Photo credits: Epic Records
Stand! was Sly and the Family Stone’s fourth album. It was released on May 3, 1969, as a soul/funk record.
Sly Stone, is the main vocalist, and multi-instrumentalist who wrote and produced the project. Stand! is often regarded as the band’s creative pinnacle. It was released by Epic Records immediately before the band’s famous performance at the Woodstock festival. The LP quickly became the band’s most financially successful record. The album was re-published on compact disc and vinyl in 1990, and features numerous well-known songs, including big singles like “Sing a Simple Song,” “I Want to Take You Higher,” “Stand!” and “Everyday People.”
It was re-published again in 2007 as a remastered numbered edition digipack CD with extra songs, as well as a CD with bonus tracks solely in the United Kingdom.
In 1969, the album sold 500,000 copies and was certified gold by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) on December 4 of that year. It reached number 13 on the Billboard 200 list and remained there for over two years. By 1986, it had sold over 1 million copies and was certified platinum in sales by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) on November 21 of that year. It went on to sell more than three million copies, making it one of the most popular albums of the 1960s. The album was placed 118 in Rolling Stone Magazine’s 500 best albums of all time list in 2003, 121 in a 2012 updated version, and 119 in a 2020 reboot of the list.
The Library of Congress designated the album as “culturally, historically, or aesthetically important” in 2015. It was chosen to be included in the National Recording Registry.
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