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The Sly and the Family Stone: Live at the Fillmore East — October 4th & 5th, 1968 box set has been receiving great reviews in the press since its release last month.

“One doozy of a box… pure groove… vintage audiophiles will just about bow down before the quality of these tapes.” – The Boston Globe

“A portrait of a large funk and soul band on fire.” – Los Angeles Times

“A long belated affirmation of the Family Stone’s ceremonious soul charge.” – Lexington Herald Leader

“The first thing you hear is pure energy: the nuclear reaction of musical power that Sly and his Family Stone generated onstage.” – Stereophile

“These discs are a showcase of [Sly’s] genius.” – The Root

Back in 1967, when funky trumpeter Cynthia Robinson joined forces with musical visionary Sly Stone, most “girls” in band units wore pretty dresses and harmonized in the background. “I never thought for one second I’d be able to play with a real band,” Robinson recalls via telephone from her home in the Bay Area. “When I was in high school, I went through a lot of bad treatment and was called a lot of names by boys, because I wanted to play. Sly was different.”

Forty-seven later, Cynthia Robinson, who still tours the world playing with the Family Stone, remembers her back in the day life on the road with the musicians she calls, the greatest band in the world.”

Read more at Ebony.

Enter for a chance to win a Sly & The Family Stone – Live At The Fillmore East October 4th & 5th 1968 CD, black vinyl and poster, plus 7 studio albums!

In the fall of 1968, Sly and the Family Stone was a confident band worried about its future. Pressured by Epic Records earlier that year to record “Dance to the Music,” a commercial second album, the band pushed back in September with “Life,” which was truer to its freewheeling roots.

To promote the album, Sly and the Family Stone were booked into New York’s Fillmore East on Oct. 4-5. … The band was eager to show Epic that its feel-good, jam-session treatments of gospel-tinged funk-rock originals could whip up any audience. Judging by Sly & The Family Stone – Live At The Fillmore East October 4th & 5th 1968 (Sony Legacy), a four-CD set due July 17, they succeeded.

Read more at The Wall Street Journal.