Chaka makes her best and funkiest album for over two decades, and her powerful voice -- that first hit the airwaves with Chicago funk band Rufus in the 1970s and punched out the mighty "Ain't Nobody" and "I'm Every Woman" in the 1980s-- on this recording shines throughout.
"Funk This", which debuted at number 15 on America's top 200 album chart - her highest chart position since her first solo album in 1978 peaked at number 12 - is a return to Khan's purity.
Recorded in analogue, it's how she sounded before the "I Feel for You"-style disco anthems of the '80s.
The album opens with an autobiographical song she co-wrote with Terry Lewis. Over the slap-wristflick of retro-funk, Chaka recalls growing up fast in "Chi-town" where her "Momma was strict about them kids".
The vocals are tight and scratchy-raw. They capture the pent-up frustrations of a young girl whose curfew meant she was "Missing the funk of the night".
The mid tempo dancer "Back In The Day" has that Rufus sound to it, and that is also evident in the covers of two Rufus classics "Pack'd My Bags/You Got The love" featuring Tony Maiden.
The funky mid tempo dancers "Superlife" , "Sign Of The Times" and "Hail To The Wrong" keep up the pace, whilst the melodic mid tempo floater "One For All Time" is also classy.
Most of Khan's musical heroes are women: she's particularly effusive on the subject of her friend Joni Mitchell, who she says is "a genius and always just a beat away from funk." The new album features a cover of Mitchell's "Ladies' Man", on which Khan pours the ache of personal experience into lines such as: "Couldn't you just love me like you love cocaine?"
The beat ballads "Angel" and the raunchy version of "Foolish Fool" are also good. On "Angel", Chaka works through of her own drug use. "Troubled little angel," she sings "inconsistent flying blind most of the time/ Drama Queen/ Preening and untangling the feathers in her wings/ Captured by her dreams desperately she sings".
"Funk This" is a mixture of originals and covers of some of the best Rhythm and Blues, Funk, Blues, and Soul music from the past thirty to forty years.
One of the songs to show off her delicacy of touch is her cover of the Jimi Hendrix's "Castles Made Of Sand". A mid-tempo song about the impermanence of dreams and the dangers of living in a fantasy world, where Ms. Khan utilizes her voice to help generate a mood appropriate to the song.
This song is also a good example of her ability to put the song ahead of her ego instead of making it about her and her talents. While younger, less mature singers will look for any excuse to unload pyrotechnics and show off their abilities, Chaka is content to let the mood of the song dictate her performance. Listening to her duet with up- and-coming powerhouse singer Mary J. Blige on the most exciting track of the album "Disrespectful" that difference is made perfectly clear. The song is a Blige composition.
"It's the kind of song two women can really sing together," says Khan, who admits that when she listens to the track now she can hardly tell where her voice ends and the younger singer's begins.
You certainly wouldn't want to be the man on the receiving end of this duo. As the jerky beat smacks you round the face, Blige and Khan take total control of the song and the relationship it describes. "You can't make me lose my mind," they roar. "I'm too strong for you".
Also amazing is Chaka's versatility as a singer as demonstrated by the range of material that "Funk This" has to offer : from the full throttle Funk of the opening track "Back In The Day" to the ballad "Angel".
She shows that slowing the pace down does nothing to detract from her sincerity as a singer.
Too often people with strong voices become stentorian when faced with a ballad and equate emotion with loudness and straining for the upper regions of the scale.
Music icons like Chaka Khan are often stifled by the pressures of delivering a successful album to their fans.
"Funk This" is an album for all skeptics.
Through the preparation for this album, Chaka has admitted that she has "been on a little journey in the last few years".
Sometimes the path to re-discovery leads us back to where originally we began. Chaka Khan's "Funk This" reminds us why we fell in love with her over 30 years ago.
The reason is because she's hopelessly...FUNKY !

Legendary singer Chaka Khan is red-hot & fiery in this tremendous collection of stunning vocal performances that are among her best ever & opening with a self-penned funky grinder "Back In The Day", it is obvious the legendary lady is back in peak form in a grandiose & inspired production...late legendary singer/songwriter Ed Townsend's timeless "Foolish Fool" is definitive here featuring a gritty raw performance from Chaka that is soul-deep and satisfying.
Something very special about "Funk This" are winning self-penned keepers like the unique & rhythmic complex "One For All Time" and numerous others which show Chaka to be a wonderfully accomplished songwriter/composer making it easy to why this masterful & tremendous collection earned Chaka Khan two Grammy Awards...BRAVO CHAKA!
Chaka is back better than ever and a classic Khan performance is always a joy to behold so sit back and listen in wonder to "Angel" and be stunned by a performance of great depth and beauty...be enthralled by an artist at the peak of her wondrous ability to take the listener to another dimension in a haunting and brilliant way.
"Will You Love Me?" is exotic & mesmerizing with another brilliant Kahn vocal hitting scorching heights while a fascinating Jimi Hendrix original "Castles Made Of Sand" is an engrossing rocker then hold on for the Grammy winning duet with Chaka & Mary J. in awesome from making "Disrespectful" the greatest DIVA DUAL in many years while in better musical times than this current musical drought, "Sign'O'The Times" penned by Prince would have been a huge #1 Blockbuster Hit like "I Feel For You"...magnificent in every way, this funky anthem will grow on anyone who loves a brilliant magical musical ride after a just a few spins...awesome arrangement and Chaka hits incredible vocal heights!
By now it is clear the amazing team of Jimmy Jam & Terry Lewis are the perfect match made in musical heaven for Chaka Khan as every song is unique and brilliant with totally inspired musicians giving it all they've got!!! Let's wish & hope this wondrous team goes in to the studio to produce another stunning musical masterpiece as this feel good music for the soul is as good as it gets!
Bravo Chaka & Co...you guys really rock and did it all this time!!!!!

CHAKA BRING THE HEAT, BACK! My wife knows what kind of music I love and this is one of them, Funk This is AMAZINGLY FUNKY! I am soooooo glad that artist from the 70's are bringing the MUSIC back. I DO love some Hip Hop and Metal music (you'll see my reviews) but FUNK is it for me. James Brown, Parliment Funkadelic, The Chambers Brothers, Slapbak, (Early) Red Hot Chili Peppers, Tower of Power, Fishbone, Weapon of Choice, etc. When Chaka sings, she does not have to struggle with hitting high notes because she's a master of it. Now all we need is for MORE 70's artist to come strong: like Tavares, Sly and the Family Stone, Rare Earth. Chaka's Back!

BROOKLYN S T A N D U P!
Cooper Park, Baby
50 Debevoise Ave

I heard Chaka Khan's new album, Funk This. I was floored! Chaka Khan is at her best, wailing and soaring soulfully on every song here! I love Back in the Day and its funky groove and bass guitars. Hail to the Wrong is another highlight. And how she closes the Prince remake of Sign O'The Times with a reprise of the whoa, whoa,whoas of I'm Every Woman is remarkably done. When I heard that Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis produced this album, I was excited. They can do these incredible records for Janet Jackson, yet come up with some dynamite numbers and a full, live funk sound for Chaka! It's like you're at a live concert hearing Chaka sing all these songs in front of you, not just hearing her own CD! The remakes are nice, yet she keeps them 2007 instead of being too retro. This is another great album that came out this year!

Harkening back to her days with the groundbreaking r & b group Rufus, Funk This is an excellent set of originals and remakes that provide ample evidence why Chaka is considered perhaps the greatest funk vocalist ever. Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis have assembled a set of first-rate musicians and compositions that fit Chaka like a glove, further reminding us that Funk This is going to be something we have not heard in quite some time.

Several reviewers of Funk This have claimed this to be Chaka's first release in 10 years (since "Come 2 My House"). Those reviewers negligently overlook 2004's wonderful Classikhan, which had Chaka teamed with the London Symphony Orchestra. Though almost entirely remakes, it cannot be flatly said that this is her first release in 10 years. But while on "Classikhan" Chaka lends her formidable jazz and blues chops to re-imagine some classic songs (including scorching versions of "Diamonds Are Forever," and "Goldfinger"), she brings pure, unadulterated funk to her latest endeavor.

From Tony Maiden's guitar licks on the opener "Back In the Day," and Chaka's first line "Guess I grew up fast/in Chi-town," you know you are in for a singular performance. There are too many other highlights to mention: the hook-drenched "Will You Love Me?" (with its "wall of Chakas), the funky "Hail To The Wrong" (those handclaps!), the beautifully rendered and structured "Angel," the aching "One For All Time," Chaka's reading of Joni Mitchell's "Ladies Man" and Jimi's "Castles Made of Sand," (the latter featuring Jesse Johnson's guitar doing a darn good Hendrix interpretation), the gritty version Dee Dee Bridgewater's "Foolish Fool" (with Aaron Spears' kickdrum at the bridge), and the blistering duet with Mary J. Blige, "Disrespectful." Though on the last, we've heard the backbeat before (Amerie's "One Thing"), nothing (and noone) can match the vocal pyrotechnics on display. When Chaka belts out the last verse--" You so/Shady/Lowdown/Crazy/You think that I want to see you?/You out yo' mind??!!"--and she hurls that last word "mind" into the stratosphere, you know you are in the presence of a style that can never be duplicated.

But what gives this set a five-star: Chaka's rendition of Prince's "Sign `O The Times." Her sizzling interpretation is put atop a rhythmic stew of swirling, punctuating guitar licks, bass, keyboards, and drums. As if that were not enough, it morphs into sonic nirvana as the "whoa, whoa, whoa-aa" coda from Chaka's classic "I'm Every Woman" emerges, and Chaka adds a hopeful declaration to Prince's excellent but darker lyrics, while belting out highs and lows that are simply not on the charts.

Chaka, Jimmy, and Terry have created a set that reminds us all what great musicianship and singing is all about. With an unparalleled combination of vocal range (four octave) and power, Funk This demonstrates once again why Chaka deserves the distinction of having one of the most amazing and influential voices in modern popular music. Note to the academy: don't overlook this performance at Grammy time.

(also Posted to ITunes)