This mentality has paid off for the band. The laid back but energetic vibe and high quality music produced by the Clyde Stubblefield Band have created a crowd of loyal followers and are constantly converting new ones. Walk into the club on a Monday, and the fact that the event attracts all kinds becomes obvious. There’s the group of dressed up college girls, the twenty-somethings that immediately hit the dance floor upon entering the club; the business man that begins the night conservatively observing from the back and gradually loosens his tie and begins to jive; and the older fans who come every week to see their friends and keep those old dancing shoes from getting dusty.

Matthew Wisniewski/Curb
Patrons young and old flock to Funky Mondays every week to get down to the smooth soul of the Clyde Stubblefield Band.

“Usually when you book somebody else, you get their crowd coming, and the crowd all tends to be the same demographic,” Gallagher said. “On Clyde’s nights, it’s everybody. Black, white, gay, straight, men, women, students, professionals, retirees, everybody. And it’s because of the universal appeal of the kind of stuff Clyde does, the quality of the musicianship.”
            
From regulars to newcomers, most everyone who comes to Funky Mondays are alike in the sense that they understand just how special the experience is. Nicole Relyea, 26, said she went to the King Club almost every Monday for a year, until a day job required her to cut back a little. She comes for the music, but also for the sense of camaraderie that comes out of it. “There are a lot of regulars that come here," Relyea said. "You get to know the crowd, and you come to hang out.”
            
Relyea also said Funky Mondays are unique because they offer a place for people to dance to music that isn’t the typical rap, hip-hop or house music usually played at clubs. On Mondays, she said, there’s everything from funk to soul to R&B to old school rock. It’s clear by the ratio of people sitting to people dancing that much of the audience appreciates the fact that the King Club provides a venue for old-fashioned boogying. The appreciation goes both ways; Skaggs said the band feeds off their enthusiastic fans.
            
“The whole dance floor is crazy,” he said. “It’s incredible … we’ve had some great crowds here.”
            
Jones attributed some of the relaxed but electric atmosphere to the club itself.
            
“The King Club is like no other bar in that it’s just a dance floor and a bar and a stage, and the stage is right on top of the dance floor,” he said. “They seem to want to create this atmosphere, this intimacy between the band and the audience, where there isn’t really a distinction between the two, it’s just everybody having a good time, and some of them happen to play instruments.”
        
“The crowd members were all very different types of people, but once [the band] started playing, it seemed like everybody was extremely comfortable, not worried about the differences between the people, and just listening to the funk,” he added.
            
Looking out at the crowd from the curved black leather booths lining the dance floor, it’s clear that something unifying is going on. The people on the dance floor have become one pulsing object, the band is enveloped in the groove and life outside the King Club seems distant. Here, there’s just the band on stage, the crowd on the floor and behind it all, Stubblefield at the drums, keeping it funky.