It’s dirty, dingy, low-fi AND the most smoking groove soulful records of all time. Some funk recordings by the likes of James Brown and Funkadelic may have come before it but I think this the first true FUNK album and it’s god damn remarkable.

There's a Riot Goin' On is the fifth studio album by American funk and psychedelic soul band Sly and the Family Stone. It was recorded from 1970 to 1971 at Record Plant Studios in Sausalito, California and released later that year on November 20 by Epic Records.

The album's recording was dominated by band frontman Sly Stone during a period of drug use and intra-group tension. Its music embraced a darker and more challenging sound than the optimistic style of the band's previous releases, making use of hard funk rhythms, primitive drum machines, extensive overdubbing, and a dense mix. The album's planned title was Africa Talks to You, but it was retitled in response to Marvin Gaye's album What's Going On, released six months before.

There's a Riot Goin' On reached the Billboard Pop Album and Soul Album charts at number one upon its release, while its lead single "Family Affair" topped the Pop Singles chart.  By 2001, it had sold one million copies and been certified platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA)  Received with ambivalence upon its release, the album is now praised as one of the greatest and most influential recordings of all time, and ranked at or near the top of many publications' best album lists. In 2003, it was ranked number 99 on Rolling Stone's list of 500 Greatest Albums of All Time.

Having achieved great success with their 1969 album Stand! and performance at Woodstock, Sly & the Family Stone were due to have submitted an album of new recordings to Epic Records by 1970. However, Sly Stone missed several recording deadlines, worrying CBS executive Clive Davis, :107, 146–152 and a Greatest Hits album was released in an eighteen-month stretch during which the band released no new material, except for the single "Thank You (Falettinme Be Mice Elf Agin)". Relationships within the band were deteriorating, with friction between the Stone brothers and bassist Larry Graham.[11]:107, 146–152 Epic executives requested more product, and the Black Panther Party, with which Stone had become associated, was demanding he make his music more militant and reflective of the black power movement, that he replace drummer Greg Errico and saxophonist Jerry Martini with black instrumentalists, and replace manager David Kapralik. After moving to Los Angeles, California in late 1969 Stone and his bandmates began to use cocaine and PCP heavily :94–98 rather than recording music. During this time Sly & the Family Stone released only one single, "Thank You (Falettinme Be Mice Elf Agin)" / "Everybody Is a Star", issued in December 1969 :122 Although "Star" was a positive song in the vein of their previous hit "Everyday People" (1968), "Thank You" featured a darker political theme.

By 1970, Stone had become erratic and moody, missing nearly a third of the band's concert dates. 113–115 He hired streetwise friends Hamp "Bubba" Banks and J.B. Brown as his personal managers, and they enlisted gangsters Edward "Eddie Chin" Elliott and Mafioso J.R. Valtrano as his bodyguards. Stone assigned these individuals to handle his business dealings, find drugs and protect him from those he considered enemies, among them his own bandmates and staff. :99–100, 150–152 A rift developed between Sly and the rest of the band, which led to drummer Gregg Errico's departure in early 1971. 146–147 Speculation arose as to the release of new studio material. In a December 24, 1970 article for Rolling Stone magazine, journalist Jon Landau wrote:

The man from Epic tells me that Sly hasn't recorded much lately. His last album of new material was released well over a year ago and even 'Thank You', his last single, is old by now. Greatest Hits was released only as a last resort in order to get something salable into the record stores. It was a necessary release and stands as the final record of the first chapter in Sly & the Family Stone's career. Whatever the reasons for his recording abstinence, I hope it ends soon so that he can get back to making new music and we can get back to listening to it.

Stone's intention of a darker, more conceptual work was influenced by drug use and the events that writer Miles Marshall Lewis called "the death of the sixties"; political assassinations, police brutality, the decline of the civil rights movement and social disillusionment. According to The Austin Chronicle, "slowed down, [Sly's] quest for post-stardom identity mirrored black America's quest for post-Sixties purpose. Article