Get yourself the 20 song Sly & The Family Stone Anthology. If it leaves your CD player in less than a year, you’ve done better than me.
Good point - it was on a CD I got called Pure Funk, and I ripped the CD and just left it in there.
Funnily enough, a song came on the radio a couple weeks ago, and during the intro, I was like, “Cool, what is this funky song?” Turns out it was Disco Inferno!
**Prince **- Housequake(“Shut up, already - Damn!”)
Isley Brothers - Fight the Power
Stevie Wonder - Superstition
James Brown - Get up Offa that Thing
And - for the win:
**Isley Brothers **- Living in the Life / Go for Your Guns I don’t know what I love better: the greasiest clavinet tone on the planet (that’s the thick keyboard/synth riff you hear) or Ernie Isley’s huge Hendrix guitar freak out starting the transition into the Go For Your Guns half of the track…
I’m going to second this heartily.
I would say Sly, George Clinton, and of course James Brown have got to be the holy trinity of funk. Outside of those three, you’ve got to have Tower of Power, Curtis Mayfield (Superfly), Earth, Wind & Fire, Ohio Players (Fire and Honey) and Rick James.
From my ever-expanding funk playlist (not comprehensive):
Tower of Power - What Is Hip?
James Brown - Make It Funky
George Clinton - Atomic Dog
Ohio Players - Fire
Rick James - Give it to me, Baby
The Commodores - Brick House
Earth, Wind & Fire - Shining Star
War - Low Rider latin funk
Zapp & Roger - More Bounce to the Ounce vocoder funk
Parliament - P-Funk (Wants To Get Funked Up) Can you imagine Doobie in your funk?
Curtis Mayfield - Pusherman soulful funk
Oh, by the bye, Muppets from Space has an awesome funk soundtrack - mostly stuff that’s been mentioned here, but it’s fun to watch in the movie - especially the household waking up and starting their day to Brick House.
Great suggestions so far. I was looking for things somewhat off the beaten path-- like Betty Davis, who knew? Some more of my favs
Prince Sexy MF Warning: The song doesn’t start until about 1:30
Graham Central Station The Jam.
Mandrill Fat City Strut
Chamber Brothers The Time Has Come Today
Bootsy Collins Bootzilla
Brothers Johnson Get The Funk Outta My Face.
On the R&B tip, The Miracles without Smokey Love Machine.
If you keep 'em coming, so will I.
WordMan funked me up good! Never heard that Isley Brother’s.
Good call!
I did a bunch of downloading today, and it looks like I’ll be doing more tomorrow. 
I got a bizarre one for you - Primus - Tommy the Cat. I have a strange fondness for Primus.
Excellent! I was thinking of starting this thread myself.
For me, one of the funkiest tracks ever is from the soundtrack of Coffy by Roy Ayers: Aragon
It, along with a couple of other tracks from the film also turns up in the soundtrack of Jackie Brown, presumably as a tribute to Pam Grier’s body of work. ETA: Actually, the whole of the coffy soundtrack is well worth a listen if you like this track.
I can’t add anything but hearty agreement with all the Sly Stone recommendations and I see “Pusherman” by Curtis Mayfield has already been mentioned. However, I think “Freddie’s Dead” is pretty spectacular too.
Finally, it’s definitely more on the pop side of the funk axis, but I just adore The Spnners’ Rubberband Man. It’s so happy and life afirming! Still, then again I always think a couple of Chic’s tracks are the unbelievably funky, especially “Good Times” and “Le Freak”.
Prince - My Name is Prince His name is Prince, and he is funky.
That Bootzilla link doesn’t work for me. Here it is again.