"Papa Don't Take No Mess" is a funk song performed by James Brown. An edited version of the song released as a two-part single in 1974 was Brown's 17th and final number one R&B hit and peaked at number thirty-one on the Hot 100. The full-length version, nearly 14 minutes long, appeared on the double album '' Hell''.
Like " The Payback," "Papa Don't Take No Mess" was originally recorded for a rejected
soundtrack
A soundtrack is recorded music accompanying and synchronised to the images of a motion picture, drama, book, television program, radio program, or video game; a commercially released soundtrack album of music as featured in the soundtrack ...
Hell Up in Harlem
''Hell Up in Harlem'' is a 1973 blaxploitation American neo-noir film, starring Fred Williamson and Gloria Hendry. Written and directed by Larry Cohen, it is a sequel to the film '' Black Caesar''.
The film's soundtrack was recorded by Edwin S ...
''.
'' Record World'' said that the song is "carefully fashioned from disco and pure black
leather funk."
Fred Wesley
Fred Wesley (born July 4, 1943) is an American trombonist who worked with James Brown in the 1960s and 1970s and Parliament-Funkadelic in the second half of the 1970s.
Biography
Wesley was born the son of a high school teacher and big band lead ...
Fred Wesley
Fred Wesley (born July 4, 1943) is an American trombonist who worked with James Brown in the 1960s and 1970s and Parliament-Funkadelic in the second half of the 1970s.
Biography
Wesley was born the son of a high school teacher and big band lead ...
- trombone
* Ike Oakley - trumpet
*
Maceo Parker
Maceo Parker (; born February 14, 1943) is an American funk and soul jazz saxophonist, best known for his work with James Brown in the 1960s, Parliament-Funkadelic in the 1970s and Prince in the 2000s. Parker was a prominent soloist on many o ...
Jimmy Nolen
Jimmy Nolen (April 3, 1934 – December 18, 1983) - accessed November 13, 2011 was an American
- guitar
* Hearlon "Cheese" Martin - guitar
* Fred Thomas - bass
* John "Jabo" Starks - drums
* John Morgan or Johnny Griggs - percussionLeeds, Alan, and Harry Weinger (1991). "Star Time: Song by Song". In ''Star Time'' (pp. 46–53) D booklet New York: PolyGram Records.
A piano solo, performed by Brown, is included in the longer edit that appears on the ''Hell'' album.
Covers and samples
Steely Dan covered this song in the band introduction segment of their "Rarities night" concerts in September 2011.
The song, like much of Brown's catalogue, was sampled into many other compositions, most notably in Janet Jackson's 1993 hit song " That's the Way Love Goes".