton Ronny Drayton (May 19, 1953 – February 7, 2020) was a guitarist based in the New York City area and Monroe, New York. Born and raised in South Jamaica, Queens, New York City, Drayton started out playing drums at St. Clement The Pope Middl ...

– guitar *Kelvyn Bell –

guitar The guitar is a fretted musical instrument that typically has six strings. It is usually held flat against the player's body and played by strumming or plucking the strings with the dominant hand, while simultaneously pressing selected stri ...

*Ayodele Maakheru (Martin Aubert) – guitar *

– guitar *Richard Martin – guitar *

– bass *Ron Mac Jenkins – bass *Reggie Washington – bass *Ted Daniels – trumpet *Byron Bowie –

saxophone The saxophone (often referred to colloquially as the sax) is a type of single-reed woodwind instrument with a conical body, usually made of brass. As with all single-reed instruments, sound is produced when a reed on a mouthpiece vibrates to pr ...

* Luther Thomas – saxophone *Charles Green – saxophone *Alex Harding –

baritone saxophone The baritone saxophone is a member of the saxophone family of instruments, larger (and lower-pitched) than the tenor saxophone, but smaller (and higher-pitched) than the bass. It is the lowest-pitched saxophone in common use - the bass, contra ...

Ronnie Burrage Ronnie Burrage (born James Ronaldo Burrage October 19, 1959) is an American jazz drummer. His style draws from jazz, funk, and soul. Career He was born in St. Louis, Missouri, United States. Burrage sang in the St. Louis Cathedral boys' choir f ...

– drums *Rishard Lampese – guitar *

Skoota Warner Ra is an American alternative metal band from Los Angeles, taking their name from the Egyptian sun god, Ra. The band was formed in 1996, and took off around 2002, when their song "Do You Call My Name" from their album ''From One'' was released ...

– drums *Tobias Ralph – drums *

Kahil El'Zabar Kahil El'Zabar (born Clifton Blackburn; November 11, 1953) is an American jazz multi-instrumentalist (mainly a Percussion instrument, percussionist) and composer. He regularly records for Delmark Records. Life and work El'Zabar was born in Chica ...

–

percussion A percussion instrument is a musical instrument that is sounded by being struck or scraped by a beater including attached or enclosed beaters or rattles struck, scraped or rubbed by hand or struck against another similar instrument. Exc ...

*Kelli Sae – vocals *Martin Fischer – keyboards *Marcus Persiani – keyboards *Kevin Bents – keyboards *Bahnamous Bowie – keyboards *Adam Klipple – keyboards *Cliff Branch – keyboards

References

External links

Official websiteSquat Theatre
* {{Authority control Jazz fusion ensembles Musical groups established in 1978 Antilles Records artists DIW Records artists Punk rock groups from New York (state) Dance-punk musical groups Funk rock musical groups American experimental musical groups Enemy Records artists