Based in The Hague, The Netherlands (40 miles from Amsterdam) Edwin and Arno Konings have been working on their upcoming biography of Sly & The Family Stone for the past seven years.

The identical twin brothers, born in 1971, have had a passion for music all their lives. As young kids, they started investigating all kinds of popular music, but as they look back now, Edwin and Arno realise it was all about the rhythm. With the guidance of their older brothers, in the early 1980s the twins discovered, amongst others, Michael Jackson, Prince and James Brown. In particular, seeing Prince performing live in 1986 had a big impact on both of them.

That same summer, the BBC series “Rock School” was broadcast on Dutch television, in which famous musicians demonstarted their technique. The episode “Funk” featured bass player Larry Graham, who talked not only about his style, but also the group that he had started out with: Sly & The Family Stone. Edwin and Arno got very excited about the music Larry was playing, and shortly afterwards, they went out and bought Sly & The Family Stone’s Greatest Hits. The sounds it contained blew their minds; the rhythm, the words, they had never heard such music before! This was the start of an obsession with Sly’s music that has continued to this current day.

During the 1990s, the twins also became very interested in Sly’s background, and searched out any information they could about the man and his music. But what they found amongst the rock history books and old magazine articles wasn’t very satisfying. “In our search for information, we mostly came across negative stories about the band,” they say. “Not many people talked about Sly’s music, and to our surprise, there wasn’t even a decent biography out there. We couldn’t believe it, because Sly & The Family Stone have such an important place in pop music history. Their influence can still be clearly heard today”.

After years of patiently expecting a proper book on Sly & The Family Stone, it was Arno who came up with the idea for the twins to write it themselves, even though neither were professional writers. Soon plans were being made. Knowing that this project would take an enormous amount of effort and time, and with both tied to regular jobs, Edwin and Arno had to set their priorities. Edwin was playing guitar in a funk band, and even produced a recording with George Clinton and Parliament-Funkadelic (another musical hero of the brothers), but he decided he had to quit to concentrate on the book.

Edwin and Arno started their journey early 2002. Through Dawn Silva and Cynthia Robinson, they got in touch with Freddie Stone, and after meeting the twins in person at a Vallejo, California diner that summer, Freddie pledged his full support to their project. That sealed it for the brothers, and over the next month they drove 3500 miles across California and interviewed over 35 people. It was a fantastic start!

Now, eight years later, Edwin and Arno have spoken with more then 250 people connected to Sly & The Family Stone, amongst them musicians, friends, engineers, managers and of course, Sly himself and all other original members of this incredible outfit.