Mothership Connection (Star Child)
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
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"Mothership Connection (Star Child)" is a funk song by Parliament. It was the third and last single released from the group's 1975 album Mothership Connection. The song introduces George Clinton's messianic alien alter ego Star Child for the first time (see P-Funk mythology).
The lyrics "Swing down, sweet chariot, stop and let me ride" quote the traditional spiritual "Swing Down, Chariot", first popularized in the 1940s by The Golden Gate Quartet and later recorded by Elvis Presley among others (and not the better-known spiritual "Swing Low, Sweet Chariot").
The track "Let Me Ride" on the Dr. Dre album The Chronic is heavily based on samples from this song.
In 1998, Scott Grooves produced a remix version of this song under the title Mothership Reconnection, followed by yet another remix by Daft Punk. The music video for the Daft Punk version hinted at the modernizing of the song by showing characters inspired by Clinton's Star Child mythology re-made in the visual style of the 1982 movie Tron.
