George Clinton’s new memoir recalls crazy career

You think you know Dr. Funkenstein. And your bop gun is loaded for the return of the Mothership, when George Clinton & Parliament Funkadelic play Brooklyn Bowl at The Linq on Tuesday.

But last year brought us the 74-year-old Clinton's autobiography, complete with a typically Byzantine-funky title: "Brothas Be, You Like George, Ain't That Funkin' Kinda Hard on You?"

A few random tidbits found in its pages should prime you for the show:

• Clinton once worked in a Wham-O factory making Hula Hoops, and let neighborhood kids assemble them.

• The Mothership, the aluminum spaceship and queen of all concert props (it ended up in the Smithsonian) was created by Broadway lighting designer Jules Fisher. His reach extends to Las Vegas shows such as "Le Reve," bearing out Clinton's claim, "soul music had never seen anything like it — for that matter, neither had rock and roll. It was like a Broadway show in the most elaborate sense, or what Las Vegas would become decades later."

• Andrew Dice Clay could have at least said thanks for the dirty nursery rhymes in "Let's Take It to the Stage." The comedian "used much of that material later, and made quite a bit of money with it," Clinton writes.

• First daughter Chelsea Clinton came to a show in Atlanta in 1996. "We set up to take a picture, and at the last minute it occurred to me that maybe I should conceal the little crack pipe I was holding in my hand," he writes. "I made a fist around it." Although it burned, the People magazine photo reveals no pipe.

Read more from Mike Weatherford at bestoflasvegas.com. Contact him at mweatherford@reviewjournal.com.