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But even before he became a proto-rap funkster and gymnastic phenomenon, Brown was a compelling vocalist whose first hit, “Please, Please, Please,” conveyed an extreme, desperate urgency seldom heard in R&B.

With the crowd providing the "Oh no, let's go" refrain in Let's Go Crazy, the Minneapolis funkster raises one eyebrow, reels off a blistering Jimi Hendrix-style guitar wail and disappears in a cloud of smoke.

“We are the fathers of jazz-funk-fusion, and I am a funkster at heart,” Mr. Henderson said in an interview with The Los Angeles Times in 1995.

The Funkster's bag typically weighs about 35 pounds.