Sly Stone: Guns, PCP, a Psycho Mutt, and a Fugitive from Justice

Summary

Podcast Summary: DISGRACELAND – Sly Stone: Guns, PCP, a Psycho Mutt, and a Fugitive from Justice

Host: Jake Brennan
Date: April 4, 2023
Duration (content): ~03:06–45:29
Podcast Description: High-stakes, true crime–tinged storytelling about the dark, chaotic, and deeply human side of music legends—this episode dives into the turbulent path of Sly Stone.

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Episode Overview

This episode unpacks the myth and madness behind Sly Stone—funk legend, visionary bandleader, notorious recluse, and a man whose journey from musical ecstasy to personal chaos rewrote the promise and peril of fame. Host Jake Brennan guides listeners through Sly’s stratospheric rise with The Family Stone, the breakdowns triggered by paranoia, drugs, and violence, his tangled relationships with the Black Panthers, and the years he spent as a fugitive and casualty of his own legend. It's a cautionary tale about the cost of genius, the allure and danger of alter egos, and the fragility of dreams—even musical ones that were supposed to unite us all.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The Golden Era of Sly and the Family Stone

• Woodstock & Musical Utopia
  • Sly and the Family Stone’s 3:30am Woodstock set became a microcosm of '60s hope: “Every one of them looked up at the stage and saw themselves reflected in the integrated faces of Sly and the Family Stone. Men, women, black, white, everyday people.” (04:23)
• Musical Innovation & Inclusion
  • Sly’s vision: genre-defiant music and a racially/gender-integrated band—“It wasn’t by chance that Sly hired black players and white players… everybody was a star.” (08:05)

2. The Shadows Fall: Isolation, Paranoia, and Drugs

• Descent into Reclusiveness
  • By 1970, Sly retreats into a Bel Air mansion, surrounded by guns, drugs, and bodyguards, attended by a dangerous pitbull named Gun, and increasingly cut off from the world.
  • “He was on his own trip now and he was taking no passengers.” (05:12)
• Corruption of Ego
  • The Sly Stone persona overtakes Sylvester Stewart, triggering severe paranoia—suspecting even close collaborators of assassination attempts and poisoning.
  • “Sly was obsessed. Sly fixated. Sly said, did you see that shadow? What was that noise? Who is that person over there and are they cool? Somebody’s watching you, brother.” (11:03)

3. The Tumult of Fame: Massive Success and Backlash

• Social and Political Pressures
  • Sly faces demands from the Black Panthers to “dump his white manager, fire his drummer... and replace them with black musicians.” (07:45)
  • The host notes Sly’s original intent was always inclusivity, not symbolism.
• Musical Output versus Turmoil
  • Despite behind-the-scenes chaos, There’s A Riot Goin’ On (1971) goes to #1. The music signals a shift: “hangover music—exhausted, pessimistic… even Family Affair, the lead off single, was funk music on life support.” (10:00)
  • Rock critic Greil Marcus’s description: “Muzak with its finger on the trigger.” (10:24)

4. Violence, Law Trouble, and Breakdown

• Onstage Riots and Missed Gigs
  • Chronic unreliability culminates in the 1970 Grant Park riot: fans storm the stage after yet another Sly no-show—ending in violence, injuries, and police intervention. (20:20)
• Drug Busts and Police Raids
  • Repeated protests from Sly’s “other self” do nothing to curb self-destruction; house raids turn up “guns, drugs, too. Sly Stone didn’t give a fuck.” (22:22)
• Courtroom Drama
  • Coolly snorting cocaine in the courthouse bathroom; deflects legal pressure onto his lawyers: “That’s what I pay you for. So I can do this.” (24:55)
  • Slapped with probation and rehab, but record label pressure mounts and Sly is suspended.

5. Isolation, Financial Disasters, and Legal Betrayal

• Career and Band Implosion
  • The Family Stone falls apart due to Sly’s self-destruction and paranoia. “By the time of the 1976 album... Cynthia Robinson was the only holdover from the glory days.” (33:00)
• Bad Business Deals & IRS Troubles
  • Desperate for cash, Sly sells away his royalties and publishing; IRS seizes what’s left. The “habit” (drugs) is his only constant companion. (35:20)
• On the Run
  • Fails to appear on narcotics charges, flees California, “hiding out in New Jersey, in Connecticut, under the name Sylvester Allen... Sly Stone ended the 1980s as a fugitive.” (38:40)

6. Down and Out: The Final Falls and Flickers of Hope

• Public Humiliations and Homelessness
  • Misses his own 1974 wedding, disappears from tributes, and is eventually found “penniless, homeless, and living in a white camper van.” (41:30)
• Legal Hope, Crushed
  • Wins $5 million in royalties in 2015, only to have a judge reverse the award within a year: “For 11 months in 2015, Sly Stone lived in a dream … but just like the final years of the 1960s… this dream wasn’t meant to last.” (43:40)

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Sly’s Mission at Woodstock:
  “He led and they followed. Boom shakalakalaka. They’re all in it together… Together they'd be free.” (05:00)
• On the Changing Era:
  “The '60s were over. It was the '70s... Just another glass half full scam that tricked you into believing that things could actually change. And that boogeyman weren’t real. But things weren’t getting better. And the boogeymen were abso-fucking-lutely real.” (06:40)
• On Drug-Aided Ego:
  “The others in the Family Stone chalked it up as the corruption of Sylvester Stewart by his alter ego, which was only made worse by the corruption wrought by the powers that be in Los Angeles. Southern California was fear, drugs and delusion. The heart of darkness, Sly’s own heart, had gone dark.” (12:00)
• Court Defiance:
  Sly’s lawyer: “You can’t do this.”
  Sly: “That’s what I pay you for. So I can do this.” (24:58)
• On the Final Legal Betrayal:
  “For 11 months in 2015, Sly Stone lived in a dream... but just like the final years of the 1960s when Sly and the Family Stone channeled a dream of inclusion, acceptance and joy into their groundbreaking music, this dream wasn’t meant to last... a world that is full of disgrace.” (44:15)

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Important Timestamps

• 03:06 – Episode begins, setting the stage for Sly’s rise and fall
• 05:00 – Woodstock performance and dream of musical unity
• 07:45 – Black Panthers intervention and band politics
• 10:00 – Release of There’s A Riot Goin’ On and musical shift
• 11:03 – Paranoia and Sly’s alter ego takeover
• 20:20 – Grant Park riot caused by Sly's absence
• 22:22 – Police raids, drug busts, and Sly’s indifference
• 24:55 – Notorious courtroom scene
• 32:07 – 1983 Florida drug bust and Sly’s financial ruin
• 38:40 – Sly becomes a literal fugitive, on the run
• 41:30 – Homelessness and public downfall
• 43:40 – Brief hope with $5M legal win, dashed by reversal
• 45:29 – Content ends

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Tone and Style

• Narration combines reverence for Sly’s talents and legacy with a sharp, noirish bite, alternating between empathetic and unsparing.
• Episodes often blur storytelling with direct address and fictionalized inner monologue to evoke the chaos and psychology of their subject.

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Summary: The Takeaway

This episode of DISGRACELAND is essential listening for any student of music history or true crime. It traces not just the public and private disasters of Sly Stone, but also explores the tragic pattern of how fame, genius, addiction, and bad luck can bury even the brightest lights. Sly’s journey is both a cautionary tale and a sorrowful elegy for the era of musical dreams, ending where it began: with a man shaped—then felled—by his own legend.

Transcript

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[Jake Brennan (Disgraceland Narrator)]

Disgraceland is a production of Double Elvis. The stories about Sly Stone are insane. He suspected that his own bass player hired someone to kill him. He was strong armed by the Black Panthers, did cocaine with Miles Davis. His LA mansion was overrun with cocaine, pcp, guns and bodyguards, drawing the attention of local law enforcement. He was soon crossing paths with cops from coast to coast and was busted time and time again for drug offenses, including the time that he went on the lam under a false name and was declared a fugitive from justice. If there is any justice in this world, Sly Stone will be remembered as the mastermind of great music. Music that was intended to break down barriers of race and genre, all in the service of making people happy. That music I played for you at the top of the show. That wasn't great music. That was a preset loop for my melotron called Vanity Calamity MK2. I played you that loop because I can't afford the rights to a clip from Rod Stewart's Maggie Mae. And why would I play you that specific slice of business in the front, party in the back? Geez, could I afford it? Because that was the number one song in America on November 1, 1971. And that was the day Sly and the Family Stone released their fifth studio album, There's a riot Going on. An unexpectedly dark missive that hinted at darker days to come. On this episode, drugs, paranoia, a fugitive from justice, murky missives and Sly Stone. I'm Jake Brennan and this is Disgrace. Sly Stone wanted to take them higher. Every last hippie down there in the mud on old man Yazzger's farm. Half a million easy stone on Acapulco gold. Tired, huddled masses yearning to breathe free. Sly knew where freedom could be found. He had the map. He could light their fire. All they had to do is stand and repeat after him. Higher. 3:30am was an early wake up call. But the people couldn't resist. Tents unzipped, sleeping bags cast aside, every one of them looked up at the stage and saw themselves reflected in the integrated faces of Sly and the Family Stone. Men, women, black, white, everyday people. The rhythm pulsated. It was unrelenting. And so was Sly's call to action. I want to take you higher. The crowd responded by echoing the word back to him. Higher. Sweat ran down Sly's forehead to his oversized glasses. His mutton chops glistened and the fringe jacket felt damp against his skin. It's close now. He could feel it. Freedom. The great release. It was like a God released a pied piper. He led and they followed. Boom shakalakalaka. They're all in it together. Together they'd be free. Together they would move as one. One year later, in 1970, Sly Stone wasn't moving. He didn't want to. Dancing to the music. Let's nod and say we did. Staying in one place, living inside yourself. Now that felt great. Sly rarely left the home studio in the loft of his Tudor style mansion at 783 Bel Air, the one he was renting from Papa John Phillips. When he did step out, he cruised LA's freeways in a cocoon on wheels. 36 foot Winnebago. He didn't engage with the outside world. It wanted too much from him to perform night after night, to take everyone higher. The pressure was overwhelming. The attention was a mind fuck. He was on his own trip now and he was taking no passengers. Those blissed out masses back at old man Yasker's farm, they could find their own way. Sly's new path was dimly lit and was paved with cocaine and pcp. And it led him here. Inside, alone, safe to outsiders, the place felt anything but safe. Sly's unhinged pitbull, that bug eyed named Gun. Yes, that's right, a pitbull named Gun. If he didn't make you paranoid, then the hired muscle with actual guns did. Who the fuck were these guys anyway? They weren't around back in San Francisco. They only started showing up once Sly moved to la. The drugs, the people, the vibe. Everything was different in LA. But then everything was different everywhere. The 60s were over. It was the 70s, Martin's dream, the hippie's dream. There were memories. Everyone just woke up. Dig it for what it is. A dream. Just another glass half full scam that tricked you into believing that things could actually change. And that boogeyman weren't real. But things weren't getting better. And the boogeymen were abso fucking lutely real. They had names like Crazy Charlie and Tricky Dick. They'd always been there and they always would be. Doing the dirty work with a flashlight while your back was turned. Or walking through your front door with a pistol aimed right between your eyes after you opened them, really opened them for the very first time. 1970, now that was a reality. Everywhere you turned there was a riot going on. Hard hats beating on anti war protesters in the streets. In New York City, snipers on the roof at Jackson State police cruisers burning in Coachella, four dead. In Ohio, the Panthers. They claimed they were on Sly's side, that they were part of the solution. But Sly was looking out for number one. Now he only trusted a few like his right hand man, Hamp, Bubba Banks, Bobby Womack and Billy Preston. Miles was alright. That new record, Bitches Brew, was a motherfucker. No, worked out. Sly wanted to make soul music that sounded like that. Miles liked to swing by Sly's mansion, head on up to the loft where Sly was working on new shit. Miles found Sly overdubbing that same track so many times that the sound coming from the reel was murky as fuck. Murky, just like Miles voice. Sly, you got any of that blow? But the Panthers, what did they really want? Not to share in Sly's stache. They had their motives. They wanted Sly's music for themselves. And they were prepared to get it by any means necessary. They strong armed him to dump his white manager, fire his drummer, Greg Aurico, and his saxophone player, Greg's cousin, Jerry Martini, both of them white, and replace them with black musicians. That was what made Sly and the Family Stones so great in the first place. It wasn't by chance that Sly hired black players and white players. He assembled that band was intention. Could Jerry Martini blow as well as some of the other cats? Didn't matter. He was the right guy for the part. In more ways than one. Just like the song said, everybody was a star. The Panthers did get their way, even though they weren't the ones to make it happen. Gregoryco saw the writing on the wall. Sly's ego and the ascendant, the all for one and one for all ethos that had driven the family stone for years. Mere vapor trails in its wake. If Sly wasn't laying down the track himself, he was having someone like Bobby or Billy do it rather than one of his own band members. Shit, he'd get Miles to blow more of the cocaine if he could. Greg knew what that meant. Pretty Soon Sly would replace Greg with that maestro rhythm king Mark two. He was in love with a fucking machine. Gregorico bailed before the record was even finished. When that record, There's a Riot Going on, was finally released In November of 1971, two years had passed since Woodstock, closer to two and a half years since the band's last studio album. Regardless, Riot went to number one because people were clamoring for something new from Sly. But what they got wasn't what they expected. There's a Riot Going on with hangover music. It sounded exhausted, pessimistic. The vibrant, life affirming songs that defined the family. Stone's first four studio albums were long gone. You even Family Affair, the lead off single, was funk music on life Support. Rock critic Grail Marcus famously referred to the record as Muzak with its finger on the trigger. And although it's since been reevaluated as one of the greatest U turns in rock history, at the time of its release, There's A Riot Going on sounded like a shock. It even shocked Larry Graham, the band's bass player. Larry just wanted to be funky. Would this shit? Most definitely was not. At least not in a conventional sense. It didn't help that Sly begun to suspect Larry had hired his own muscle to do him in. Someone had tried to poison him. Sly was sure of it. At a party. Who else was the target of those spiked drinks, if not Sly? Such was the conceit of ego. And the ego had landed an alter ego. Sly Stone was just that. A character created by a man named Sylvester Stewart. And Sylvester Stewart wasn't himself anymore. He was the other guy. He was Sly. Sly was taking over. Sly was obsessed. Sly fixated. Sly said, did you see that shadow? What was that noise? Who is that person over there and are they cool? Somebody's watching you, brother. The others in the face. Family Stone chalked it up as the corruption of Sylvester Stewart by his alter ego, which was only made worse by the corruption wrought by the powers that be in Los Angeles. Southern California was fear, drugs and delusion. The heart of darkness, Sly's own heart, had gone dark. None of this even faced him. Not even in February of 1973 when the pounding started on the front door of 783 Bel Air. Loud, aggressive. Could be the county sheriff immediately, maybe the feds. Look around. Cocaine everywhere. Angel dust, sedatives, rifles, guns. And that psycho mutt. But Sly didn't panic. Sly oozed cool. Sly Stone had people to take care of like this. People on both the right and the wrong side of the law. But the guy who created this Sly Stone alter ego, Sylvester Stewart, he was scared shitless. He wasn't non plus like Sly, he was plussed as Sly was in control like he always was. Sly said, yeah man, let him come in. Let him break down the door. What did he have to lose? Sylvester Stewart, meanwhile, was sweating his ass off. He had plenty to lose. The question was just how much would he lose when that front door swung open and the outside world came crashing in? Foreign.

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[Jake Brennan (Disgraceland Narrator)]

Word was Sly Stone had gone full on Howard Hughes. He was a recluse, a hermit growing out his fingernails and pissing into jars. The rumors were everywhere. Sly Stone was not. Sly was once the ecstatic face of rock and roll's future. And that face was all over the place. The Oakland Coliseum, Winterland in San Francisco. The Psychedelic Supermarket in Boston. The Fillmore west. The Fillmore East, Detroit, Vegas, Decatur, Harlem, Ed Sullivan, Top of the Pops and the COVID of Rolling stone magazine. From 1967 to 1969, Sly and the Family Stone cranked out four breathless albums and a couple of non album singles that mashed genres and blue minds. Dance to the music, sing a simple song. Thank you for letting me be myself again. Everyday people they could not miss. They were the epitome of late 60s cool on the cutting edge of the music industry. And they delivered each new creation with confidence and virtuosic talent. Sly Stone had worked towards this moment for years. Back in Vallejo, when he was still just Sylvester Stewart, one of five kids singing gospel music in his father's Pentecostal church, touring churches up and down California. He knew he was probably the most talented kid in the house, full of talent. But he didn't hog that talent. He spread the love and the joy. His idea of family wasn't limited to the people living under his roof. He ran with a local gang. Actually, the Cherry Busters were less a gang and more a bunch of kids who just wanted to look cool together. Which, as anyone who has started a rock band can attest, is probably even more important than sounding cool for at least the beginning stages. But Sylvester sounded cool from the jump. His dynamic voice made him a regional celebrity. As a DJ on KSOL fm, the number two black station in San Francisco. He spun Dylan and the Beatles next to his latest R and B tracks. No one was crossing genres like that on commercial radio. His reputation as a tastemaker grew. A small local label hired him as a house producer. Sly oversaw early hits by white rock groups like the Beau Brummels and the Mojo Men. Legend has it he even helped a little Bay Area band called the warlocks produce their 1965 track Can't Come down, just one month before they changed their name to the Grateful Dead. Music was freedom. Black, white rock, soul. Any attempts to define a song didn't do it justice. It undersold the experience. Music was about expression, the feel, the harmony, the possibility. When he became Sly Stone, Sylvester Stewart took it one step further. He wanted his music to make people happy, no matter their color or creed. Sly and the Family Stone walked that walk from their inception in 1966. Sly's brother Freddie on guitar and Larry Graham on bass. Two black men, Sly's sister Rose on keys and Cynthia Robeson on trumpet. Two black women, Jerry Martini on saxophone and Gregorico on drums. Two white men. But when they sang thank you for letting me be myself, they didn't just mean their gender or color or their skin. They were talking about all that leopard print robes and capes, wigs and go go skirts, Afros and neon jewelry and goggle shades. Like. Like any gang worth their salt, the Family Stone had their look down. It took them until their second album, 1968's Dance to the Music, to get their sound down, too. The album's title track, which managed to introduce all seven members of the band in just three minutes was the band's first top 10 hit. As the calendar turned from 1968 to 1969, their single Everyday People held the number one spot on the Billboard Hot 100 for four weeks. Weeks. But Sly Stone, or rather Sylvester Stewart self doubt grew in equal measure to his band's success. What if the next single wasn't as good as the last? What if the band couldn't maintain this level of excellence? What if the crowds kept getting bigger? Sly went from being everywhere to being nowhere. In 1970 alone, he missed 26 of the Family Stone's 80 scheduled gigs. It's not like he was backstage with a case of cold feet, bailing at the last minute. He didn't even bother to show up. That was a rumor floating around the crowd of 75,000 at Grant park in Chicago, July 1970. The free show was an olive branch from an unreliable and erratic grifter. A show to make up for the last Chicago show, which Sly had missed. The rumors ran as hot as a 90 degree temperature. Sly didn't give a fuck about Chicago. Shit, man, Sly wasn't even in the state. The audience was hot, drunk and stoned. They chanted Sly's name over and over. But Sly never took the stage, so the crowd did. Thousands of people surged feet, trampled bodies, bottles and rocks soared through the air. Chicago PD swarmed the crowd picked up whatever they could find sticks, dirt, scraps of asphalt, tossed them. And the cops responded with tear gas. Red and swollen faces cried out. Windows shut, shattered street signs and lampposts uprooted. A police cruiser was overturned. Another was set on fire. Rioters jumped from the bushes and ambushed the cops. The pigs are retreating. They yelled like they were on the Cambodian border. Keep attacking. The cops drew their service revolvers. Shots rang out. Hot fun in the summertime. At 9:50pm about six hours after the riot began, it was over 150 arrests. At least 100 people, including 24 cops were treated for injuries. Three kids have been shot by the police. And Sly Stone? He was far, far away. He was back home. Some said he only left his sanctuary to ride around in his Winnebago. Others said an imposter was now playing the role of Sly. The real Sly Stone. Sylvester Stewart. That motherfucker was dead. LAPD got that particular tip from a ph phone call. It was 1973. A voice on the other end of the line said, there's a dead body at 783 Bel Air. The cops went over to Sly's place, ready for anything his reputation preceded him. He had a recent bust at his Winnebago out on Santa Monica Boulevard to thank for that. Now cops were banging on Sly's front door and his muscle tried to stall. No use. The cops were inside within seconds. They told everyone to stay where they were and not to fucking move. They opened every drawer or returned every cushion. No dead body. Lots of guns. Drugs, too. Sly Stone didn't give a fuck. And when Sylvester Stewart protested from somewhere in the back of his mind, Sly placated him with more drugs. Later at the courthouse, Sly slipped into the bathroom to snort coke off the countertop. He could do whatever he wanted. Go AWOL from a scheduled concert, get high in court. He was untouchable. His lawyer disagreed. Sly, you can't do this. His lawyer said. That's what I pay you for. Sly responded, so I can do this. Sly's defense argued that the guns the LAPD confiscated were part of an antique collection and that the pills were prescription drugs. Sly didn't know if the cops had found any of the cocaine or pcp. He was barely paying attention, and he didn't really care. In the end, he got one year's probation and court ordered rehab. That little slap on the wrist didn't so much hurt. But the next slap did. That came courtesy of Clive Davis, president of Columbia Records, parent company of Sly's label, Epic. Clive was irritated. Sly was late delivering his new album. There's a Riot Going on was two years old now, and why couldn't Sly be more like Marvin or Stevie? For Sly's peers, every year meant at least one new album. Wasn't Sly a jack genius like the rest? It didn't help that the Record Plant in Sausalito, the one place Sly would leave his home studio for these days, wasn't exactly conducive to getting work done. They built Sly's own room, called the Pit. Sunken floor, carpeted Jacuzzi, loft bed for when the hours stretched into days. Clive was pissed. He suspended Sly's contract. Shape up or ship out. Fuck that, Sly thought. No one told me Sly one to finish a record. Not even Clive Davis. So Sly took matters into his own hands. He went down to the Record Plant flanked by two of his dudes, big menacing types. The Record Plant's manager didn't know if these were the guys she'd heard about. Underworld mafioso types like Edward Eddie chin Elliott or J.R. valtrano. The kind of company Sly kept these days. But she didn't need to know their names. She saw the pieces strapped to their belts. And she knew they meant business. And when Sly spoke in that low, menacing voice, practically an octave deeper than how he sounded on the records, it was obvious he was all business. Give me my fucking tapes. The tapes, AKA Sly's still unfinished new album. But the tapes didn't belong to Sly. They were property of Epic. Sly could give a damn. Those were his songs on those tapes. His voice, his blood, his sweat, his tears. He repeated his demand. The fucking tapes. Now. The studio manager wasn't backing down. Sly Stone didn't scare her. If one of his goons wanted to get nuts, then fine, let's get nuts. Go ahead and shoot. Sly knew this wasn't working. He calmed his voice, told his guys to chill. He asked the manager if the two of them could speak privately in a different room, out of earshot of his muscle, Sly went from a shot caller to a beggar. Don't embarrass me, he said. Please just give me the tapes. But the studio manager wasn't the one embarrassing Sly. He was just embarrassing himself. And he knew it was true. He left the record plant empty handed. And he felt about as low as that sunken floor room at the record plant. And soon he'd feel even lower.

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[Jake Brennan (Disgraceland Narrator)]

June 22, 1983. Fort Myers, Florida Ramada Airport Hotel. There was no answer from room 221. The bellhop knocked a second time with his free hand. The other hand balanced a tray of hotel food. He waited. Nothing. This was odd. He knew someone was in there. The front desk had received several calls that morning. Sly Stone demanding room service. He sounded as angry as the previous night when he stoned into the hotel lobby after playing at a local bar. Said the owner stiffed him, didn't pay up. That pissed Sly off. Not just because it was wrong, but because Sly needed the money. Bad finances have been a bitch since the mid-1970s. Fresh the album psy labored over at the record plan and finally delivered in the middle of 1973 was a solid effort with some great songs like the single if youf Want Me To Stay. But each subsequent release offered diminishing returns. The bottom line in his bank account diminished too. And so did the family Stone original members left one by one. It was hard not to embrace complete disillusionment while your bandleader embraced complete self destruction. By the time of the 1976 album heard you'd miss Me while I'm Back, Cynthia Robinson was the only holdover from the glory days. And even she eventually left. Despite the record's title, no one was missing Sly all that much by that point. The title of his next album, 1979's Back on the Right Track, gave the impression that things were chugging along just fine. It was all for show. Sly had gone off the rails long before. In the mid-70s, broke, strung out and still paranoid, Sly Stone hit up his friend and one time manager Ken Roberts for some money. Sly was desperate. In exchange for the cash, he irrevocably made Roberts the recipient of his performance right royalties, which is the money a songwriter is paid every time a song. Songs were performed, meaning on the radio, concerts, jukeboxes, stadiums. So not a good deal for Sly. And then in 1980, the IRS levied a multi million dollar tax lien on Sly's income due to years of unpaid taxes. Which meant that he didn't even see the majority of the money he was making from his music. Sly had nothing left but a habit. And he felt that habit call out to him. As he made a beeline through the lobby of the Fort Myers Ramada, his nerve shook like a low E string plucked by Larry Graham's thumb. Freedom awaited him upstairs in room 221. The next morning, the bellhop continued to knock on Sly's door Louder. This time, still only silence. He began to worry, what with Sly's demeanor the night before and the reputation he dragged around. The bellhop called for the general manager, who quickly appeared with a key. He unlocked the door and slowly turned the doorknob. The men stepped inside. They saw two bodies, Sly Stone and a woman, both out cold. Next to Sly was a glass pipe, a torch, a razor with white powder. When the paramedics arrived, Sly was starting to come too. They asked him if he'd been freebasing cocaine. Yes, Sly responded, but it's all gone. Not just the drugs, the money, the family, Stone, everything was gone. But Sly Stone was given a chance to get it all back. The good things, at least. If he stayed away from drugs, then the money, the family, the music, they could all be his again. He just had to do one thing. All he had to do was recognize that Sly Stone was a character that he, Sylvester Stewart, had control over. And if Sylvester refused to give in to Sly's demands, he didn't cater to Sly's every urge. He'd once again achieved greatness. This was the solution presented by the staff at the Lee Mental health clinic, a six acre retreat in Fort Myers where Sly Stone did six months of court ordered drug rehab in 1984 following his conviction for possessing freebasing paraphernalia. For those six months, it seemed to work. Sly receded into the background and Sylvester peeked out from behind those dark, oversized glasses. He was clean, coherent, focused. He was thankful and thoughtful. But when he was released from rehab, he was still broke. Sylvester Stewart didn't make the money. Sly Stone made the money. Sly Stone had always made the money. So Sly Stone got to work. Sly sold his publishing interest in most of his compositions to Michael Jackson as a way to pay off debts. This was in 1985, the same year that the Kingdom Pop famously took control of the Beatles catalog from Paul McCartney. And then at the end of the decade, according to Sly himself, Sly began a professional relationship with a manager named Jerry Goldstein. Sly later alleged that between December of 1988 and February of 1989, Goldstein, through his company, Goldstein Music, made about 30 loans to Sly. $100 here, $100 there. The loans helped Sly pay living expenses and pay for more cocaine. But in late February 1989, Goldstein and his attorney had a new proposition. If Sly wanted to keep getting cash loans and thus keep getting drugs, Goldstein told him that he needed to sign an agreement that made his entity, even street, the manager of Sly's personal and professional financial affairs. The pitch was this Sly was still in deep with the irs. It would be better if his assets weren't in his name and if his royalty payments weren't being sent directly to him. The deal is a lifeline. It would ensure that his cash flow wouldn't completely dry up and that there would always be a little scratch he could get his hands on when he was desperate. Because in 1989, at the end of a decade in which he was arrested numerous times for failure to pay child support, for possession of cocaine, for violation of probation, and for state narcotics charges charges, Sly Stone was perhaps more desperate than he'd ever been. He failed to appear in an LA court for those narcotics charges and instead fled the state, running away at a getaway. He was hiding out in New Jersey, in Connecticut, under the name Sylvester Allen. A California judge issued a bench warrant for his arrest. Sly stone ended the 1980s as a fugitive. Sly Stone was nowhere to be found. But what else was new? He was always late. He was late to his own wedding in May of 1974, in front of 21,000 people at Madison Square Garden. Decades later, in 2000, in 2006, he was late to a musical tribute in his honor at the Grammy Awards. Five songs into a star studded medley, he appeared. Blonde mohawk, silver robe, platform boots, cast on one arm, only to bounce after he played half of one song. It was all part of Sly's legend. His behavior grew to overshadow his astonishing body of music. He was the J.D. salinger of funk. He was unstable and unreliable, the wildest of wild cards in rock and roll's deck. A once brilliant pop and funk king whose years of hard drugs turned him into a joker. Sly Stone was a cautionary tale. And now in 2010, the crowd at the Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival were kicking themselves for not heeding that tale. For allowing themselves to get excited over a comeback show and a reunion that on paper, seemed like a long time shot. It was two in the morning, some three hours after a reunited Sly and the Family Stone were scheduled to take the stage. The collective desire to witness Sly take a festival crowd higher like he had all those years before at Woodstock, that was the ultimate act of desperation by fans stuck in their past. You can make it if you try. More naive hippie dippy that was. But then, a little after 2am People began to take the stage. There were the horn players, Cynthia and Jerry. And look, Freddie Stone. Shit Gregory on drums. It was happening. The Family Stone were materializing right before their eyes. And then Sly. Was it really him? The guy in the long blonde wig with the captain's hat. Holy shit. It was him. But the band's attempt to finish just one song were fractured and pitiful. Ditto for every time Sly stopped the song to mumble into the mic. He told the crowd that he'd been kidnapped, that he had a lawsuit pending against his former manager, Jerry Goldstein, and that he'd been living in hotels. It all sounded like the ramblings of a crazy person, but there was some truth to what he was saying. The following year, in 2011, a profile in the New York Post revealed that Sly was, in fact penniless, homeless, and living in a white camper van that he parked on the side of a residential street in LA's Crenshaw neighborhood. Just a few years earlier, the cash advances had stopped rolling in from Jerry Goldstein. Sly had nothing. And that caused him to take a harder look at the agreements he signed back in 1989. He cried foul, said he'd been conned, coerced to sign his life away when he was at his most vulnerable. And then after he signed the agreements, Jerry Goldstein's lawyer negotiated a settlement of Sly's IRS tax lien in 1996, which meant that for 15 years, Sly's royalties were not going to tax collectors, but to banks and companies managed by Goldstein, including roughly $3 million from BMI alone. So Sly sued, and in 2015, a Los Angeles Superior Court jury found that Sly Stone had not been fully paid for his songwriting royalties. Jerry Goldstein, his lawyer, and their entity, Even street, owed Sly $5 million in royalties and damages. The verdict was huge. Sly thanked the everyday people of the jury. With that money, he could stop living in a van on the streets. He could pull himself out of poverty. Sly Stone, one of the most creative musical minds of the 20th century, could finally get some of his dignity back, get clean and make a new record. Take the people higher one more time. And maybe Sylvester Stewart would get his too. Once again, take control over his alter ego like he had for those few months at the Lee Mental Health clinic in the 80s. Put the bad shit behind him. Forget about running away, living on the lam, busted under a phony name in Connecticut and extradited back to California. They locked him up. They never threw away the key. Forget about the more recent run ins with Johnny Law, like the one in 2011 when the LAPD pulled over his van for some stupid traffic violation and claimed they found cocaine rocks in his clothes. Freedom from all that bullshit was going to be a brand new high. But the high didn't last. Just 11 months after winning his court case in December of 2015, a Superior Court judge ruled that Sly Stone would not be able to collect the $5 million after all. In his decision, the judge said that when Sly Stone assigned his royalties to even street in 1989, he was given a 50% ownership in the company. In return, Mr. Stewart entered the agreement with the assistance of advisors, the judge wrote, and received a substantial benefit. At the time of the ruling, Sly Stone was 72 years old. For 11 months in 2000 2015, Sly Stone lived in a dream. A dream in which he got what he was owed and then some. A dream in which things finally went up for once instead of down. A dream where the world took Sly Stone higher. But just like the final years of the 1960s, when Sly and the Family Stone channeled a dream of inclusion, acceptance and joy into their groundbreaking music, this dream wasn't meant to last. It ended like all dreams do, leaving Sly Stone living in the here and now, in the real world, a world that is full of disgrace. I'm Jake Brennan and this is Disgraceland. Disgrace Land was created by yours truly and is produced in partnership with Double Elvis. Credits for this episode can be found on the show notes [e-mail] if you're listening as a Disgraceland All Access member, thank you for supporting the show. We really appreciate it. And if not, you can become a member right now by going to Disgracelandpod.com membership members can listen to every episode of Disgraceland Ad free plus plus you'll get one brand new exclusive episode every month, weekly unscripted bonus episodes, special audio collections, and early access to merchandise and events. Visit disgracelandpod.com membership for details, rate and review the show and follow us on Instagram, TikTok, Twitter and Facebook Disgracelandpod and on [e-mail] Disgracelandpod Rocka Rolla

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