André Cymone to rekindle timeless funk in new music

“My goal with this album is to reintroduce funk music. Give it the respect that it deserves. Get the world to reconnect,” noted André Cymone in describing his latest project, “The Resurrection of Funk.”

“That was the foundation of what we did with Grand Central,” he continued. “And from a Minneapolis standpoint, as we came of age, we had a lot to do with funk in the eighties, putting our own stamp on it. But it seems that music is slipping away from people’s consciousness. I want to go back to that energy, those sensibilities, that attitude. The spirit of funk, so to speak.” 

Cymone, who celebrates his 66th birthday on this week’s MSR publication date (June 27), is one of the most seminal figures in shaping what history has come to know as the Minneapolis Sound. While he’s eternally humble and gracious, it’s likely not lost on Cymone that he doesn’t always get his due.

“André was every bit as talented as Prince,” says Pepé Willie, who worked closely with Grand Central, the band Cymone and Prince played in together as teens. “They both played all the instruments. Even at that age. Whatever one of them could do, so could the other. It was unbelievable.”

Cymone’s contribution runs much deeper than talent alone; he helped put the whole Minneapolis Sound thing together from the very start.  

For André Simon Anderson, the youngest of six children born to Fred and Bernadette Anderson, it didn’t take long to get a sense of what he might want out of life. “My dad was a musician, and he had this upright bass around the house, which I learned to play by the time I was seven or eight.”

Although music came naturally to Cymone, he wasn’t sure that was exactly what he would do, at least not right away. “I grew up in the projects and was what you might call an ‘adventurous kid,’” laughs Cymone. “So, one day, I came across this abandoned house and made my way inside.”

He discovered in the garage stacks upon stacks of magazines spotlighting celebrities and their “Hollywood” lifestyles. “I keyed in on those images. I studied them. And whether that meant I’d have to become an actor, athlete, or a musician, I knew that’s what I wanted—that lifestyle.”

Cymone’s success at a grade school talent show, coupled with the insistence of family members that he perform on demand for guests, planted the seed that music was, indeed, the path forward. “I became the entertainer in the family. Sort of like a wind-up doll,” reminisces Cymone. 

“Somebody’d always say, ‘André, show ‘em this or show ‘em that.’ So, I’d do my James Brown routine, or Jackie Wilson, things like that.” 

After the Anderson family moved to Russell Avenue North, Cymone began junior high school “not really knowing anyone at all.” The fact that he didn’t care much for authority immediately brought him into conflict with his new gym teacher.

“I didn’t like his brand of telling me what to do. That didn’t work for me, so we had words,” Cymone recalls. “Then there’s this other kid that says to me, ‘You are going to get us in trouble.’ I looked at him and was like, ‘And who are you?’”

That other kid just happened to be Prince Rogers Nelson, and by inserting himself into the moment, he serendipitously established a brotherhood between the two. Both youngsters claimed to be musicians, but neither believed the other at first.

Yet it soon became clear how serious each of them was. And when they discovered by happenstance that their fathers were once in a band together, this only helped to cement their bond.

They formed Grand Central with Prince’s cousin Charles Smith. Cymone rounded out the rest of the group by bringing in his sister Linda, Terry Jackson, the late William “Hollywood” Doughty, and Morris Day, who would replace Smith on drums.

“I wanted us to stand out, to be seen as original, as innovators,” Cymone says. “We knew how to write songs, and we were outshining bands much older than us.”

Prince spent the better part of that time living in the Anderson home. And when Prince signed with Warner Bros. Records in 1977, Cymone, despite his own dreams and aspirations, understood, “This is my friend. I have his back, whatever he needs.”

 So, with Cymone on Prince’s right-hand side and guitarist Dez Dickerson on the left, the three men formed one of the most impressive front lines you’ll ever see on stage.

After three albums and as many tours with Prince, Cymone signed a deal with Columbia Records. He released three innovative solo albums while also establishing a side project of his own, The Girls.

“When I went out on my own, I was creating a different style of music, something fun, futuristic,” explains Cymone. “But the label started sweating me, wanting me to sound like Prince.

“Sure, I could have done that. I helped create all that. My bass is what drove that sound. But that wasn’t what I was doing anymore.”

Cymone left Columbia and soon went on to write, produce, and perform on most of Jody Watley’s debut album (plus three more), which garnered her a Grammy for Best New Artist, at the same time letting his former label and the world know that “Yes! I can still do all that.”

The roster of artists that Cymone has since written and produced for is as diverse as it is long. It includes Tina Turner, Tom Jones, Evelyn ‘Champagne’ King, James Ingram, Adam Ant, Pretty Poison, Pebbles, Jermaine Stewart, and many more.

By 2012, Cymone was releasing his solo work again, beginning with the single “America,” written in support of President Obama’s re-election campaign. Soon to follow were the songs “Trayvon,” “My Best Friend” (a tribute to his mother Bernadette), and his first solo album in 29 years, 2014’s “The Stone.”    

Following the EP “Black Man in America” was yet another critically acclaimed offering from Cymone, the album “1969,” evoking an era when musical artists weren’t afraid to “speak truth to power” and sang about the world in which they lived.

“It’s important that artists use their platform to address the issues of the day. What is relevant to our times,” asserts Cymone. “There are some ominous things going on in the world today, and those tend to hit Black people first and hardest. Our nation has been hollowed out. People are scraping just to get by.”

In addition to his socially conscious work, Cymone’s songwriting runs the gamut of musical genres. “I’ve written and recorded so many things. Classical, jazz, reggae, rock. A bunch of different things.” 

Nonetheless, for Cymone, 2024 has got to be the Summer of Funk. “Like I said, I just want to reestablish my connection to that element of the Minneapolis Sound. That funk aspect of it all. To bring it back to where it originally was.”

Cymone has created such an abundance of funk with this project that he finds it difficult to contain his excitement, wanting to share that feeling with everyone.

The plan is to start releasing a little bit of funk here and there on the way to the full release of “The Resurrection of Funk.” That first song, “Funk is Alive,” drops on June 27. You can hear it by visiting andrecymone.bandcamp.com/track/funk-is-alive.