“Papa's Got A Brand New Bag” by James Brown

"Papa's Got a Brand New Bag" is where James Brown drew up the plans for funk. He wrote it himself and the band cut it in one take, and when King put it out as a two-part single in 1965, the tape had been trimmed and sped up, so it runs faster and a half step higher than they played it.

The song cheers on an old man bold enough to hit a nightclub dance floor, and "brand new bag" is slang for a fresh way of doing things. The horns blare, the rhythm pushes, Jimmy Nolen, on his first Brown session, supplies the hooking guitar riff, and everybody lands hard on the one. It was Brown's first top-ten hit on the Hot 100, held the R&B top spot for eight weeks and won him his first Grammy. It resurfaced in 1970 on Soul on Top.

Written with AI assistance from RockLists chart data, MusicBrainz and Wikipedia.