Funkadelic's Cholly (Funk Getting Ready To Roll)

"Cholly (Funk Getting Ready To Roll)" is a great funk track off Funkadelic's landmark album One Nation Under a Groove (1978). "Cholly" is a rather underrated song in the P-Funk canon. It has a sick groove with a wickedly funky bass line provided by Bootsy Collins. The late, great Garry "Starchild" Shider contributes the soulful lead vocal. The song has some clever lyrics about a jazz and classical music lover who suddenly has an epiphany when a friend introduces him to P-Funk.

The narrator, Cholly, realizes that he had been caught up in the "syndrome" and was always too uptight to really get down. By the end of the song, Cholly is ready to hop on the Motherhip and freely express the funk that was within him all along and leave all his hangups behind. P-Funk has freed him from all his constrictions, and he's able to be his true funky self.

The song also has a cool hook in the "Funk Gettin' Ready to Roll" chant. The live version became a P-Funk concert staple in the late '70s.  Shider would incite everyone in the audience to sing the "Funk Gettin' Ready to Roll" chant to get them in a party mood.

The track was written by George Clinton, Bootsy and the multi-talented Walter "Junie" Morrison, who was formerly a member of the legendary R&B/funk band the Ohio Players, where he was a writer, producer, keyboardist and vocalist. I used to play this track to death back in the day.