Parliament was an American funk band formed in the late 1960s by George Clinton as a flagship act of his P-Funk collective. Evolving out of an earlier vocal group, Parliament became associated with a more commercial and less rock-oriented sound than its sister act Funkadelic. Their work incorporated Afrofuturism concepts, horn arrangements, synthesizer, and outlandish theatrics. The band scored a number of Top 10 hits, including the million-selling 1976 single "Give Up the Funk ," and Top 40 albums such as Mothership Connection (1975).

Funk is a music genre that originated in African-American communities in the mid-1960s when musicians created a rhythmic, danceable new form of music through a mixture of various music genres that were popular among African-Americans in the mid-20th century. It deemphasizes melody and chord progressions and focuses on a strong rhythmic groove of a bassline played by an electric bassist and a drum part played by a percussionist, often at slower tempos than other popular music. Funk typically consists of a complex percussive groove with rhythm instruments playing interlocking grooves that create a "hypnotic" and "danceable" feel. It uses the same richly colored extended chords found in bebop jazz, such as minor chords with added sevenths and elevenths, and dominant seventh chords with altered ninths and thirteenths.