Rediscovering Del Jones, the 1970s Philly funk bandleader and activist whose music is being reissued after 50 years

It only took 50 years, but Del Jones’ music — and his message — are being heard loud and clear, again.

In 1973, Jones — a West Philadelphia bandleader, protorapper, and political activist who died in 2006 — put out two LPs of hard-hitting James Brown-meets-Gil Scott-Heron funk and jazz.

The two releases were the raw Court Is Closed, with propulsive rhythms shot through with psychedelic rock, and the polished Del Jones’ Positive Vibes, which reworked the former with horns arranged by Jones’ uncle Herbie Jones, a veteran of Duke Ellington’s band.

Each is a portal back to an early ‘70s era when Black liberation politics fused with the expansive musical vision of groups like Jones’ and kindred Philly spirits such as Sounds of Liberation, Nat Turner Rebellion, and Sun Ra Arkestra.

Both LPs were self-released in extremely limited quantities — 500 for Court is Closed, 2,500 for Positive Vibes. And each became a rare commodity among collectors, valued for muscular grooves and gritty stories of inner city life told in songs like “Inside Black America” and “Times Are Hard, Friends Are Few.”

» READ MORE: Fifty years later, the sole surviving member of Philly funk band Nat Turner Rebellion finally sees its debut album released

Now, those stories, and Del Jones’ own, are again being told.

That’s thanks to the reissue of Jones’ music by Los Angeles’ Now-Again Records, which has released both albums plus a third disc with protests like “Attica” and workouts such as “Big Feet (Philly Reggae)” in a three-LP package. The music is also available on streaming services.

The LP package puts forth Del Jones as “Underground Philadelphia’s response to Amiri Baraka’s and Gil Scott-Heron’s indictment of the Black American experience.” That’s not an overreach. The reissue lifts the cover off a little known chapter in Philadelphia music history, but it also gives new voice to inspired music, unjustly unheard. “It’s not just a feel-good hometown story,” said Philly DJ Cosmo Baker. “It’s that potent. It’s that good.”

Now-Again is headed by Eothen Alapatt, whose passion for Jones’ music began when he was a teenage hip-hop fan in Connecticut in the 1990s. Eventually, it led him to knock on the door of Jones’ brother, Wayman, in Mount Airy in 2019.

The knock came at an opportune time, said Wayman Jones. The percussionist, who joined Del’s band at 16, spoke while sitting between older brothers Simeon and Deke on his living room couch.

“Deke and I had always wanted to rerelease the Del Jones’ Positive Vibes album,” Wayman Jones said.

Deke Jones said Del was “the creative force” among the seven brothers who grew up in West Philly, sons of a World War II veteran and beautician father, Simeon, and mother Ellen, a nurse.

Court is Closed was recorded in 1973 at Regent Sound, the studio at 309 S. Broad St. that was the home of American Bandstand-era Philly label Cameo-Parkway. Later, it would become an outpost of Sigma Sound Studios.

That year was auspicious for the Sound of Philadelphia. Philadelphia International Records acts like the O’Jays, with “Love Train,” and Intruders, with “I’ll Always Love My Mama,” had cheerful hits. But a socially conscious movement was growing, with songs like Billy Paul’s “Am I Black Enough For You?” and the O’Jays’ “Don’t Call Me Brother.”

Meanwhile, Del Jones occupied the underground. The band played the Church of the Advocate in North Philly and Lee Cultural Center in West Philly, and traveled to HBCUs like Cheyney University and Howard University in Washington.

“Del was in a different lane,” said Alfie Pollitt, a Philly musician who played with Teddy Pendergrass and Billy Paul. He remembers gigs with Jones at Thomas Hall at Temple University with the Original Slave Singers, a vocal group he played piano with that sang Negro spirituals.

“Major records were being put out worldwide,” Pollitt said. “Simultaneously, Del was doing his thing. He was like the Last Poets or James Brown. Or a combination of both, and beyond.”

Jones’ music deals in harsh themes, like drug addiction, but carries hope. “Hey! Put that needle away and get with your brother,” Jones talk-sings in “Needle ‘N Spoon.”

But with the records issued on Jones’ Hikeka label without distribution, commercial reach was limited. In books he self-published in the 1980s and 1990s, Del Jones called himself a “war correspondent.”

“He was reporting on a war against African African people in Africa, but also African people in America,” said Deke Jones, 74, owner of the Know Thyself Bookstore in West Philly.

“From the day he was born to the day he died, I never saw him compromise on anything,” said Simeon Jones, 85. He was once fired by a Philly alternative newspaper for a column critical of Nelson Mandela, Deke Jones pointed out.

Positive Vibes remains the Joneses’ favorite. “It was always important to him to create music that moved you as well as informed you,” Wayman Jones said. “To educate, and be educated. He was always growing.”

It didn’t make inroads commercially and the band had ceased playing together by the late 1970s. But through Positive Vibes, Del Jones’ reputation grew over the decades, as diligent crate diggers discovered it.

“I was hip to that record on record-digging message boards maybe 20 years ago,” said Baker, the Philly DJ. “It was a big record in the rare funk and soul community.” A physical copy would sell for $1,000. The scarcer Court Is Closed, for three or four times that.

Alapatt first heard Positive Vibes in the 1990s. In 2006, he discovered Court Is Closed and decided to find Del Jones, only to learn he had recently died.

Years went by, said Alapatt, the creative director of the estate of hip-hop producer J Dilla, before Jones’ widow, Quaraandin “Sistah Q” Jones, pointed him to Deke and Wayman.

In 2019, Alapatt was in Philadelphia with producer Madlib for Made in America. When a ride to Know Thyself looking for Deke yielded no results, Alapatt headed to Mount Airy with fingers crossed to knock on Wayman Jones’ door.

“I heard music playing inside, so that’s always a good sign,” he said.

During a three-hour chat, Wayman Jones was impressed by the duo’s knowledge of Del Jones and the deal was cemented.

The reissue has taken three and half years, including restoration of tapes damaged in a flood in Del Jones’ house in the Wynnefield section of Philadelphia.

“Our goal was to get Del’s message and music out with an understanding of the sacrifices that Del endured,” Wayman Jones says. Now, “there’s a real feeling of completeness, if there is such a word. The family has a satisfaction about Del’s work and how it’s being appreciated even after 50 years. We’re closer because of the experience.”