For many, Trouble Funk’s 1982 album Drop the Bomb was their introduction to Washington, D.C.’s homegrown funk, which was dubbed go-go. Others discovered it when E.U.’s “Da Bump” appeared on the soundtrack to Spike Lee’s School Daze in 1987. Instead of entering the musical mainstream, go-go, like New Orleans funk, remained a regional thing. Chuck Brown is the architect of go-go, and here’s his account of its roots:

“In my first big album, We the People, that was w...