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14 episodes with Bobby Womack
6 episodes with Bobby Womack
6 episodes with Bobby Womack
3 episodes with Bobby Womack
6 episodes with Bobby Womack
7 episodes with Bobby Womack
7 episodes with Bobby Womack
7 episodes with Bobby Womack
7 episodes with Bobby Womack
**The Groove Doctors Friday Drive Time Show Replay On traxfm.org. This Week The Groove Doctor Featured 80's Grooves/Rare Groove/Contemporary Soul From G.Q. Midnight Star. One Way.Steve Parks. I-Level. Ohio Players. Collins & Collins. Bobby Womack. Minnie Riperton. Meli'sa Morgan & More #originalpirates #soulmusic #boogie #80ssoul #RareGrooves Listen Live Here Via The Trax FM Player: chat.traxfm.org/player/index.html Mixcloud LIVE :mixcloud.com/live/traxfm Free Trax FM Android App: play.google.com/store/apps/det...mradio.ba.a6bcb The Trax FM Facebook Page : facebook.com/profile.php?id=10...100092342916738 Trax FM Live On Hear This: hearthis.at/k8bdngt4/live Tunerr: tunerr.co/radio/Trax-FM Radio Garden: Trax FM Link: radio.garden/listen/trax-fm/IEnsCj55 OnLine Radio Box: onlineradiobox.com/uk/trax/?cs...cs=uk.traxRadio Radio Deck: radiodeck.com/radio/5a09e2de87...7e3370db06d44dc Radio.Net: traxfmlondon.radio.net Stream Radio : streema.com/radios/Trax_FM..The_Originals Live Online Radio: liveonlineradio.net/english/tr...ax-fm-103-3.htm**
**Music Mick's Mick's Vibez Show Replay On Trax FM & Rendell Radio. This Week Mick & The Mixvibez Show Gave Us 70's & 80's Grooves/Dance Classics From Eugene Record, Dynasty, Harold Melvin & The Bluenotes, Gap Band, Central Line, Skyy, Barry White, Bobby Womack, Slick, Kool & The Gang, Stevie Wonder & More. #originalpirates #soulmusic #boogiefunk #disco #danceclassics #boogie Catch The Music Mick's Mixvibez Show Every Saturday From 4PM UK Time On Trax FM & Rendell Radio Listen Live Here Via The Trax FM Player: chat.traxfm.org/player/index.html Mixcloud LIVE :mixcloud.com/live/traxfm Free Trax FM Android App: play.google.com/store/apps/det...mradio.ba.a6bcb The Trax FM Facebook Page : https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100092342916738 Trax FM Live On Hear This: hearthis.at/k8bdngt4/live Tunerr: tunerr.co/radio/Trax-FM Radio Garden: Trax FM Link: http://radio.garden/listen/trax-fm/IEnsCj55 OnLine Radio Box: onlineradiobox.com/uk/trax/?cs...cs=uk.traxRadio Radio Deck: radiodeck.com/radio/5a09e2de87...7e3370db06d44dc Radio.Net: traxfmlondon.radio.net Stream Radio : streema.com/radios/Trax_FM..The_Originals Live Online Radio: liveonlineradio.net/english/tr...ax-fm-103-3.htm**
Sintonía: "Breezin´" - Bobby Womack"What´s Happening" - Boris Gardiner; "Ain´t No Sunshine" - Bill Withers; "Happiness Is A Warm ´Pussin´" - Boris Gardiner; "Melting Pot" y "You´ll Never Get Away" - Boris Gardiner; "You Just Got To Be In Love" - Boris Gardiner; "Today", "The Captive" y "Raindrops" (Bart Bacharach) - Boris Gardiner; "Phoenix" - Jim Webb; "Paradise For Fools" y "One Woman" - Boris Gardiner; "Don´t Take Away" - Peter Ashbourne; "Strangers In The Night" - B. Haempfert; "Let´s Stay Together" - Al GreenTodas las músicas extraídas de la recopilación (1xCD/2xLP) "A Soulful Experience Is Happening" (Vampisoul, 2004/Vampi CD 064), grabaciones originales de 1970/71Escuchar audio
**Lynda Law's Soul Show Replay On traxfm.org. This Week Lynda Features Soul/Boogie/Dance Classics/Contemporary Soul From Salsoul Orchestra, Brian McKnight, Crackin', Robert IMtume Owens, Johnny Bristol, Keith Robertson, Kashif, Thunderstorm, Al Jarreau, Bobby Womack, Taylor Pace, Diana Ross, Narda Michael Walden & More #originalpirates #soulmusic #contemporarysoul #70smusic #80smusic #disco #danceclassics Catch Lynda's Soul Show Every Tuesday From 4:00PM UK Time On www.traxfm.org Listen Live Here Via The Trax FM Player: chat.traxfm.org/player/index.html Mixcloud LIVE :mixcloud.com/live/traxfm Free Trax FM Android App: play.google.com/store/apps/det...mradio.ba.a6bcb The Trax FM Facebook Page : https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100092342916738 Trax FM Live On Hear This: hearthis.at/k8bdngt4/live Tunerr: tunerr.co/radio/Trax-FM Radio Garden: Trax FM Link: http://radio.garden/listen/trax-fm/IEnsCj55 OnLine Radio Box: onlineradiobox.com/uk/trax/?cs...cs=uk.traxRadio Radio Deck: radiodeck.com/radio/5a09e2de87...7e3370db06d44dc Radio.Net: traxfmlondon.radio.net Stream Radio : streema.com/radios/Trax_FM..The_Originals Live Online Radio: liveonlineradio.net/english/tr...ax-fm-103-3.htm**
Les ballades de Mariah Carey, pleines de passion et de douleur, ont fait frissonner des millions de personnes. Parmi les plus mémorables, il y a "We belong together", sortie en 2005 et dont la vidéo met un point final au récit amorcé dans le clip du single précédent. Ici, nous assistons au mariage des personnages de Mariah et d'Eric Roberts. Mais la future épouse quitte subitement la cérémonie pour s'enfuir en voiture avec son amant, prenant au dépourvu le clone de Tommy Mottola, son ex-mari autoritaire. Elle concrétise sûrement un fantasme qu'elle avait quand elle partageait sa vie avec lui. Histoire de donner du grain à moudre aux journaux à scandale, Mariah en rajoute une couche par rapport à leur relation… Mais qu'a-t-elle pu bien faire pour générer le buzz ? Pour le savoir, découvrez la suite de cet épisode consacré aux 20 ans de son album "The emancipation of Mimi".Un grand MERCI à Milana et Didier pour leur participation.Crédits de l'épisode :- "Crie hie" (Eugene Fredy / Jérôme Rastello)- "Shake it off" (Mariah Carey, Jermaine Dupri, Bryan-Michael Cox, Johnta Austin)- "Get your number" feat. Jermaine Dupri (Mariah Carey, Jermaine Dupri, Johnta Austin, John Phillips, Ahsley Ingram, Bryan-Michael Cox, Leee John, Steve Jolley, Tony Swain, LRoc)- "Don't forget about us" (Mariah Carey, Jermaine Dupri, Bryan-Michael Cox, Johnta Austin)- "Say somethin'" feat. Snoop Dogg (Mariah Carey, Pharrell Williams, Chad Hugo, Calvin Cordozar Broadus Jr.)- "We belong together" (Mariah Carey, Jermaine Dupri, Sandra Sully, Johnta Austin, Darnell Bristol, Sid Johnson, Bobby Womack, Patrick Moten, Kenneth Edmonds, Manuel Seal)- "One sweet day" (Mariah Carey, Walter Afanasieff, Michael McCary, Nathan Morris, Wanya Morris, Shawn Stockman)- "Touch my body" (Mariah Carey, Christopher Stewart, Crystal Johnson, Terius The-Dream Nash, L.A. Reid)- "Angels cry" feat. Ne-Yo (Mariah Carey, James Wright, Christopher Stewart, Crystal Johnson)- "Oh santa !" (Mariah Carey, Jermaine Dupri, Bryan-Michael Cox)- "Giving me life" feat. Slick Rick & Blood Orange (Mariah Carey, Devonté Hynes, Ricky M.L. Walters)- "For the record" (Mariah Carey, Bryan-Michael Cox, Adonis Shropshire)- "Dedicated" feat. Nas (Mariah Carey, James Fauntleroy, Nasir Jones, Chauncey Hollis, Dennis Coles, Robert Diggs, Gary Grice, Lamont Hawkins, Jason Hunter, Russell Jones, Clifford Smith, Corey Woods, Hit-Boy, Darhyl Camper, Hazebanga)L'épisode contient aussi :- Un extrait de l'interview de Mariah Carey pour Access Hollywood (2005)- Un extrait de l'interview de Mariah Carey pour Sirius XM (16/11/2018)- Un extrait du medley de Mariah Carey sur "We belong together" et "Fly like a bird" à la 48ème cérémonie des Grammy Awards (08/02/2006)Hébergé par Ausha. Visitez ausha.co/politique-de-confidentialite pour plus d'informations.
Performed and Produced by Pehr Flühr 2025 Written by Bobby Womack
Here we go, here we go, here we go again: another Spider-Man adaptation? Don't get your webs in a tizzy, True Believers, because this one is really worth it. Your Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man, the new animated series created by Jeff Trammell, imagines a branch of the Marvel Cinematic Universe where Peter Parker was never supposed to be bitten by that genetically altered spider–until he was. Cue wacky high school shenanigans, as a number of key changes from the comics and other shows/movies cause that butterfly effect to start flappin' its wings. Paul, Arlo, and forever guest Eric Sipple discuss how Trammell and company capture the spirit of the early Ditko/Lee comics, praise the vibrant animation, consider whether these iterations of the Osbornes are definitive, and much more. Plus, the gang pays tribute to Val Kilmer, there are new teasers for Star Wars: Tales of the Underworld and Superman, Arlo's been reading some more of the Kirby/Lee Fantastic Four, and Jonathan Hickman's Ultimate Spider-Man is the best Spidey book on the stands. NEXT: we yare what we yare, and what we yare is discussing Robert Altman's 1980 take on Popeye for a new That Was Then. BREAKDOWN 00:00:35 - Intro / WAY TOO MUCH BANTER!!! 00:50:38 - Your Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man 02:04:30 - Outro / Next MUSIC “Neighbor Like Me” by The Math Club “Across 110th Street” by Bobby Womack, Across 110th Street (1973) GOBBLEDYCARES National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: https://suicidepreventionlifeline.org/ Abortion Funds in Every State: https://bit.ly/AbortionFundsTwitter Support AAPI communities and those affected by anti-Asian violence: https://www.gofundme.com/c/act/stop-aapi-hate Support the AAPI Civic Engagement Fund: https://aapifund.org/ Support Black Lives Matter and find anti-racism resources: https://blacklivesmatters.carrd.co/ The Trevor Project provides information and support to LGBTQ youth: thetrevorproject.org Trans Lifeline: https://translifeline.org/ National Center for Transgender Equality: transequality.org Advocate for writers who might be owed money due to discontinuance of royalties: https://www.writersmustbepaid.org/ Help teachers and classrooms in need: https://www.donorschoose.org/ Do your part to remove the burden of medical debt for individuals, families, and veterans: https://www.unduemedicaldebt.org/ Register to vote: https://vote.gov/
Au début des 90's, Mariah Carey était l'une des figures emblématiques de la scène pop, partageant la vedette avec une autre diva, Whitney Houston
On today's episode I start off with when it's late at night, Bobby Womack's on the radio. The loneliest of pods lol, i speak on hanging out with a friend and running into trouble. I get to talk about how the new generation really doesn't know the music i grew up on. It really blew my mind, like i feel like a super old head now. Also as you can see from the thumb nail, i attempt to spin the block on a girl i like and boy oy boy did i fail at that. No more of spinning anything. Renee Geyer - Stares and WhispersMariah Carey - We Belong together(00:00 - 42:09)I have a new not so new segment which is about movie reviews and spoilers. This week i speak about “ Den of thieves 2” and how i absolutely hated it. It was just a huge waste of unoriginal ideas. Like most movies borrow ideas, but they run away with it. The first one was not that bad, but this one left me with no desire to see another.(42:10 - 55:29)I then jump into The Cool Report where i discuss the Doomsday reveal, Marvel has pulled out all of the stops with this case, but it still leaves us wanting more, what is there to expect with this new phase of movie projects. We then get into something more serious, where a man was hiding under the bed of a child, real life bogeyman moments. We then finish it off influencer drama, where a jeweler took advantage of a kid that looks like he was on the spectrum, but i could be wrong. Either way charging someone for goods that aren't up to regulation is wild. Glad this was caught on tape, to show the shady side of the jewelry game. (55:30 - 01:20:04)We then step into a segment where the listeners ask me 3 questions about myself or just randomness. A character ask how i feel about Zoe Saldana and the controversy behind her and the oscars. Do i feel she turned her back on her culture and is she stealing jobs from others using her skin as an advantage. Another wants to know why i am strap shaming, and it's clearly because i lack the facilities, sorry I'm not packing another left making me a tripod ladies lol. Also a snowflake tries to tell me about new border policy like i was rooting for this to pass. It was also funny seeing people complain about this new policy in place knowing damn well they voted for this. (01:20:05 - 01:34:45)Then we have 2 fans ask us a questions for PTL where we get asked the tough questions where we place ourselves in their shoes. Like telling your ex boo y'all are done, and you did not wait for them when they went to summer camp *wink wink*. Now they're trying to play catch up with you and the PO is the third wheel. Another so call lover is tired of being chivalrous to is lady, and though i would agree with his views, but y'all know me better than that. I 100% agree with views.(01:34:46 - 01:42:01)THE FINi give thank to everyone that shows us love and wish y'all the best on the journey called life.(01:42:02 - 01:43:25)please continue to like, share, comment and subscribe.PEACE OUT!!!! For questions to be answered on Part time lover please email @nospecialcharacterspod@gmail.comTIME CODEINTRO/ WHAT'S NEW - 00:00MOVIE REVIEW - 42:10THE COOL REPORT - 55:30ASK ME A QUESTION - 01:20:05PART TIME LOVER - 01:34:46OUTRO - 01:42:02
Back to a 'normal' Diggers Delight this week. 2 hours of soulful gems featuring the likes of Bobby Womack, Lisa Stansfield, Barry White, Chairman of the Board and Gladys Knight, to name but a few. And don't forget 'North of the Gap' three blindingly good Northern stompers in the middle of the show. PLAYLIST Artist Title Year 1 Bobby Womack, Give it up 1979 2 Mirage, Can't stop a man in love 1976 3 Al Hudson & the Soul Partners, When you're gone 1975 4 Loose Change, I wanna hold on to you 1979 5 Diephuis & Easter (ft. Jocelyn Brown), Don't quit 6 Conquest, Give it to me 1981 7 Lisa Stansfield, Too much lovemakin 8 Diane Ducane, Better late than never 1979 9 Percy and Them, Look in the mirror of my eyes 1977 10 Barry White, Barry and Glodean 1981 11 Bobby Moore, Call me your anything man 1975 NORTH OF THE GAP 12 Bob Relf, Girl You're my kind of wonderful 1970 13 Alfie Davison, Love is a serious business 1985 14 Bobby Sheen, Something new to do 1973 15 Flakes, No One 1981 16 Matt Bianco, Half a minute (Joey Negro Sunburst mix) 2013 17 Chairman of the Board, I'm on my way to a better place 1972 18 Eugene Record, Overdose of Joy 1977 19 Gladys Knight, Baby baby don't waste my time 1981 20 Sonny Turner & Sound Unlimited, Now that you're gone 1972 21 Marjie Joseph, Come on back to me lover 1977 22 Kent Drake, Boss thing together 1971 23 Ernest Ernie & the Sincerities, Do something 2018 24 Pretty Purdie & the Playboys, Watcha see is whatcha get 1971 25 Chloe Martin, It comse to my attention 1974
HERE WE GO MY SHOW ON SOUL LEGENDS RADIO 11-MARCH-2025TWO HOURS OF QUALITY TUNES FOR YOUR LISTENING DELIGHT INCLUDING DONALD BYRD, BOBBY WOMACK, JOHNNY BRISTOL, TOM BROWNE, THELMA HOUSTON, CHANGE AND MANY MORE ALSO SOME NEW TRACKS FROM CHRISSI POLAMD, CROSSROADS ft CLER, AP CONNECTION ft HEATHER HAYWOOD, HOPE YOU ENJOY OR DOWNLOAD FOR LATER WITH A GLASS OF SMETHING XXXX
Lee and Leah are joined this week by returning guests hosts Matt and Vaughn to talk about Barry Shear's "Across 110th Street (1972)", starring Anthony Quinn, Yaphet Kotto, and Anthony Franciosa. Don't be another punk errand boy, and tune it to listen to the hosts talk about what they've watched, and what they thought about this 1970s American crime drama, that does more than just nod at the Blaxploitation genre. "Across 110th Street" IMDB Find Matt at the Movie Melt podcast. Find Vaughn at the Motion Picture Massacre podcast. Featured Music: "Quicksand" & " Across 110th Street" by Bobby Womack.
In this episode of “When Rock Ruled The Charts” we take a close look at July 12th, 1979, the day that The Great Chicago Disco Demolition took place. This week we will be looking at the Billboard 200 album chart to see what music was considered hot. Series Info: In the “When Rock Ruled The Charts” series, we look at a specific day, week, or month in music history and discuss briefly the significance of that date and then take a deeper dive into the music or album charts for that time period to look at what was happening in music during that period of time. WE NEED YOUR HELP!! It's quick, easy, and free - Please consider doing one or all of the following to help grow our audience: Leave Us A Five Star Review in one of the following places: Apple Podcast Podchaser Spotify Connect with us Email us growinuprock@gmail.com Contact Form Like and Follow Us on FaceBook Follow Us on Twitter Leave Us A Review On Podchaser Join The Growin' Up Rock Loud Minority Facebook Group Do You Spotify? Then Follow us and Give Our Playlist a listen. We update it regularly with kick ass rock n roll Spotify Playlist Buy and Support Music From The Artist We Discuss On This Episode Growin' Up Rock Amazon Store Pantheon Podcast Network Joe Becht Chicago Disco Demolition Episode Music in this Episode Provided by the Following: Leo M, Streelight, Bad Company, Jorge Ben Jor, Bobby Womack, Rod Stewart, The Rolling Stones, Van Halen, Cheap Trick, New England, Foreigner Crank It Up New Music Spotlight Streetlight - “Captured In The Night” If you dig what you are hearing, go pick up the album or some merch., and support these artists. A Special THANK YOU to Restrayned for the Killer Show Intro and transition music!! Restrayned Website Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
El impacto de las músicas negras… Estos días de febrero que nacieron Bobby Brown, Rick James o Bob Marley. ¿Quién es Ruby Andrews? ¿Y Laura Taylor? Atención a Carmen y María, con soul de este siglo y en español, el “más difícil todavía”. Recordamos también a Viola Wills y Karen Young. DISCO 1 RAMSEY LEWIS Sky Islands DISCO 2 VIOLA WILLS* Gonna Get Along Without You NowDISCO 3 BOBBY BROWN Every Little StepDISCO 4 RICK JAMES Give It To Me BabyDISCO 5 CARMEN Y MARÍA No Te TocaDISCO 6 TEDDY SWIMS Your Kind of CrazyDISCO 7 KAREN YOUNG Hot Shot 1978 DISCO 8 ANDREW HAMILTON & LENA FIAGBE Sweet BabyDISCO 9 LAURA TAYLOR Dancin' in My Feet DISCO 10 THE CRUSADERS & BOBBY WOMACK Inherit The WindDISCO 11 SABRINA STARKE Morning SunDISCO 12 BOB MARLEY & THE WAILERS Waiting In VainDISCO 13 RUBY ANDREWS A Love Feeling* Viola Mae WilkersonEscuchar audio
Beacon actors working on returning show to stage In 2001, after Reefer Madness: The Musical had run for nearly two years in Los Angeles, its actors and backers built up big expectations for the show's off-Broadway premiere. Then, four days before curtain, 9/11 happened. "All of a sudden, a comedy about questioning and criticizing authority lost its vibe," recalls Christian Campbell, who created the lead role of Jimmy Harper on stage and later screen. Now, with recreational marijuana legal in many parts of the country (including New York) and lampooning business and government figures a staple of the entertainment world, Campbell is part of a production group eyeing a revival. "We have horses running in New York and London and look to line up investors," he says. "This is the most relevant show out there, by far. It's based on a kitschy film, but it's really about misinformation and propaganda." Campbell and his sister, Neve Campbell, are third-generation actors. He's married to actor America Olivo, who is also helping to revive the musical, along with actors Alan Cumming and Kristen Bell, director Andy Fickman and Dan Studney, who wrote the book and music. The song-and-dance version of Reefer Madness, originally a campy, preachy 1936 film about the dangers of cannabis that developed a cult following, opened in 1998 in Los Angeles. Its ill-fated New York run in 2001 lasted only a few weeks. Four years later, Showtime aired Reefer Madness: The Movie Musical, also starring Campbell. In 2014, the movie cast reunited to support the BabyQuest Foundation, a nonprofit that helps couples with fertility treatments. Campbell and Olivo had difficulty conceiving a child, but five years ago a "miracle baby" arrived. The couple, who got engaged two weeks after meeting, moved north from Hell's Kitchen on a whim in 2016. "We kept hearing about Beacon at parties and planned to visit Dia," Campbell says. "Four hours after arriving, we put an offer on the place. So far, we've done well with our eye-blink decisions." Taking advantage of the shift in current events and the 25th anniversary of the initial play's awards, a new cast in 2024 revived Reefer Madness: The Musical in Los Angeles, where it ran for four months. A soundtrack album was released on Jan. 10 (see reefermadness.com). For the moment, Campbell has paused his thespian career, which included most recently the lead in Beacon resident Jeremy Schonfeld's The Father Who Stayed and a year on his mother Marnie Neve's favorite soap opera, All My Children, as the fourth incarnation of Bobby Womack. "We laugh at the fact that a character can disappear for a long time without explanation and just come back as a completely new person who doesn't even resemble the actor that previously played the part," he says. "My guy had blond hair and blue eyes and one day he went up into the attic to get some ski equipment and never came down. Years later, he magically reappears - as me." Acting on a soap opera, he says, is "one of the hardest gigs there is - I gained new respect for the craft. You have to turn water into some form of wine. It may taste like Manischewitz in the end, but at least it's better than before."
Este miércoles Sam Cooke hubiera cumplido 94 años. Así que cerramos el programa con él y alguna familia heredera, los Womack & Womack. Estamos prendados de Sabina Starke y encantados de que este verano Kool & The Gang vuelvan a España. Y rescatamos temazos perdidos en el tiempo de I To I, Lena Fiagbe o Nu Colours. DISCO 1 CASBASH 73 Sweet Maybe Synthnstrumental( ESCA) DISCO 2 I TO I The Right Time (FOUR WEDDINGS… - 8) DISCO 3 SABRINA STARKE Love The Mystery (5) DISCO 4 LENA FIAGBE Can’t Smile Without You (ESCA) DISCO 5 LAUREN MAYBERRY Crocodile Tears (ESCA) DISCO 6 SNOOP DOGG DR DRÉ & STING Another Part Of Me (ESCA) DISCO 7 KHALID Everything I See (ESCA) DISCO 8 NU COLOURS Smoke Gets In your Eyes (FOUR WEDDINGS… - 4) DISCO 9 BRUNO MARS & KOOL & THE GANG Get Down To 24K Magic (Flipboitamidles Mashup T) (ESCA)DISCO 10 BOBBY WOMACK When The Weekend Comes (Cara 1 Corte 2)DISCO 11 WOMACK & WOMACK Celebrate The World (ESCA) DISCO 12 SAM COOKE What A Wonderful World This Could Be ( )DISCO 13 SAM COOKE Another Saturday Night ( )Escuchar audio
HERE WE GO MY SHOW FOR 09-JAN-2025 WITH A MIXED BAG OF OLD CLASSICS INCLUDING ( THE BAND AKA, WAYNE HENDERSON, NEW JERSEY CONNECTION, BOBBY WOMACK, PHIL HURRT, GLEN JONES, THE BLACKBYRDS ) AND MANY MORE ALSO SOME TOP NEW TRACKS FROM ( CROSSROADS ft CLER, JESSIE LAINE POWELL, EVERET ) WE ALSO HAVE THE CONNOISSEURS CORNER ( THIS WEEK WE HAVE KIM WATERS AND SPYRO GYRA) AND WE HAVE THE BACK TO BACK CLASSICS BY A CLASSIC ARTIST (THIS WEEK WE HAVE TWO TRACKS FROM DEXTER WANSEL ) THEN WE HAVE THREE TRACKS DUG OUT FROM THE GARAGE FROM ( THE FOUR TOPS, JUDY CLAY & WILLIAM BELL, JR WALKER & THE ALL STARS) FINNISHING OF WITH A COUPLE OF SLOW TRACKS AND MUCH MUCH MORE SIT BACK WITH A GLASS OF SOMETHING AND ENJOY OR DOWNLOAD FOR LATER
The House of Blues, The Late Show w David Letterman American Bandstand, PBS~Those are just SOME of the place you have seen "La La" Dolores Brooks, the original lead singer of top hits of the girl group the Crystals and Broadway & Film actress. She is best known as the lead vocalist on the Crystals' hits "Then He Kissed Me" and "Da Doo Ron Ron", "Santa Claus is Coming to Town" & many others.Ms. Brooks also sang lead on three songs on the album A Christmas Gift for You, one of only two Christmas albums inducted in the Grammy Hall of Fame.In 1968, she appeared in the original Broadway production of the musical Hair, where she performed the song "Aquarius". She would later appear in the Broadway show Two Gentlemen of Verona in 1971. She also toured with and recorded for various artists (such as the Neville Brothers, Bobby Womack and Isaac Hayes); made short appearances in films; and contributed songs to different movie soundtracks (including the 1970 film Cotton Comes to Harlem).In 1983, she and her family moved to London, England, where she and Idris continued their careers in music. In 1990, they moved to Vienna, Austria where she continued singing and writing songs with her husband Idris Muhammad and also hosted a local radio show; they lived in Vienna until 1997.Andrew Edge sang backing vocals on her BMG (Austria) CD LaLa Brooks & Friends in 1994. Brooks moved back to the United States at the turn of the century and resides in the East Village. She is now a grandmother of three, has her own band and is still performing. Her music compilation's is called "All or Nothing!! © 2024 Building Abundant Success!!2024 All Rights ReservedJoin Me on ~ iHeart Media @ https://tinyurl.com/iHeartBASSpot Me on Spotify: https://tinyurl.com/yxuy23baAmazon Music ~ https://tinyurl.com/AmzBASAudacy: https://tinyurl.com/BASAud
Do androids dream of electric California? Covers by: Jose Feliciano, Bobby Womack, The Beach Boys, Die Geschwister Pfister, Safari, Sia, Freischwimmer, Leo Tidal playlist here
** PLEASE SUBSCRIBE ** Featured in WYGYFF Episode 4: The son of soul singer Curtis Womack and nephew of the legendary Bobby Womack. Binky Womack is a soul and funk music producer, guitarist and vocalist who transitioned from backing his famous father and uncle to working with stars like Usher and Snoop Dogg. His fifth solo album since 2018, called Womack 100%, was released earlier this year. Womack is also a member of hardcore funk group Tha P-Union, which released a pair of albums earlier this decade and two more under the new name, Tha Skunk Mob – including this year's great one called Tha Firmament. Halfway through, Womack is joined by seveal other band members and collaborators, including Lisa Love, Jay Bass, Old Man Loc and Roc B. RECORDED SEPTEMBER 2024 Hosted by Scott "DR GX" Goldfine — musicologist, author of “Everything Is on the One: The First Guide of Funk” and creator/host of the popular TRUTH IN RHYTHM podcast — "Where'd You Get Your Funk From?" is the latest interview show brought to you by FUNKNSTUFF.NET. Where'd You Get Your Funk From (WYGYFF) is an open format video and audio podcast focusing on the here and now, with a broad range of creative and artistic guests sharing fascinating stories, experiences, and perspectives. WYGYFF is a welcoming avenue to newer and independent musical acts as well as established and still active musicians of any genre; authors; filmmakers; actors; artists; collectors and archivists; radio & podcast personalities; journalists; scholars; sound techs; promoters; photographers; and other creative people. A common thread, is the show's standard opening question: Where'd you get your funk from? This is much deeper than it may seem as the answer need not be strictly about funky music, as not everyone has found the funk. It could hit on whatever type of music touches their soul or pleasure centers. Additionally, the question extends beyond music. Paraphrasing George Clinton, funk is whatever it needs to be to get you over the hump. Thus, guests can explain where they got their grit, perseverance, inspiration, talent, creativity, character or other qualities that shaped them into who they are today. This serves as a springboard into candid, in-depth and engrossing conversations. LEGAL NOTICE: All video and audio content protected by copyright. Any use of this material is strictly prohibited without expressed consent from original content producer and owner Scott Goldfine, dba FUNKNSTUFF. For inquiries, email info@funknstuff.net. Get your copy of "Everything Is on the One: The First Guide of Funk" today! https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1541256603/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=1541256603&linkCode=as2&tag=funknstuff-20&linkId=b6c7558ddc7f8fc9fe440c5d9f3c400
Episode 121- Join hosted Troy Saunders as he sits down and chats with "The Prince of Soul", Calvin Richardson!.Calvin Richardson is a national singer, songwriter, and entertainer who delights fans and has a significant market presence and high touring demand. In additional to his own legacy of successful albums and chart topping singles, he has written multi-platinum, platinum, and gold hit singles for many of the music industry's top recording artists including Charlie Wilson “There Goes My Baby”, Angie Stone “More Than a Women”, Raphael Saadiq “Falling Out”. USA Today declares Calvin Richardson is “influenced by vintage R&B and his gritty vocals sets him apart from contemporaries...fresh vibes for a singer who respects his roots.” Calvin Richardson's music touches soul, R&B, blues and pop. His 8th studio album release, Gold Dust, produced the chart topping hits “Let Me Love On You”, “Be Your Friend” and “If You're Thinking About Leaving”. His seventh album All or Nothing charted in the top 20 on the Billboard Top 200 Album Chart. His hit single “Can't Let Go” was in the top 30 on Billboard's Urban AC Chart and has over 100 million streams. “Treat Her Right” is his prior hit release from All or Nothing. Calvin Richardson recorded a tribute album to Bobby Womack called Facts of Life which coincided with Womack's introduction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Facts of Life was highly acclaimed and received a Grammy Nomination. Many of his hits remain in rotation in markets around the country. As a well established artist, Calvin Richardson has released albums through Universal Records, Hollywood Records, Primary Wave Music/BMG Rights Management, Shanachie Entertainment, and his most recent release is distributed through Virgin Music Group via a partnership with Music Matters Entertainment/The SRG-ILS Group.Tune in to this episode as Troy and Calvin discuss the making of each album, while Troy spins some of his favorite cuts. Whether you are a fan of Calvin's or just a lover of great soul music; this is one you won't want to miss.Listen and subscribe to the BAAS Entertainment Podcast on Spotify, Amazon Music, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Deezer, iHeartRadio, Pandora, Podchaser, Pocket Casts and TuneIn. “Hey, Alexa. Play the BAAS Entertainment Podcast.”
Listen every Tuesday from 21 till 22 (Moscow time) Jazz FM (radiojazzfm.ru) Subscribe in iTunes: https://itunes.apple.com/ru/podcast/funk-and-beyond-weekly/id1063844118?mt=2 for more details please visit beyondfunk.ru Tracklist: 1. Peter Thomas Sound Orchestra - Land Of Make Believe 2. Bonnie Bramlett - Crazy 'bout My Baby 3. Letta Mbulu - Kilimandjaro Take Us Higher 4. Nadie La Fond - 3 Way Situation 5. City Limits - Words Without Love 6. Chelsea - Living For You 7. Ozo - Night Of The Black Mamba 8. Rainbow Trio - Busy 9. Sidney Joe Qualls - I Don't Do This 10. The Jacksons - Your Ways 11. Bobby Womack, The Brotherhood - Home Is Where the Heart Is 12. Wayne Davis - Look at the People! 13. Carlos Garnett - Mother of the Future 14. New World - We're Gonna Make It 15. Astemix - Nervoso 16. Monica Lassen and The Sounds - Incitation 17. Faces - Plastiki Epohi
Calvin Richardson R&B singer-songwriter who's been singing for decades. In the mid-1990s, Richardson went solo and shortly after released His debut album, Country Boy. But he didn't stop there he has 2:35, When Love Comes, Facts of Life: The Soul of Bobby Womack, America's Most Wanted, I Am Calvin, all or Nothing, and Gold Dust. I encourage you to comment on your thoughts and be a part of the show. Websites and Links Website: www.iamcalvinrichardson.com Instagram: Instagram.com/iamcalvinrichardson Facebook: facebook.com/iamcalvinrichardson TikTok: tiktok.com/iamcalvinrichardson ▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬ ABOUT MY CHANNEL This channel is where inspiration meets laughter and happiness, and about women supporting women. We cover lots of cool stuff such as self-love, and overcoming life. Life may throw some curveballs, but we have the power to write our own songs and produce our own happiness. So, grab your metaphorical pen and paper, and let's write the anthem of our lives together. Let's show the world that winning is the only option!
HERE WE GO MY SHOW FOR 19-SEPT-2024 WITH A MIXED BAG OF OLD CLASSICS INCLUDING ( MELBA MOORE, ROY AYERS, THE FATBACK BAND, SWEET THUNDER, BOBBY WOMACK, ODYSSEY, ) AND MANY MORE ALSO SOME TOP NEW TRACKS FROM ( CORNELL CC CARTER, NITESHADE & 3 IN1 , BflyLadyDi/VINCE BROOMFIELD ) WE ALSO HAVE THE CONNOISSEURS CORNER ( THIS WEEK WE HAVE THE HAGGIS HORNS AND GARY BARTZ ) AND WE HAVE THE BACK TO BACK CLASSICS BY A CLASSIC ARTIST (THIS WEEK WE HAVE TWO TRACKS FROM THE JACKSONS REMEMBERING TITO JACKSON WHO PASSED AWAY THIS WEEK ) THEN WE HAVE THREE TRACKS DUG OUT FROM THE GARAGE FROM ( THE DRIFTERS, TYRONE DAVIS, SAM COOKE ) FINNISHING OF WITH A COUPLE OF SLOW TRACKS AND MUCH MUCH MORE SIT BACK WITH A GLASS OF SOMETHING AND ENJOY OR DOWNLOAD FOR LATER
Join us at the Camino Cafe as the talented LA-based singer-songwriter Harold Payne takes us on his transformative journey along the Camino Portuguese. Harold opens up about the deeply personal motivations behind his walk, from his academic background in Spanish to the profound need for healing following his wife's passing. Along the way, he shares the exhilaration of completing the journey and the empowering sense of accomplishment it brings, interwoven with stories from his impressive music career, including collaborations with legends like Bobby Womack, Rod Stewart, and Snoop Dogg.Ever gotten a black eye from a guidebook? Harold has, and he's here to tell the tale. We explore the balance between the physical challenges of the Camino, like heel pain and blisters, and the mystical, meaningful encounters that can happen on such a journey. Drawing parallels to his experience on an international peace walk in India, Harold reminisces about the spontaneous connections made along the way. To top it off, he treats us to a heartfelt performance of his original song "One Step," which captures the essence of taking small, meaningful actions.Finally, we reflect on the lasting impact of the Camino de Santiago on Harold's life. Harold chats about his own love for travel and adventure, sharing insights on the importance of spontaneity and the value of accommodations that balance comfort and proximity to the action. With memorable advice for future travelers and an impromptu song aptly titled "The Camino Saved Me," Harold's reflections offer a heartfelt guide for anyone looking to embark on their own Camino journey.Connect with Harold:Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/haroldpaynemusic909YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/@HaroldPayneMusicAll songs are original songs written and performed by Harold PayneConnect with Leigh:Camino News Update https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PL9jRyUVnjI4WJMbM7rEbXW9ycGuQwm8Ae&si=vKPxgrYLQfyC_m4HSubscribe to our YouTube Channel https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC6VN9ze3z61n6tRLtDXWuQwFollow us on Instagram https://www.instagram.com/thecaminocafepodcast/The Camino Cafe's intro and outro song with thanks to fellow Pilgrim, Jackson Maloney. Original Song - "Finnis Terre" - written and performed by Jackson Maloney - Singer, Musician, and Songwriter. Connect with Jackson: https://open.spotify.com/artist/3fdQsSqq9pDSwKcWlnBHKR
In which the Curmudgeons end their epic series of odes to the music of a nine-year period that transformed everything--and then some--in popular music. By 1972, the hangover from the revolutionary vibes of the 1960s had subsided, and that era's outgrowth of freedom and experimentation truly started to blossom. The Rolling Stones filtered American roots music through a dirty, sweaty prism to create a true rock masterpiece. David Bowie perfected glam rock and intergalactic theater to create a masterpiece of his own. And Stevie Wonder, Al Green and Curtis Mayfield set Black music on a wilder, more lush course. We explore all of that and much more during this episode. Enjoy all the great music of 1972 on our special Spotify playlist: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/22v1Gg8aZWlUaGrBHqaZ0B?si=446b89de0580497d Here's a handy navigation companion to this episode. (00:52 - 05:02) - Arturo Andrade sets the parameters for our discussion of 1972 (05:16 - 17:32) - The Paralell Universe, featuring reviews of new albums by Kelly Stoltz and King Gizzard and The Lizard Wizard (18:17 - 55:50) - We celebrate the 1972 output of The Rolling Stones, David Bowie, Curtis Mayfield and Stevie Wonder (57:22 - 01:20:30) - We revisit the 1972 music of Al Green, The Eagles, Steely Dan, Roxy Music, Neu! and Big Star (01:21:29 - 1:45:51) - We pay loving tribute to albums from Can, Neil Young, Black Sabbath and others who help define 1972 Listen to all of this great music by accessing our special Spotify playlist: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/159nl5UDgswraoThqqv07A?si=7b57198f803e4944 Here's a handy navigation companion to this episode. (00:52 - 04:56) - Arturo Andrade sets the parameters for our discussion (05:49 - 16:23) - The Parallel Universe, feauturing reviews of new albums from King Hannah and Wand (17:08 - 45:11) - We discuss 13 great songs from blaxploitation films from artists including Earth, Wind & Fire, James Brown, Solomon Burke, Bobby Womack and Donny Hathaway (46:29 - 1:09:08) - We discuss 13 additional songs from blaxploitation films from artists including Gladys Knight & the Pips, Don Julian, Willie Hutch, Isaac Hayes and The Staple Singers Join our Curmudgeonly Community today! facebook.com/groups/curmudgeonrock Hosted on Podbean! curmudgeonrock.podbean.com Subscribe to our show on these platforms: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-curmudgeon-rock-report/id1551808911 https://open.spotify.com/show/4q7bHKIROH98o0vJbXLamB?si=5ffbdc04d6d44ecb https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9hbmNob3IuZm0vcy80M Co-written and co-produced by Arturo Andrade and Christopher O'Connor - The Curmudgeons
In which The Curmudgeons stand up to the man and deliver the best of the best of a special era for both cinema and music, when African-Americans anti-heroes lit up the screens and imaginations of a generation of young Black people. And also young Black artists, who cranked out stunning funk, soul and disco anthems to accompany these films. Isaac Hayes, Curtis Mayfield, Marvin Gaye, Donny Hathaway and The Staple Singers were among the legends who contributed to this electrifying canon. We enter our wayback machine and revisit some of the best Black music of its time. Listen to all of this great music by accessing our special Spotify playlist: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/159nl5UDgswraoThqqv07A?si=7b57198f803e4944 Here's a handy navigation companion to this episode. (00:52 - 04:56) - Arturo Andrade sets the parameters for our discussion (05:49 - 16:23) - The Parallel Universe, feauturing reviews of new albums from King Hannah and Wand (17:08 - 45:11) - We discuss 13 great songs from blaxploitation films from artists including Earth, Wind & Fire, James Brown, Solomon Burke, Bobby Womack and Donny Hathaway (46:29 - 1:09:08) - We discuss 13 additional songs from blaxploitation films from artists including Gladys Knight & the Pips, Don Julian, Willie Hutch, Isaac Hayes and The Staple Singers Join our Curmudgeonly Community today! facebook.com/groups/curmudgeonrock Hosted on Podbean! curmudgeonrock.podbean.com Subscribe to our show on these platforms: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-curmudgeon-rock-report/id1551808911 https://open.spotify.com/show/4q7bHKIROH98o0vJbXLamB?si=5ffbdc04d6d44ecb https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9hbmNob3IuZm0vcy80M Co-written and co-produced by Arturo Andrade and Christopher O'Connor - The Curmudgeons
Oh this album y'all! There are few things I love more than early 70's soul. The Delfonics, Bobby Womack, The Crusaders, Marvin Gaye. Sooooo much good music! Jalen Ngonda has really leaned into the early 70's sound with his 2023 album Come Around with Me. The title track is gorgeous and the perfect thing to listen to on a summer evening that turns into morning. Once a month, I eagerly share a song that resonates deeply with me. Music has been an unwavering companion in my life, consistently infusing immense joy into my days.My musical taste knows no boundaries; I effortlessly traverse genres like punk, folk, pop, hip hop, and grunge. These songs, whether they carry a touch of melancholy or exude the sweetness of candy, play a vital role in my creative journey. They set the rhythm and tone, whether I'm dreaming big, taking a bird's eye view, or diving into the intricate details.Subscribers to the newsletter receive an exclusive treat—a thoughtfully curated playlist that captures my musical selections throughout the year. If you're a fellow wild creative soul yearning to explore life's deeper facets, I invite you to join our vibrant MUSE community by signing up through the link in my bio. We have an incredible time together, navigating the weird and wonderful wilderness of the human condition, all while savoring the beauty of great music along the way. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lisaandersonshaffer.substack.com
Dancefloor Memories with Patrick Hawkins, over 60 Minutes of Disco, Soul and Funk Podcast. Classic tracks, Dancefloor fillers from, Emotions, Kool and the Gang, Change, Stephanie Mills, Linda Clifford new tracks from, Georgie B and the Groove Association, MS1 Project ft Alex James, This weeks tune of the week is from Jarrod Lawson & Raquel Rodriguez, more classic tracks from Grover Washington jr ft Bill Withers, Wilton Fielder ft Bobby Womack and The Crusaders ft Randy Crawford (Alex Di Cio Re-Edit). Just settle down with a long drink and chill or boogie around your kitchen to tracks others would never dream of playing! Spread the word, give me a like and follow my Podcasts. Much Love Pat
HERE WE GO MY SHOW FOR 18-JULY-2024 WITH A MIXED BAG OF OLD CLASSICS INCLUDING ( CAVIAR, DELEGATION, LEROY HUTSON, BOBBY WOMACK, THE PLAYERS ASSOCIATION, DAYTON, THE OJAYS, LIGHT OF THE WORLD ) AND MANY MORE ALSO SOME TOP NEW TRACKS FROM ( GEORGIE B & THE GROOVE ASSOCIATION, MS1 PROJECT ) WE ALSO HAVE THE CONNOISSEURS CORNER ( THIS WEEK WE HAVE TWO TRACKS FROM DAVE KOZ ) AND WE HAVE THE BACK TO BACK CLASSICS BY A CLASSIC ARTIST (THIS WEEK WE HAVE TWO TRACKS THELMA HOUSTON ) THEN WE HAVE THREE TRACKS DUG OUT FROM THE GARAGE FROM (MARTHA REEVES & THE VANDELA, THE FOUR TOPS AND JR WALKER & THE ALL STARS ) FINNISHING OF WITH A COUPLE OF SLOW TRACKS AND MUCH MUCH MORE SIT BACK WITH A GLASS OF SOMETHING AND ENJOY OR DOWNLOAD FOR LATER
In the final episode of What Happened In Alabama, Lee considers the man his father became, despite the obstacles in his way. Later, Lee goes back to Alabama and reflects with his cousins on how far they've come as a family. Now that we know what happened, Lee pieces together what it all means and looks forward to the future. Over the last nine episodes, you've listened to me outline the impact of Jim Crow apartheid on my family, my ancestors and me. I've shared what I've learned through conversations with experts, creating connections to how the effects of Jim Crow manifested in my own family.In the process of this work I lost my father. But without him, this work couldn't have been accomplished.My name is Lee Hawkins and this is What Happened In Alabama: The Epilogue Rev. James Thomas: You may be seated. We come with humble hearts. We come, dear Jesus, with sorrow in our hearts. But dear Jesus, we know that whatever you do,dear God,it is for your will and purpose. And it is always good. We buried my father on March 9, 2019. His funeral was held at the church I grew up in. Mount Olivet Baptist Church in St. Paul Minnesota.Rev. James Thomas: Dear God, I pray that you would be with this family. Like you have been with so many that have lost loved ones and even one day we all know we are going to sleep one day.Thank you for preparing a better place for us.Mount Olivet's pastor, Rev. James Thomas, knew my parents well, especially since my father was part of the music ministry there for 30 years. It was a snowy day, but people came from all over Minnesota and from as far away as Prague to pay their last respects. I looked at the packed parking lot and all the cars lined up and down the street, and I felt a sense of gratitude in knowing that my dad had played such a strong role in so many people's lives, not just the lives of his own children and family.Rev. James Thomas: Brother Leroy is probably playing the guitar over there. We can hear him with that squeak voice “yeeeee.” Jalen Morrison: We could talk about Prince, we could talk about gospel music. He was even up on the hip hop music, too, which kind of shook me up. But I was like, okay, Grandpa [laughter] Naima Ferrar Bolden: He really just had me seeing far beyond where I could see. He had me seeing far past my circumstances. He really changed my perspective, and that was just life altering for me ever since I was a little girl. Herman Jones: He just had the heavy, heavy accent. He still had that booooy. But you know,he was always smiling, always happy all the time. You know, just full of life.As I sat and listened to all the speeches that came before my eulogy of my dad, I couldn't help but recognize both the beauty of their words and the extent to which my father had gone to shield so many of the people he loved from the hardest parts of his life—especially Alabama. It was as if he didn't want to burden them, or, for most of our lives, his children, with that complexity. Most people remembered and honored him as that big, smiling, gregarious man with the smooth, first tenor voice, who lit up any space he was in and lit up when his wife, children, grandchildren, family, or friends walked into a room. He loved deeply; and people loved him deeply in return. And though he was victimized under Jim Crow, he was never a victim. In fact, after he sat for those four years of interviews with me for this show, opening up the opportunity for so many secrets to be revealed, he emerged as even more of a victor.In our last conversation, he told me he wasn't feeling well and that he had been to the doctor three times that week, but was never tested for anything. And Dad, after that third visit, he just accepted it. I do wonder if there was ever a time in those moments that he had a flashback to his mother being sent home in a similar way - 58 years prior - but from a segregated Jim Crow Alabama hospital. I don't know. I'll never know.Tony Ware: Yeah. Mine. You know, I would always ask my mom, you know, about Alabama. You know, she was one of the five that came up here. That's my cousin Tony Ware. His mom was my Aunt Betty. The “five” that he's talking about were my Dad's siblings who migrated to Minnesota from Alabama - my aunts Helen, Toopie, Dorothy, Betty, and my Dad. Tony Ware: They kind of hung around together and they would always have sit downs where they would talk. Get a moon pie, a soda. Hmm. Some sardines.Lee Hawkins: Cigarettes. Tony Ware: Cigarettes, sardines. And they would start talking. And some white bread. And they would sit there and talk and we would hear some of it. I sat in my mom's lap, and you know, they're talking about this, and it's like they just went into a different world. When I was a kid in Minnesota, I loved when my dad's sisters and their kids would come over. Us cousins would play hide-and-seek and listen to our music while our parents sat around the dining room table, talking and laughing, and listening to their own music. Our soundtrack was always great – Prince, Michael Jackson, New Edition, Cameo – but theirs was, too, with Curtis Mayfield, Aretha Franklin, Jerry Butler, Johnny Taylor, and Bobby Womack. The food was even better. They'd talk over one another, smoke clouding the air under the chandelier, and my allergy-sensitive nose could detect that smell from three rooms away. Sometimes, I'd sneak a quick sip from an unattended can of beer in the kitchen. Despite the bitter taste, getting away with it always gave me a thrill. But then, someone would mention the word “Alabama,” and that festive energy would suddenly vanish.Tony Ware: But I heard Alabama. I heard this. I heard names that I never, you know, heard, you know, because all I knew was my aunt Dorothy, Lee Roy, you know, all I knew was. But then I heard certain names, uncles such and such. And I'm like, Who? Who, what, what? To us as kids, "Alabama" was more than a place—it was a provocative word that brought a suffocating heaviness to our lives. My cousin Gina remembers, even as a child, that mysterious word and the weariness it triggered in her mother. It left her feeling utterly helpless.Gina Hunter: And I would just sit there and listen to them talk about home and all the things that bothered them. Oh, my God. And yeah, it would hurt my feelings because I would see my mom just break out and cry for nothing. They would be talking and a song would be playing and Betty would just kind of get, she'd well up. Lee Hawkins: Yeah. Gina Hunter: And I'm like, Why are they so sad? Why are they so depressed? They they're together. They've got their kids. We're visiting, we're having fun. But it wasn't fun for them.That veil of secrecy our parents kept around Alabama, prevented us from seeing it as anything other than ground zero for, in our family, dreadful despair. Even when they talked about the happy memories— the church revivals that they called “big meeting,” and picking fresh strawberries right off the vine – it seemed like a thread of fear just wove through almost every story. Tony Ware:I knew something was going on more than what I knew here, you know, at a young age. So. I was always interested in finding out. But through my mom, you know, she she would talk about how nice it was down there, how beautiful it was down there. But she never wanted to go back there.And as Gina remembers– and I agreed– it colored every facet of how they raised us. As she spoke, I just sat there, marveling at the fact that she could have replaced her mom's name with my dad's name, or any one of those siblings, and her observations would still be spot on. Gina Hunter:My mom was and Aunt Helen, they were super, super close. And there was always just a deep seeded paranoia of people in general, just like everything. And I would think, why are these people why are they so scared and nervous and afraid of life and people and experiencing things? It seemed like it led them to live a super sheltered life.The central question of this podcast is, "What happened in Alabama?"What happened was Jim Crow apartheid—a crime against humanity committed by the American government against five generations of Black families like mine. This apartheid lasted for nearly hundred years, officially ending in 1964, and created generations of people who perished and millions who survived. I refer to these individuals as Jim Crow apartheid survivors. However, America has yet to acknowledge that Jim Crow was apartheid, that it was a crime against humanity, and that the millions of people who lived through it should be formally recognized as survivors.In the prologue, I explained that so-called Jim Crow segregation was not merely about separate water fountains and back-of-the-bus seating. Through the accounts of family trauma I've shared, we now understand it was a caste system of domestic terrorism and apartheid, enforced by a government that imposed discrimination in every aspect of life through laws and practices designed to maintain white supremacy. The myth of "separate but equal" masked a reality far more sinister and pervasive than what most of us were taught in school.We often think of white supremacy as fringe hate groups, but we've overlooked its traditional and far more damaging form—a government-imposed system that oppressed Black people for a century after emancipation. This isn't a distant academic concept or an opinion or a loaded political statement; it's a fact. This is recent American history, and it deeply impacted our families, controlling every aspect of our lives physically, mentally, and emotionally for five generations after slavery.Since 1837, every generation of my family in America has had a member murdered, often with no consequences for the white perpetrator. The fear, caution, and grief were passed down by those who stood around the caskets, including my father. The daily indignities only compounded this grief, leading to accelerated aging and chronic stress that I believe ultimately killed my father. Yes, Jim Crow apartheid killed my father.Still, I'm encouraged because I have the platform to tell this aspect of the story. Sharing this story has been extremely difficult, but I've been lifted not just by my faith and ancestors but also by my family, their support, optimism, and determination. With this new information, we live with the awareness of the effects of slavery and Jim Crow, striving to break their negative cycles and be empowered by the accomplishments of our families who found ways to thrive despite the oppression caused by those crimes. Telling this story has fortified my resolve, reminding me that our past is not just a story of struggle, but of relentless triumph and dignity. For generations, we have managed to thrive together as a family. By infusing even more consciousness and evolution into our families with each generation, we can continue to thrive.That's why I'm grateful for my cousins, including my first cousin, David Stanley, the son of my dad's sister, Aunt Weenie, who articulated this sentiment powerfully during an interview with my cousins, my father's sisters' children.David Stanley: I think it's a new form of freedom, OK. And even though they faced the backwardness of Jim Crow and all those things that our ancestors went through, they still had their dreams and dignity. And no matter what happened, it's not about the environment around you, it's the environment inside of you. ‘You're not going to stop us. We're going to continue to grow. So by doing that, they said, ‘Okay, you know what? We are going to plant the seed, our offspring, okay?' You can do this in our generation during this time, but guess what? There's another generation coming up.' And that triggers all the way to us today. And then you got your nieces and your nephew, and then you got grandkids, et cetera. Lee: Yeah. And your kids have all master's degree and PhDs. And then your wife is a superintendent of a school district. David: That's right. Yep. So they left their seed, they left their vision. And my point is that I believe that they are all up in heaven smiling down on us and really proud of us.David: I have to go and take that trip to Alabama and bring my children with me and my grandkids with me, because it's vital. Because you put that out there, I really appreciate that. That's something that's definitely going to be done ,and I think that's something that we all need to do, to rekindle and reconnect and do those things. The past can't hurt you, but my point is that by being in the present right now, now we can solidify our future, you know what unapologetically. And do the things they were always yearning to do, in their lives. And they couldn't do them. But they can do them through us.Lee Hawkins: A lot of it is facing your parents' fears,that's what it id. for them as well. My dad really loved Alabama. He did. And my dad would talk about that in a very nostalgic way, but also the fear was still there. And so when I started going to Alabama, I was going for him as well. Not to mention, I have had a couple of people in the family say, ‘Oh be careful down there.' And Aunt Toopie even said, ‘You went in that field? You went to that cemetery?' That fear was on me when I first went to Alabama. The last trip that we went to, I did it with family.Walking through the cemeteries and the landscapes of Alabama alongside my family who live there transformed my mission, helping me to finally lay my father's fear to rest. Lee Hawkins: Mary Ruth's Southern Food for Southern People Made with Love. I love that. That slogan. Marvin Smith: Welcome to Mary Ruth's. Thank you for coming. Lee Hawkins: You got some grits on the griddle huh. Marvin Smith: Oh I got it all. Got me some grits, cheese grits, patty sausage, salmon croquettes, link sausage, bacon. Whatever you ask for we'll cook it. Pancakes, whatever. Hey, we aint Burger King but you can sure get it your way though. Group: [Laughter] There's so much energy in the cafe. I feel the family. My family. We spend a couple hours eating together. Mapping family connections. People come into the cafe, some grab their food and take a seat, some join us. A woman walks in the door and she recognizes me…. not because she knows who I am, but because of my resemblance to her husband, he's also a Pugh. Erica Page: Y'all got a line that will not just go away. It's strong genes. You'll have strong and strong. Yes, cause I have a daughter and a grandson. Oh, God. Looks just like him Her name is Erica Page. Lee Hawkins: You know, Uncle Ike Pugh? Erica Page: We went to the house several times.At one point, someone pulls out a family reunion book. It's a laminated, spiral bound scrapbook. Someone put a lot of work into making it. We're flipping through the pages together….Lee Hawkins: My grandma was Opie Pugh.Erica Page: I know the name. Lee Hawkins: She was. Well, she was Ike's sister. Erica Page: I know. I know the name.I means she's in the book. We find pictures of our Pugh ancestors, Uncle Ike and my dad's mom, Grandma Opie. I've seen these photos before through my research into the family tree.But suddenly, Alabama feels different from the times I visited before for research. I am not surprised that the shift in my relationship with Alabama was guided by my family members who chose to stay rather than migrate north. They stayed and evolved Alabama to the point where both Montgomery and Birmingham now have African American mayors. They, and the millions of Black people who stayed, led a movement that benefits all Americans today. In discussing the hardships my family endured there, it is important to recognize that the progress of our people and our nation is largely attributable to the activism of the courageous Black Americans who stayed and fought. These same Black Americans welcomed me back to Alabama with open arms and support, encouraging me to move forward with this project. They reminded me not to be resentful or afraid to come home, to give Alabama a chance, and to offer it the same benefit of the doubt and acknowledgment of complexity that I give my country.Understanding that it was our families, the Black descendants of American slavery, who led the movement that resulted in the Civil Rights Act of 1964, ending Jim Crow apartheid and bringing America closer to liberty and justice for all, reinforces the reality that, despite significant trauma, we have remained a solutions-oriented people, some of the most effective activists this nation has ever known.Their legacy and courage have shaped Alabama and America and their spirit of irrepressibility continues to inspire me.In my forthcoming book, "I Am Nobody's Slave: How Uncovering My Family History Set Me Free," published by HarperCollins, I will strive to capture not just the stories of trauma but how we can continue to conquer it as a family, a Black American community, and a nation. Inspired by the spirit of my ancestors and my father, who transcended the limitations Alabama tried to impose on him, I will continue my journalism on several issues discussed in this series. These include exposing and addressing the long-term effects of corporal punishment in homes and schools, the impact of childhood trauma on the health and well-being of children, encouraging school districts to implement policies of mandatory consequences for hate speech and harassment, and highlighting economic and health inequities along racial lines. I will also focus on the plight and power of Jim Crow apartheid survivors as they strive to quell the ripple effect of historical atrocities on their families.The question now is, what can we all do as a nation to recognize Jim Crow as a crime against humanity and to support the millions of Americans over 60 who lived in the South during this unfortunate period? How can we make our homes, schools, and society safer for the generations of children and grandchildren coming behind them?Together, we can acknowledge our past, honor the strength of those who came before us, and build a future filled with hope, determination, and joy. Let us rise with the resilience of our ancestors and create a world where every child can dream freely and every family can thrive. Lee Roy: You've run the game and you know the Lord and you're doing your thing, man. And that's the best you can do as far as I'm concerned. You have to keep your heart and your head up. I don't know this thing about being proud. I know the Lord and I know the Lord loves me. So if I'm proud, man, please forgive me and if I shouldn't be, but it is a poor dog that don't wag his own tail, son, when you're trying to reach your goals, I'll put it like that, you know. Lee Jr.: Right on. Well, okay buddy, I'm going to hit it, but I'll be in touch, okay? Lee Roy: Yeah, keep going, man, I'm loving it. I'm loving what we're doing, Lee. Lee Jr.: Okay, love you, Dad. Lee Roy: Okay man. Love you. Bye.CREDITS
In part two of our latest episode of How to Really Run a City podcast, former Atlanta mayor Kasim Reed and former Philly mayor Michael Nutter hear more rhetorical gems from bestselling author and public intellectual Michael Eric Dyson ... who has some, uh, soulful theories about how to win elections and govern cities. Listen, subscribe, spread the word! And visit The Philadelphia Citizen to find more solutions to city problems.
In part two of our latest episode of How to Really Run a City podcast, former Atlanta mayor Kasim Reed and former Philly mayor Michael Nutter hear more rhetorical gems from bestselling author and public intellectual Michael Eric Dyson ... who has some, uh, soulful theories about how to win elections and govern cities. Let's call it the Bobby Womack school of governance.
How can one of the most creative and promising generations of our time be tied to the lamest catch phrases? Well, let's go...with this episode. Today we talk about the riveting Kidz Bop version of the Kendrick and Drake beef, which may be the only way I the associate with a beef again. But we also chat about the struggle of having a conversation where someone isn't trying to convince you that you're thinking is wrong and their's is correct. Like, we love having sex, but do you really need a room dedicated to just sex? Not judging, just asking for a friend. So, remember to smell you house when you come home from vacation, put on some Bobby Womack and lets go!! (insert irony here) ~Enjoy the Journey~ IG - @adamriehlhealing FB - facebook.com/adamriehlhealing FB - facebook.com/robin.grether.1 IG - @itzyourweirdaunt
PropsAndPraise everybody. It's me - iamgregordeee filling in for Graham this month with selections ranging from The Unit Band to Bobby Womack. Have a seat for the next 60 minutes & Enjoy!!! & BLACK LIVES STILL MATTER!!!!!For more info and tracklisting, visit: https://thefaceradio.com/searching-for-soulTune into new broadcasts of Searching For Soul, the 4th Tuesday from 4 - 6 PM EST / 9 - 11 PM GMT//Dig this show? Please consider supporting The Face Radio: http://support.thefaceradio.com Support The Face Radio with PatreonSupport this show http://supporter.acast.com/thefaceradio. Join the family at https://plus.acast.com/s/thefaceradio. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Lickers Jay and Deon wax poetic on ten of their favorite records from their respective collections which are filed under the letter J. Their choices lead to discussions on Blindboy Boatclub (he rules), the origins of their nicknames (do you even know these guys?), another blind-bought Burger Records beauty (Jay is a total Burger fanboy), Steve Albini (R.I.P.), and much more. Tune in and rock out! --- In the early 1970s, legendary collaborator and self-proclaimed non-musician Brian Eno famously designed a deck of 115 cards containing elliptical imperatives to spark in the user creative connections unobtainable through regular modes of work. He called his creation "Oblique Strategies." For the past half century, countless artists and professionals across the globe have benefited from utilizing the oblique strategies technique when attempting to overcome a lull in creative output. In 2024, idiotic, introverted yet somehow still award-winning* hobby podcasters and self-proclaimed Lightnin' Lickers Jay and Deon found themselves uninspired when contemplating the potential theme of their upcoming thirty-seventh episode. Together, they decided... to default back to the alphabet. Because they have a reasonably solid grasp of the alphabet and how it works. They had previously utilized the letters A thru I, so naturally, they went with J. Sonic contributors to the thirty-seventh episode of Lightnin' Licks Radio podcast include: Brothers Johnson, Holland-Dozier-Holland, Lee Moses, Steve Albini, L.L. Cool J, Patience, Prince Paul, De La Soul, Freddie King, Little Walter, Blinboy Boatclub, SHANNON, Cornbroom Jenkins, Mighty Mista Knapps, Lucy Givens, Sesame Street, Huey Lewis & the News, The Jesus Lizard, Jonathon Wolffe, Kenny Gamble, Leon Huff, The Three Degrees, EMINIM, Labi Siffre, Marilyn Manson, Hootie & the Blowfish, Drive Like Jehu, Led Zepplin, Helmet with David Yow, Junk Monkeys, Goo Goo Dolls, Syl Johnson, Howlin' Wolf, Wu-tang Clan, Kanye West with Jay-Z, Hank & Kieth Shocklee with Public Enemy, Charlie Rich, Cypress Hill, The Luniz, R2D2, Jessie Jones, Death Valley Girls, Pete Jolly, Art Pepper, Jessica McQuarter, Herb Alpert, Jerry Moss, Ugly Duckling, DJ Einstein, Jimmie & Vella, Bobby Womack, Dead Prez, J. Cole, Kendrick Lamar, Anthony Fantano, Drake, Timmy Thomas, Post-POTUS George W. Bush, Childish Gambino, Jobriath, David Bowie, Stephen Trask, Vernard Jonson, Peter C. Johnson, Paul Vance & Lee Pockriss, Cody Jinks, Shellac, the Radiolab archives, The Clockers. LLR “J” mixtape: [SIDE A](1) The Jesus Lizard - Mouth Breather (2) Jimmie & Vella - Well (3) Peter C. Johnson - Snowblind (4) J. Cole - No Role Modelz (5) Vernard Johnson - Soul Metamorphosis Medley MegaMix [SIDE B] (1) Pete Jolly - Springs (2) Junk Monkeys - Round and Round (3) Syl Johnson - Is It Because I'm Black (4) Jessie Jones - Sugar Coated (5) Jobriath - World Without You Thanks for listening. Tune in again sometime within a few weeks for another bonus episode. Have a great summer! *former REVIEW magazine best live streaming production --- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/llradio/message
By the time of his death at just 33, singer Sam Cooke had become a bona fide superstar, as well as being an effective activist in the movement for Black equality in America. He had also been married twice, and it's in the story of his second wife, Barbara Campbell Cooke, where things get very complicated, very fast. Because Barbara did not attend Sam Cooke's funeral alone. She was escorted by his friend, protege, and guitar player Bobby Womack, who drove her there in Sam's car, dressed in Sam's best clothes. And the story only gets worse from there. Want early, ad-free episodes, regular Dumpster Dives, bonus divorces, limited series, Zoom hangouts, and more? Join us at patreon.com/trashydivorces! Want a personalized message for someone in your life? Check us out on Cameo! Sponsors June's Journey from Wooga. June needs your help, detective! Download June's Journey for free today on iOS and Android! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Brian breaks down the larger-than-life, unbelievable tale of the man who showed up to Sam Cooke’s funeral with Sam Cooke’s wife – Bobby Womack. There is sex. There is attempted murder. There is lots of drugging with Sly Stone. This episode is brought to you in part by Louder Than Life Music Festival. Send us an episode request about one of the bands performing and you could win tickets to see them there! Email: WeAreTheStoryGuys@gmail.com SHOW NOTES: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bobby_Womack https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-news/bobby-womack-1944-2014-246105/ https://atlantablackstar.com/2024/01/22/story-marry-bobby-womack-sam-cooke-widow-after-death/ The Soul Stirrer by Barney Hoskins: https://teachrock.org/article/the-soul-stirrer-sam-cooke/ Jet Magazine story: https://www.tumblr.com/twixnmix/190983933828/sam-cookes-widow-marries-bobby-womack-77-days https://kissrichmond.com/1753642/rb-singer-bobby-womack-still-heartbroken-about-baby-sons-death/ https://www.theguardian.com/music/2014/jun/28/bobby-womack-dies-aged-70 https://raresoul.com/bobby-womack-marries-sam-cookes-widow-gets-pistol-whipped/ https://raycharlesvideomuseum.blogspot.com/2015/07/bobby-and-ray-1966.html https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/how-we-met-womack-and-womack-1403513.html https://www.mtv.com/news/l698zf/bobby-womack-sam-cooke https://eurweb.com/2022/womack-sisters-born-into-betrayal-entanglement/ https://www.iloveoldschoolmusic.com/vintage-entanglement-bobby-womack-got-shot-for-sleeping-with-daughter-of-his-celebrity-friend/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harry_Womack https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Bravest_Man_in_the_Universe http://www.apologetix.com/faq/faq-detail.php?faq_q_id=52 Mark Farner's Christian version of “Some Kind of Wonderful”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rLvIBR4rxGQ
On the show this week, we bring you two hours of Classic and Rare Funk and Soul including, Bill Withers, Gene Harris and Bobby Womack plus all of the regular features.For more info and tracklisting, visit: https://thefaceradio.com/lock-and-stockTune into new broadcasts of Lock And Stock, Friday from 8 – 10 AM EST / 1 - 3 PM GMT.//Dig this show? Please consider supporting The Face Radio: http://support.thefaceradio.com Support The Face Radio with PatreonSupport this show http://supporter.acast.com/thefaceradio. Join the family at https://plus.acast.com/s/thefaceradio. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
This week we continue with the third installment of the lyrical breakdown series that I call Toxic Tracks. I have back as a guest the multitalented artist and content creator Koko to help me analyze these songs. The songs featured are what some people would call "oldies or dusties" Shirley Murdock's As we Lay & Bobby Womack's If You Think You're Lonely Now These tracks make us touch on the previous generations' perception of infidelity, those post break up woes and so much more Keep up with Koko here; https://beacons.ai/keepingupwkoko Follow the podcast on IG @simplykingpod Follow on Tiktok @kings_memoirs Follow me everywhere @kings_memoirs Follow my business page @lifeasking Sign up for my email list so that you never miss content https://www.lifeasking.com/links
Singer-songwriter Gabrielle joins Chris to discuss her career as a music maker. The London born singer was a huge music fan growing up, loving the music she heard on the radio and TV from acts like Wham, Haircut 100, Duran Duran and Adam And The Ants. And she was also exposed to the records of Barry White, Motown, Michael Jackson and Bobby Womack which her mum played. This broad love of music would make Gabrielle an artist who could touch a diverse audience, something that became evident when her very first single, 1991's 'Dreams', went to number one in the UK. Since then she's proven to be a distinctive musician with an incredible string of hit singles and albums, has toured with Al Green and even got a co-write with Bob Dylan.
This week is all about bands playing a famous singer–songwriter's songs better than he ever did… This is a particular phenomenon known as, “The Dylan Factor”. In this episode, we showcase songs by old Bobby Dylan that sound better than the versions he recorded. Some will say that's not a hard feat, but none can deny the powerful songwriting and auspicious lyrics of Dylan.What's this InObscuria thing? We're a podcast that exhumes obscure Rock n' Punk n' Metal and puts them in one of 3 categories: the Lost, the Forgotten, or the Should Have Beens. If you've never listened to Dylan because of his polarizing voice and delivery, try these awesome rock n' punk n' metal versions instead! Songs this week include:Frank Marino & Mahogany Rush – “All Along The Watchtower” from Tales Of The Unexpected (1979)Me First & The Gimme Gimmes – “The Times They Are A-Changin'” from Rake It In: The Greatest Hits (2017) Vains Of Jenna – “Blowin' In The Wind” from Reverse Tripped (2011)Mick Ronson – “Like A Rolling Stone” from Heaven And Hull (1994)Ministry – “Lay Lady Lay” from Filth Pig (1995)Red Hot Chili Peppers – “Subterranean Homesick Blues” from The Uplift Mofo Party Plan (1987)The Dead Weather – “New Pony” from Horehound (2009)Please subscribe everywhere that you listen to podcasts!Visit us: https://inobscuria.com/https://www.facebook.com/InObscuriahttps://twitter.com/inobscuriahttps://www.instagram.com/inobscuria/Buy cool stuff with our logo on it!: https://www.redbubble.com/people/inobscuria/og-shopCheck out Robert's amazing fire sculptures and metal workings here: http://flamewerx.com/If you'd like to check out Kevin's band THE SWEAR, take a listen on all streaming services or pick up a digital copy of their latest release here: https://theswear.bandcamp.com/If you want to hear Robert and Kevin's band from the late 90s – early 00s BIG JACK PNEUMATIC, check it out here: https://bigjackpnuematic.bandcamp.com/
"Exploring the Sweetness of 'Candyman': A Grateful Dead Classic"Larry Mishkin reflects on a Grateful Dead show from 44 years ago on April 1st, 1980, where the band played a prank on April Fool's Day, starting with a Chuck Berry tune and then transitioning to their usual instruments to perform the song again. Larry also talks about the significance of the song "Candyman" and its role in the Grateful Dead's repertoire, as well as Billy Joel's milestone 100th residency concert at Madison Square Garden. Larry also talks about "Friend of the Devil" and its origins, penned by lyricist Robert Hunter in collaboration with Jerry Garcia and John Dawson. Grateful DeadApril 1, 1980 (44 years ago)Capitol TheaterPassaic, NJGrateful Dead Live at Capitol Theater on 1980-04-01 : Free Download, Borrow, and Streaming : Internet Archive April Fool's DayOpener that's keeping with the theme INTRO: The Promised Land Track # 2 1:14 – 3:18 Chuck Berry tune with the Boys having a bit of fun to celebrate April Fool's Day: Jerry and Brent on DrumsBobby on keyboardBilly on bass and background vocalsMickey on rhythm guitar and singing lead vocalsPhil on lead guitar Kind of plodded through the song, but the fans loved the idea and the effortThey then went back to normal instruments, played the tune again and killed it! A fun opener with a good reality check for the dosed fans in the crowd. SHOW No. 1: Candyman Track #4 4:56 – 6:30 Garcia/Hunter masterpieceThe song Candyman is part of the album American Beauty, which found its way into the world in November 1970. American Beauty is an album that is cherished by many, as it brings stories and emotions that feel both personal and universal. Candyman, with its blend of sweetness and shadow, invites listeners to delve into a world that is rich, complex, and thoughtfully spun. The album, with its varied tales and emotions, continues to be a friend to listeners, offering stories that explore the many sides and shades of life's journey.The thought-provoking words of Candyman were penned by Robert Hunter, and the compelling music was created by Jerry Garcia. These two artists worked together to create many of the Grateful Dead's memorable songs. Their collaboration in Candyman offers a rich story that allows listeners to explore and imagine a world that is sweet, slightly shadowed, and full of interesting adventures. The images and tales spun by the words and music invite people to think, feel, and maybe even find bits of their own stories within the tale of the Candyman.Played a total of 273 times. Almost always a Jerry first set tune alternated with Loser, West LA, and a few othersFirst played on April 3, 1970 (10 years earlier than today's show) at Armory Fieldhouse in Cincinnati, OHLast played on June 30, 1995 at Three Rivers Stadium in Pittsburgh. SHOW No. 3: Friend of the Devil Track #8 3:36 – 5:20 Grateful Dead lyricist Robert Hunter told Relix that "Friend of the Devil" was the closest that the Grateful Dead ever came to creating "what may be called a classic song." Many Deadheads may disagree, but it's an interesting perspective from the man who penned the words for the majority of the Dead's most iconic pieces.Whether or not "Friend of the Devil" is the sole "classic" Dead tune, it's hard to argue that the band tapped into the outlaw's zeitgeist to find a timeless song with this one. Dead chronicler extraordinaire David Dodd, for one, agrees. "No other Dead tune gets played quite so often," Dodd writes in Greatest Stories Ever Told.Jerry Garcia and John Dawson of New Riders of the Purple Sage (NRPS) wrote the music for "Friend of the Devil." Hunter wrote the lyrics, but Dawson played a critical part in that area, as well.In his online journal, Robert Hunter recounted writing the lyrics for "Friend of the Devil" in a single afternoon in Madrone Canyon. He actually created the song with the intent of playing it with NRPS, after the band had asked him to be their bassist. This is why he first unveiled the song to David Nelson and John Dawson in their home in Kentfield. At that point, Hunter explains, "The 'Sweet Anne Marie' verse which was later to become a bridge was only one of the verses, not yet a bridge."Where things get really interesting in this story is where Hunter tells us that the chorus originally went:I set out running but I take my timeIt looks like water but it tastes like wineIf I get home before daylightI just might get some sleep tonightNotice how the line "A friend of the devil is a friend of mine" doesn't play into that chorus? This is where Dawson comes in.After showing the guys the song, Hunter explains, the band went down to the kitchen for espresso. "We got to talking about the tune and John said the verses were nifty except for 'it looks like water but it tastes like wine,' which I had to admit fell flat. Suddenly Dawson's eyes lit up and he crowed "How about 'a friend of the devil is a friend of mine.' Bingo, not only the right line but a memorable title as well!We ran back upstairs to Nelson's room and recorded the tune. I took the tape home and left it on the kitchen table. Next morning I heard earlybird Garcia (who hadn't been at the rehearsal - had a gig, you know) wanging away something familiar sounding on the peddle [sic] steel. Danged if it wasn't 'Friend of the Devil.' With a dandy bridge on the 'sweet Anne Marie' verse. He was not in the least apologetic about it. He'd played the tape, liked it, and faster than you can say dog my cats it was in the Grateful Dead repertoire."It's interesting to wonder whether or not the song would still have become a staple if Dawson hadn't popped those lyrics. The line, "a friend of the devil is a friend of mine" isn't the only great thing about the song, but it's definitely a critical part.Hunter dipped out of NRPS almost as fast he dipped in, and so the song became a Dead tune. Certainly a popular tune with the band and the Deadheads. Played 310X, almost always a first set tune.First – March 20, 1970 at the Capitol Theatre in Port ChesterLast – June 2, 1995 at RFK Stadium in D.C. SHOW No. 4: I Used To Love Her But It's All Over Now Track # 9 3:15 – 5:00 "It's All Over Now" is a song written by Bobby Womack and his sister-in-law Shirley Womack.[1] It was first released by The Valentinos, featuring Bobby Womack, in 1964. The Rolling Stones heard it on its release and quickly recorded a cover version, which became their first number-one hit in the United Kingdom, in July 1964. The Valentinos recorded the song at United Recording in Hollywood on March 24, 1964,[2] and released it two months later.[3] It entered the Billboard Hot 100 on June 27, 1964, and stayed on the chart for two weeks, peaking at number 94. The Rolling Stones landed in New York on June 1, 1964, for their first North American tour, around the time the Valentinos' recording was released. New York radio DJMurray the K played the song to the Rolling Stones. He also played the Stones' "King Bee" (their Slim Harpo cover) the same night and remarked on their ability to achieve an authentic blues sound. After hearing "It's All Over Now" on that WINS show, the band recorded their version nine days later at Chess Studios in Chicago. Years later, Bobby Womack said in an interview that he had told Sam Cooke he did not want the Rolling Stones to record their version of the song, and that he had told Mick Jagger to get his own song. Cooke convinced him to let the Rolling Stones record the song. Six months later on, after receiving the royalty check for the song, Womack told Cooke that Mick Jagger could have any song he wanted.The Rolling Stones' version of "It's All Over Now" is the most famous version of the song. It was first released as a single in the UK, where it peaked at number 1 on the UK Singles Chart, giving the Rolling Stones their first number one hit.[5] It was the band's third single released in America, and stayed in the Billboard Hot 100 for ten weeks, peaking at number 26. Months later it appeared on their second American album 12 X 5. The song was a big hit in Europe and was part of the band's live set in the 1960s. Cash Box described it as a "contagious cover of the Valentinos' click" and "an infectious thumper that should head right for chartsville." Dead played it 160 times, always a first set Bobby tune.First on Sept. 6, 1969 at Family Dog At The Great Highway in S.F.Last on July 2, 1995 at Deer Creek in Indy/ This version is great with the Brent solo leading into the Jerry solo. Check out the entire clip. SHOW No. 4: Shakedown Street Track #19 4:30 – 5:57 When people think of the Grateful Dead, they often think of free-flowing improvisational music. However, the band was known for many things, including their ability to construct incredibly catchy songs with deep meanings. This is exemplified in one of their most iconic songs, “Shakedown Street.” Shakedown Street, the title track of the Grateful Dead's tenth studio album, released in 1978, has been interpreted in countless ways over the years. According to Hunter in an interview with Rolling Stone magazine, “Shakedown Street” was a place where the underbelly of society came out and did its trading. “It was a place for freaks, weirdos, and people who didn't fit in anywhere else. It was one of the only places where they could socialize and be themselves without fear of persecution.” The lyrics of “Shakedown Street” talk about this place where everybody is welcome, regardless of who they are or where they come from. As the song says, “Don't tell me this town ain't got no heart. Just gotta poke around.”The song is a reflection of the band's values and the alternative society that they represented. It highlights the idea that people should be treated equally, without judgment, and that everyone should be able to express themselves.Played 164XPopular show opener, second set opener and occasionally, as here, an encore. Great way to end a show rocking out hard for 10+ minutes and then going home.First: August 31, 1978 Red RocksLast: July 9, 1995 Soldier Field – played it right up until the end! .Produced by PodConx Deadhead Cannabis Show - https://podconx.com/podcasts/deadhead-cannabis-showLarry Mishkin - https://podconx.com/guests/larry-mishkinRob Hunt - https://podconx.com/guests/rob-huntJay Blakesberg - https://podconx.com/guests/jay-blakesbergSound Designed by Jamie Humiston - https://www.linkedin.com/in/jamie-humiston-91718b1b3/Recorded on Squadcast
In this episode, Big Sauce reflects on life and aging, expressing gratitude for his health and the impact he has on others. He emphasizes the importance of spreading peace, compassion, and kindness, particularly towards children. He discusses the need for open-mindedness and understanding, especially in relation to different identities and beliefs. Sauce encourages honest conversations and respect for differences, highlighting the role of older generations in being role models for the youth. He stresses the significance of grace and compassion for kids, and the avoidance of judgment and unnecessary opinions. Sauce also discusses the ethics of friendship and loyalty, warning against disloyal and fake individuals. He concludes by emphasizing the value of sharing intellectual conversations and game with others.Support the show
Shannon Sharpe and Chad “Ochocinco” Johnson discuss Alex Rodriguez's viral "tan", how they would handle their significant other going on stage at a concert, and their best memories from NFL and college locker rooms. 0:00 Alex Rodriguez talks about how he got his tan; tells everyone to calm down9:45 Omah Lay dances with female fan at concert, boyfriend not thrilled12:20 Unc never gets mad at a dude for hitting on his woman19:40 Ocho references Bobby Womack song22:30 Unc tells story about getting in a fight about a woman24:45 Ocho wouldn't want Rell on stage with Usher32:00 DJ Khaled gets carried to keep Jordans clean - Ocho & Unc don't care enough about shoes33:40 KFC introduces the “Chizza” - Neither Unc or Ocho interested in trying it36:00 Spell-O-Cinco42:50 Q and Ayeeee57:00 Much more Nightcap! #Club #VolumeSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Shannon Sharpe and Chad “Ochocinco” Johnson discuss Alex Rodriguez's viral "tan", how they would handle their significant other going on stage at a concert, and their best memories from NFL and college locker rooms. 0:00 Alex Rodriguez talks about how he got his tan; tells everyone to calm down9:45 Omah Lay dances with female fan at concert, boyfriend not thrilled12:20 Unc never gets mad at a dude for hitting on his woman19:40 Ocho references Bobby Womack song22:30 Unc tells story about getting in a fight about a woman24:45 Ocho wouldn't want Rell on stage with Usher32:00 DJ Khaled gets carried to keep Jordans clean - Ocho & Unc don't care enough about shoes33:40 KFC introduces the “Chizza” - Neither Unc or Ocho interested in trying it36:00 Spell-O-Cinco42:50 Q and Ayeeee57:00 Much more Nightcap! #Club #VolumeSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Shannon Sharpe and Chad “Ochocinco” Johnson discuss Alex Rodriguez's viral "tan", how they would handle their significant other going on stage at a concert, and their best memories from NFL and college locker rooms. 0:00 Alex Rodriguez talks about how he got his tan; tells everyone to calm down9:45 Omah Lay dances with female fan at concert, boyfriend not thrilled12:20 Unc never gets mad at a dude for hitting on his woman19:40 Ocho references Bobby Womack song22:30 Unc tells story about getting in a fight about a woman24:45 Ocho wouldn't want Rell on stage with Usher32:00 DJ Khaled gets carried to keep Jordans clean - Ocho & Unc don't care enough about shoes33:40 KFC introduces the “Chizza” - Neither Unc or Ocho interested in trying it36:00 Spell-O-Cinco42:50 Q and Ayeeee57:00 Much more Nightcap! #Club #VolumeSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Episode 168 of A History of Rock Music in Five Hundred Songs looks at “I Say a Little Prayer”, and the interaction of the sacred, political, and secular in Aretha Franklin's life and work. Click the full post to read liner notes, links to more information, and a transcript of the episode. Patreon backers also have a forty-five-minute bonus episode available, on "Abraham, Martin, and John" by Dion. Tilt Araiza has assisted invaluably by doing a first-pass edit, and will hopefully be doing so from now on. Check out Tilt's irregular podcasts at http://www.podnose.com/jaffa-cakes-for-proust and http://sitcomclub.com/ Resources No Mixcloud this week, as there are too many songs by Aretha Franklin. Even splitting it into multiple parts would have required six or seven mixes. My main biographical source for Aretha Franklin is Respect: The Life of Aretha Franklin by David Ritz, and this is where most of the quotes from musicians come from. Information on C.L. Franklin came from Singing in a Strange Land: C. L. Franklin, the Black Church, and the Transformation of America by Nick Salvatore. Country Soul by Charles L Hughes is a great overview of the soul music made in Muscle Shoals, Memphis, and Nashville in the sixties. Peter Guralnick's Sweet Soul Music: Rhythm And Blues And The Southern Dream Of Freedom is possibly less essential, but still definitely worth reading. Information about Martin Luther King came from Martin Luther King: A Religious Life by Paul Harvey. I also referred to Burt Bacharach's autobiography Anyone Who Had a Heart, Carole King's autobiography A Natural Woman, and Soul Serenade: King Curtis and his Immortal Saxophone by Timothy R. Hoover. For information about Amazing Grace I also used Aaron Cohen's 33 1/3 book on the album. The film of the concerts is also definitely worth watching. And the Aretha Now album is available in this five-album box set for a ludicrously cheap price. But it's actually worth getting this nineteen-CD set with her first sixteen Atlantic albums and a couple of bonus discs of demos and outtakes. There's barely a duff track in the whole nineteen discs. Patreon This podcast is brought to you by the generosity of my backers on Patreon. Why not join them? Transcript A quick warning before I begin. This episode contains some moderate references to domestic abuse, death by cancer, racial violence, police violence, and political assassination. Anyone who might be upset by those subjects might want to check the transcript rather than listening to the episode. Also, as with the previous episode on Aretha Franklin, this episode presents something of a problem. Like many people in this narrative, Franklin's career was affected by personal troubles, which shaped many of her decisions. But where most of the subjects of the podcast have chosen to live their lives in public and share intimate details of every aspect of their personal lives, Franklin was an extremely private person, who chose to share only carefully sanitised versions of her life, and tried as far as possible to keep things to herself. This of course presents a dilemma for anyone who wants to tell her story -- because even though the information is out there in biographies, and even though she's dead, it's not right to disrespect someone's wish for a private life. I have therefore tried, wherever possible, to stay away from talk of her personal life except where it *absolutely* affects the work, or where other people involved have publicly shared their own stories, and even there I've tried to keep it to a minimum. This will occasionally lead to me saying less about some topics than other people might, even though the information is easily findable, because I don't think we have an absolute right to invade someone else's privacy for entertainment. When we left Aretha Franklin, she had just finally broken through into the mainstream after a decade of performing, with a version of Otis Redding's song "Respect" on which she had been backed by her sisters, Erma and Carolyn. "Respect", in Franklin's interpretation, had been turned from a rather chauvinist song about a man demanding respect from his woman into an anthem of feminism, of Black power, and of a new political awakening. For white people of a certain generation, the summer of 1967 was "the summer of love". For many Black people, it was rather different. There's a quote that goes around (I've seen it credited in reliable sources to both Ebony and Jet magazine, but not ever seen an issue cited, so I can't say for sure where it came from) saying that the summer of 67 was the summer of "'retha, Rap, and revolt", referring to the trifecta of Aretha Franklin, the Black power leader Jamil Abdullah al-Amin (who was at the time known as H. Rap Brown, a name he later disclaimed) and the rioting that broke out in several major cities, particularly in Detroit: [Excerpt: John Lee Hooker, "The Motor City is Burning"] The mid sixties were, in many ways, the high point not of Black rights in the US -- for the most part there has been a lot of progress in civil rights in the intervening decades, though not without inevitable setbacks and attacks from the far right, and as movements like the Black Lives Matter movement have shown there is still a long way to go -- but of *hope* for Black rights. The moral force of the arguments made by the civil rights movement were starting to cause real change to happen for Black people in the US for the first time since the Reconstruction nearly a century before. But those changes weren't happening fast enough, and as we heard in the episode on "I Was Made to Love Her", there was not only a growing unrest among Black people, but a recognition that it was actually possible for things to change. A combination of hope and frustration can be a powerful catalyst, and whether Franklin wanted it or not, she was at the centre of things, both because of her newfound prominence as a star with a hit single that couldn't be interpreted as anything other than a political statement and because of her intimate family connections to the struggle. Even the most racist of white people these days pays lip service to the memory of Dr Martin Luther King, and when they do they quote just a handful of sentences from one speech King made in 1963, as if that sums up the full theological and political philosophy of that most complex of men. And as we discussed the last time we looked at Aretha Franklin, King gave versions of that speech, the "I Have a Dream" speech, twice. The most famous version was at the March on Washington, but the first time was a few weeks earlier, at what was at the time the largest civil rights demonstration in American history, in Detroit. Aretha's family connection to that event is made clear by the very opening of King's speech: [Excerpt: Martin Luther King, "Original 'I Have a Dream' Speech"] So as summer 1967 got into swing, and white rock music was going to San Francisco to wear flowers in its hair, Aretha Franklin was at the centre of a very different kind of youth revolution. Franklin's second Atlantic album, Aretha Arrives, brought in some new personnel to the team that had recorded Aretha's first album for Atlantic. Along with the core Muscle Shoals players Jimmy Johnson, Spooner Oldham, Tommy Cogbill and Roger Hawkins, and a horn section led by King Curtis, Wexler and Dowd also brought in guitarist Joe South. South was a white session player from Georgia, who had had a few minor hits himself in the fifties -- he'd got his start recording a cover version of "The Purple People Eater Meets the Witch Doctor", the Big Bopper's B-side to "Chantilly Lace": [Excerpt: Joe South, "The Purple People Eater Meets the Witch Doctor"] He'd also written a few songs that had been recorded by people like Gene Vincent, but he'd mostly become a session player. He'd become a favourite musician of Bob Johnston's, and so he'd played guitar on Simon and Garfunkel's Sounds of Silence and Parsley, Sage, Rosemary and Thyme albums: [Excerpt: Simon and Garfunkel, "I am a Rock"] and bass on Bob Dylan's Blonde on Blonde, with Al Kooper particularly praising his playing on "Visions of Johanna": [Excerpt: Bob Dylan, "Visions of Johanna"] South would be the principal guitarist on this and Franklin's next album, before his own career took off in 1968 with "Games People Play": [Excerpt: Joe South, "Games People Play"] At this point, he had already written the other song he's best known for, "Hush", which later became a hit for Deep Purple: [Excerpt: Deep Purple, "Hush"] But he wasn't very well known, and was surprised to get the call for the Aretha Franklin session, especially because, as he put it "I was white and I was about to play behind the blackest genius since Ray Charles" But Jerry Wexler had told him that Franklin didn't care about the race of the musicians she played with, and South settled in as soon as Franklin smiled at him when he played a good guitar lick on her version of the blues standard "Going Down Slow": [Excerpt: Aretha Franklin, "Going Down Slow"] That was one of the few times Franklin smiled in those sessions though. Becoming an overnight success after years of trying and failing to make a name for herself had been a disorienting experience, and on top of that things weren't going well in her personal life. Her marriage to her manager Ted White was falling apart, and she was performing erratically thanks to the stress. In particular, at a gig in Georgia she had fallen off the stage and broken her arm. She soon returned to performing, but it meant she had problems with her right arm during the recording of the album, and didn't play as much piano as she would have previously -- on some of the faster songs she played only with her left hand. But the recording sessions had to go on, whether or not Aretha was physically capable of playing piano. As we discussed in the episode on Otis Redding, the owners of Atlantic Records were busily negotiating its sale to Warner Brothers in mid-1967. As Wexler said later “Everything in me said, Keep rolling, keep recording, keep the hits coming. She was red hot and I had no reason to believe that the streak wouldn't continue. I knew that it would be foolish—and even irresponsible—not to strike when the iron was hot. I also had personal motivation. A Wall Street financier had agreed to see what we could get for Atlantic Records. While Ahmet and Neshui had not agreed on a selling price, they had gone along with my plan to let the financier test our worth on the open market. I was always eager to pump out hits, but at this moment I was on overdrive. In this instance, I had a good partner in Ted White, who felt the same. He wanted as much product out there as possible." In truth, you can tell from Aretha Arrives that it's a record that was being thought of as "product" rather than one being made out of any kind of artistic impulse. It's a fine album -- in her ten-album run from I Never Loved a Man the Way I Love You through Amazing Grace there's not a bad album and barely a bad track -- but there's a lack of focus. There are only two originals on the album, neither of them written by Franklin herself, and the rest is an incoherent set of songs that show the tension between Franklin and her producers at Atlantic. Several songs are the kind of standards that Franklin had recorded for her old label Columbia, things like "You Are My Sunshine", or her version of "That's Life", which had been a hit for Frank Sinatra the previous year: [Excerpt: Aretha Franklin, "That's Life"] But mixed in with that are songs that are clearly the choice of Wexler. As we've discussed previously in episodes on Otis Redding and Wilson Pickett, at this point Atlantic had the idea that it was possible for soul artists to cross over into the white market by doing cover versions of white rock hits -- and indeed they'd had some success with that tactic. So while Franklin was suggesting Sinatra covers, Atlantic's hand is visible in the choices of songs like "(I Can't Get No) Satisfaction" and "96 Tears": [Excerpt: Aretha Franklin, "96 Tears'] Of the two originals on the album, one, the hit single "Baby I Love You" was written by Ronnie Shannon, the Detroit songwriter who had previously written "I Never Loved a Man (the Way I Love You)": [Excerpt: Aretha Franklin, "Baby I Love You"] As with the previous album, and several other songs on this one, that had backing vocals by Aretha's sisters, Erma and Carolyn. But the other original on the album, "Ain't Nobody (Gonna Turn Me Around)", didn't, even though it was written by Carolyn: [Excerpt: Aretha Franklin, "Ain't Nobody (Gonna Turn Me Around)"] To explain why, let's take a little detour and look at the co-writer of the song this episode is about, though we're not going to get to that for a little while yet. We've not talked much about Burt Bacharach in this series so far, but he's one of those figures who has come up a few times in the periphery and will come up again, so here is as good a time as any to discuss him, and bring everyone up to speed about his career up to 1967. Bacharach was one of the more privileged figures in the sixties pop music field. His father, Bert Bacharach (pronounced the same as his son, but spelled with an e rather than a u) had been a famous newspaper columnist, and his parents had bought him a Steinway grand piano to practice on -- they pushed him to learn the piano even though as a kid he wasn't interested in finger exercises and Debussy. What he was interested in, though, was jazz, and as a teenager he would often go into Manhattan and use a fake ID to see people like Dizzy Gillespie, who he idolised, and in his autobiography he talks rapturously of seeing Gillespie playing his bent trumpet -- he once saw Gillespie standing on a street corner with a pet monkey on his shoulder, and went home and tried to persuade his parents to buy him a monkey too. In particular, he talks about seeing the Count Basie band with Sonny Payne on drums as a teenager: [Excerpt: Count Basie, "Kid From Red Bank"] He saw them at Birdland, the club owned by Morris Levy where they would regularly play, and said of the performance "they were just so incredibly exciting that all of a sudden, I got into music in a way I never had before. What I heard in those clubs really turned my head around— it was like a big breath of fresh air when somebody throws open a window. That was when I knew for the first time how much I loved music and wanted to be connected to it in some way." Of course, there's a rather major problem with this story, as there is so often with narratives that musicians tell about their early career. In this case, Birdland didn't open until 1949, when Bacharach was twenty-one and stationed in Germany for his military service, while Sonny Payne didn't join Basie's band until 1954, when Bacharach had been a professional musician for many years. Also Dizzy Gillespie's trumpet bell only got bent on January 6, 1953. But presumably while Bacharach was conflating several memories, he did have some experience in some New York jazz club that led him to want to become a musician. Certainly there were enough great jazz musicians playing the clubs in those days. He went to McGill University to study music for two years, then went to study with Darius Milhaud, a hugely respected modernist composer. Milhaud was also one of the most important music teachers of the time -- among others he'd taught Stockhausen and Xenakkis, and would go on to teach Philip Glass and Steve Reich. This suited Bacharach, who by this point was a big fan of Schoenberg and Webern, and was trying to write atonal, difficult music. But Milhaud had also taught Dave Brubeck, and when Bacharach rather shamefacedly presented him with a composition which had an actual tune, he told Bacharach "Never be ashamed of writing a tune you can whistle". He dropped out of university and, like most men of his generation, had to serve in the armed forces. When he got out of the army, he continued his musical studies, still trying to learn to be an avant-garde composer, this time with Bohuslav Martinů and later with Henry Cowell, the experimental composer we've heard about quite a bit in previous episodes: [Excerpt: Henry Cowell, "Aeolian Harp and Sinister Resonance"] He was still listening to a lot of avant garde music, and would continue doing so throughout the fifties, going to see people like John Cage. But he spent much of that time working in music that was very different from the avant-garde. He got a job as the band leader for the crooner Vic Damone: [Excerpt: Vic Damone. "Ebb Tide"] He also played for the vocal group the Ames Brothers. He decided while he was working with the Ames Brothers that he could write better material than they were getting from their publishers, and that it would be better to have a job where he didn't have to travel, so he got himself a job as a staff songwriter in the Brill Building. He wrote a string of flops and nearly hits, starting with "Keep Me In Mind" for Patti Page: [Excerpt: Patti Page, "Keep Me In Mind"] From early in his career he worked with the lyricist Hal David, and the two of them together wrote two big hits, "Magic Moments" for Perry Como: [Excerpt: Perry Como, "Magic Moments"] and "The Story of My Life" for Marty Robbins: [Excerpt: "The Story of My Life"] But at that point Bacharach was still also writing with other writers, notably Hal David's brother Mack, with whom he wrote the theme tune to the film The Blob, as performed by The Five Blobs: [Excerpt: The Five Blobs, "The Blob"] But Bacharach's songwriting career wasn't taking off, and he got himself a job as musical director for Marlene Dietrich -- a job he kept even after it did start to take off. Part of the problem was that he intuitively wrote music that didn't quite fit into standard structures -- there would be odd bars of unusual time signatures thrown in, unusual harmonies, and structural irregularities -- but then he'd take feedback from publishers and producers who would tell him the song could only be recorded if he straightened it out. He said later "The truth is that I ruined a lot of songs by not believing in myself enough to tell these guys they were wrong." He started writing songs for Scepter Records, usually with Hal David, but also with Bob Hilliard and Mack David, and started having R&B hits. One song he wrote with Mack David, "I'll Cherish You", had the lyrics rewritten by Luther Dixon to make them more harsh-sounding for a Shirelles single -- but the single was otherwise just Bacharach's demo with the vocals replaced, and you can even hear his voice briefly at the beginning: [Excerpt: The Shirelles, "Baby, It's You"] But he'd also started becoming interested in the production side of records more generally. He'd iced that some producers, when recording his songs, would change the sound for the worse -- he thought Gene McDaniels' version of "Tower of Strength", for example, was too fast. But on the other hand, other producers got a better sound than he'd heard in his head. He and Hilliard had written a song called "Please Stay", which they'd given to Leiber and Stoller to record with the Drifters, and he thought that their arrangement of the song was much better than the one he'd originally thought up: [Excerpt: The Drifters, "Please Stay"] He asked Leiber and Stoller if he could attend all their New York sessions and learn about record production from them. He started doing so, and eventually they started asking him to assist them on records. He and Hilliard wrote a song called "Mexican Divorce" for the Drifters, which Leiber and Stoller were going to produce, and as he put it "they were so busy running Redbird Records that they asked me to rehearse the background singers for them in my office." [Excerpt: The Drifters, "Mexican Divorce"] The backing singers who had been brought in to augment the Drifters on that record were a group of vocalists who had started out as members of a gospel group called the Drinkard singers: [Excerpt: The Drinkard Singers, "Singing in My Soul"] The Drinkard Singers had originally been a family group, whose members included Cissy Drinkard, who joined the group aged five (and who on her marriage would become known as Cissy Houston -- her daughter Whitney would later join the family business), her aunt Lee Warrick, and Warrick's adopted daughter Judy Clay. That group were discovered by the great gospel singer Mahalia Jackson, and spent much of the fifties performing with gospel greats including Jackson herself, Clara Ward, and Sister Rosetta Tharpe. But Houston was also the musical director of a group at her church, the Gospelaires, which featured Lee Warrick's two daughters Dionne and Dee Dee Warwick (for those who don't know, the Warwick sisters' birth name was Warrick, spelled with two rs. A printing error led to it being misspelled the same way as the British city on a record label, and from that point on Dionne at least pronounced the w in her misspelled name). And slowly, the Gospelaires rather than the Drinkard Singers became the focus, with a lineup of Houston, the Warwick sisters, the Warwick sisters' cousin Doris Troy, and Clay's sister Sylvia Shemwell. The real change in the group's fortunes came when, as we talked about a while back in the episode on "The Loco-Motion", the original lineup of the Cookies largely stopped working as session singers to become Ray Charles' Raelettes. As we discussed in that episode, a new lineup of Cookies formed in 1961, but it took a while for them to get started, and in the meantime the producers who had been relying on them for backing vocals were looking elsewhere, and they looked to the Gospelaires. "Mexican Divorce" was the first record to feature the group as backing vocalists -- though reports vary as to how many of them are on the record, with some saying it's only Troy and the Warwicks, others saying Houston was there, and yet others saying it was all five of them. Some of these discrepancies were because these singers were so good that many of them left to become solo singers in fairly short order. Troy was the first to do so, with her hit "Just One Look", on which the other Gospelaires sang backing vocals: [Excerpt: Doris Troy, "Just One Look"] But the next one to go solo was Dionne Warwick, and that was because she'd started working with Bacharach and Hal David as their principal demo singer. She started singing lead on their demos, and hoping that she'd get to release them on her own. One early one was "Make it Easy On Yourself", which was recorded by Jerry Butler, formerly of the Impressions. That record was produced by Bacharach, one of the first records he produced without outside supervision: [Excerpt: Jerry Butler, "Make it Easy On Yourself"] Warwick was very jealous that a song she'd sung the demo of had become a massive hit for someone else, and blamed Bacharach and David. The way she tells the story -- Bacharach always claimed this never happened, but as we've already seen he was himself not always the most reliable of narrators of his own life -- she got so angry she complained to them, and said "Don't make me over, man!" And so Bacharach and David wrote her this: [Excerpt: Dionne Warwick, "Don't Make Me Over"] Incidentally, in the UK, the hit version of that was a cover by the Swinging Blue Jeans: [Excerpt: The Swinging Blue Jeans, "Don't Make Me Over"] who also had a huge hit with "You're No Good": [Excerpt: The Swinging Blue Jeans, "You're No Good"] And *that* was originally recorded by *Dee Dee* Warwick: [Excerpt: Dee Dee Warwick, "You're No Good"] Dee Dee also had a successful solo career, but Dionne's was the real success, making the names of herself, and of Bacharach and David. The team had more than twenty top forty hits together, before Bacharach and David had a falling out in 1971 and stopped working together, and Warwick sued both of them for breach of contract as a result. But prior to that they had hit after hit, with classic records like "Anyone Who Had a Heart": [Excerpt: Dionne Warwick, "Anyone Who Had a Heart"] And "Walk On By": [Excerpt: Dionne Warwick, "Walk On By"] With Doris, Dionne, and Dee Dee all going solo, the group's membership was naturally in flux -- though the departed members would occasionally join their former bandmates for sessions, and the remaining members would sing backing vocals on their ex-members' records. By 1965 the group consisted of Cissy Houston, Sylvia Shemwell, the Warwick sisters' cousin Myrna Smith, and Estelle Brown. The group became *the* go-to singers for soul and R&B records made in New York. They were regularly hired by Leiber and Stoller to sing on their records, and they were also the particular favourites of Bert Berns. They sang backing vocals on almost every record he produced. It's them doing the gospel wails on "Cry Baby" by Garnet Mimms: [Excerpt: Garnet Mimms, "Cry Baby"] And they sang backing vocals on both versions of "If You Need Me" -- Wilson Pickett's original and Solomon Burke's more successful cover version, produced by Berns: [Excerpt: Solomon Burke, "If You Need Me"] They're on such Berns records as "Show Me Your Monkey", by Kenny Hamber: [Excerpt: Kenny Hamber, "Show Me Your Monkey"] And it was a Berns production that ended up getting them to be Aretha Franklin's backing group. The group were becoming such an important part of the records that Atlantic and BANG Records, in particular, were putting out, that Jerry Wexler said "it was only a matter of common decency to put them under contract as a featured group". He signed them to Atlantic and renamed them from the Gospelaires to The Sweet Inspirations. Dan Penn and Spooner Oldham wrote a song for the group which became their only hit under their own name: [Excerpt: The Sweet Inspirations, "Sweet Inspiration"] But to start with, they released a cover of Pops Staples' civil rights song "Why (Am I treated So Bad)": [Excerpt: The Sweet Inspirations, "Why (Am I Treated So Bad?)"] That hadn't charted, and meanwhile, they'd all kept doing session work. Cissy had joined Erma and Carolyn Franklin on the backing vocals for Aretha's "I Never Loved a Man the Way I Love You": [Excerpt: Aretha Franklin, "I Never Loved a Man the Way I Love You"] Shortly after that, the whole group recorded backing vocals for Erma's single "Piece of My Heart", co-written and produced by Berns: [Excerpt: Erma Franklin, "Piece of My Heart"] That became a top ten record on the R&B charts, but that caused problems. Aretha Franklin had a few character flaws, and one of these was an extreme level of jealousy for any other female singer who had any level of success and came up in the business after her. She could be incredibly graceful towards anyone who had been successful before her -- she once gave one of her Grammies away to Esther Phillips, who had been up for the same award and had lost to her -- but she was terribly insecure, and saw any contemporary as a threat. She'd spent her time at Columbia Records fuming (with some justification) that Barbra Streisand was being given a much bigger marketing budget than her, and she saw Diana Ross, Gladys Knight, and Dionne Warwick as rivals rather than friends. And that went doubly for her sisters, who she was convinced should be supporting her because of family loyalty. She had been infuriated at John Hammond when Columbia had signed Erma, thinking he'd gone behind her back to create competition for her. And now Erma was recording with Bert Berns. Bert Berns who had for years been a colleague of Jerry Wexler and the Ertegun brothers at Atlantic. Aretha was convinced that Wexler had put Berns up to signing Erma as some kind of power play. There was only one problem with this -- it simply wasn't true. As Wexler later explained “Bert and I had suffered a bad falling-out, even though I had enormous respect for him. After all, he was the guy who brought over guitarist Jimmy Page from England to play on our sessions. Bert, Ahmet, Nesuhi, and I had started a label together—Bang!—where Bert produced Van Morrison's first album. But Bert also had a penchant for trouble. He courted the wise guys. He wanted total control over every last aspect of our business dealings. Finally it was too much, and the Erteguns and I let him go. He sued us for breach of contract and suddenly we were enemies. I felt that he signed Erma, an excellent singer, not merely for her talent but as a way to get back at me. If I could make a hit with Aretha, he'd show me up by making an even bigger hit on Erma. Because there was always an undercurrent of rivalry between the sisters, this only added to the tension.” There were two things that resulted from this paranoia on Aretha's part. The first was that she and Wexler, who had been on first-name terms up to that point, temporarily went back to being "Mr. Wexler" and "Miss Franklin" to each other. And the second was that Aretha no longer wanted Carolyn and Erma to be her main backing vocalists, though they would continue to appear on her future records on occasion. From this point on, the Sweet Inspirations would be the main backing vocalists for Aretha in the studio throughout her golden era [xxcut line (and when the Sweet Inspirations themselves weren't on the record, often it would be former members of the group taking their place)]: [Excerpt: Aretha Franklin, "Ain't Nobody (Gonna Turn Me Around)"] The last day of sessions for Aretha Arrives was July the twenty-third, 1967. And as we heard in the episode on "I Was Made to Love Her", that was the day that the Detroit riots started. To recap briefly, that was four days of rioting started because of a history of racist policing, made worse by those same racist police overreacting to the initial protests. By the end of those four days, the National Guard, 82nd Airborne Division, and the 101st Airborne from Clarksville were all called in to deal with the violence, which left forty-three dead (of whom thirty-three were Black and only one was a police officer), 1,189 people were injured, and over 7,200 arrested, almost all of them Black. Those days in July would be a turning point for almost every musician based in Detroit. In particular, the police had murdered three members of the soul group the Dramatics, in a massacre of which the author John Hersey, who had been asked by President Johnson to be part of the National Advisory Commission on Civil Disorders but had decided that would compromise his impartiality and did an independent journalistic investigation, said "The episode contained all the mythic themes of racial strife in the United States: the arm of the law taking the law into its own hands; interracial sex; the subtle poison of racist thinking by “decent” men who deny they are racists; the societal limbo into which, ever since slavery, so many young black men have been driven by our country; ambiguous justice in the courts; and the devastation in both black and white human lives that follows in the wake of violence as surely as ruinous and indiscriminate flood after torrents" But these were also the events that radicalised the MC5 -- the group had been playing a gig as Tim Buckley's support act when the rioting started, and guitarist Wayne Kramer decided afterwards to get stoned and watch the fires burning down the city through a telescope -- which police mistook for a rifle, leading to the National Guard knocking down Kramer's door. The MC5 would later cover "The Motor City is Burning", John Lee Hooker's song about the events: [Excerpt: The MC5, "The Motor City is Burning"] It would also be a turning point for Motown, too, in ways we'll talk about in a few future episodes. And it was a political turning point too -- Michigan Governor George Romney, a liberal Republican (at a time when such people existed) had been the favourite for the Republican Presidential candidacy when he'd entered the race in December 1966, but as racial tensions ramped up in Detroit during the early months of 1967 he'd started trailing Richard Nixon, a man who was consciously stoking racists' fears. President Johnson, the incumbent Democrat, who was at that point still considering standing for re-election, made sure to make it clear to everyone during the riots that the decision to call in the National Guard had been made at the State level, by Romney, rather than at the Federal level. That wasn't the only thing that removed the possibility of a Romney presidency, but it was a big part of the collapse of his campaign, and the, as it turned out, irrevocable turn towards right-authoritarianism that the party took with Nixon's Southern Strategy. Of course, Aretha Franklin had little way of knowing what was to come and how the riots would change the city and the country over the following decades. What she was primarily concerned about was the safety of her father, and to a lesser extent that of her sister-in-law Earline who was staying with him. Aretha, Carolyn, and Erma all tried to keep in constant touch with their father while they were out of town, and Aretha even talked about hiring private detectives to travel to Detroit, find her father, and get him out of the city to safety. But as her brother Cecil pointed out, he was probably the single most loved man among Black people in Detroit, and was unlikely to be harmed by the rioters, while he was too famous for the police to kill with impunity. Reverend Franklin had been having a stressful time anyway -- he had recently been fined for tax evasion, an action he was convinced the IRS had taken because of his friendship with Dr King and his role in the civil rights movement -- and according to Cecil "Aretha begged Daddy to move out of the city entirely. She wanted him to find another congregation in California, where he was especially popular—or at least move out to the suburbs. But he wouldn't budge. He said that, more than ever, he was needed to point out the root causes of the riots—the economic inequality, the pervasive racism in civic institutions, the woefully inadequate schools in inner-city Detroit, and the wholesale destruction of our neighborhoods by urban renewal. Some ministers fled the city, but not our father. The horror of what happened only recommitted him. He would not abandon his political agenda." To make things worse, Aretha was worried about her father in other ways -- as her marriage to Ted White was starting to disintegrate, she was looking to her father for guidance, and actually wanted him to take over her management. Eventually, Ruth Bowen, her booking agent, persuaded her brother Cecil that this was a job he could do, and that she would teach him everything he needed to know about the music business. She started training him up while Aretha was still married to White, in the expectation that that marriage couldn't last. Jerry Wexler, who only a few months earlier had been seeing Ted White as an ally in getting "product" from Franklin, had now changed his tune -- partly because the sale of Atlantic had gone through in the meantime. He later said “Sometimes she'd call me at night, and, in that barely audible little-girl voice of hers, she'd tell me that she wasn't sure she could go on. She always spoke in generalities. She never mentioned her husband, never gave me specifics of who was doing what to whom. And of course I knew better than to ask. She just said that she was tired of dealing with so much. My heart went out to her. She was a woman who suffered silently. She held so much in. I'd tell her to take as much time off as she needed. We had a lot of songs in the can that we could release without new material. ‘Oh, no, Jerry,' she'd say. ‘I can't stop recording. I've written some new songs, Carolyn's written some new songs. We gotta get in there and cut 'em.' ‘Are you sure?' I'd ask. ‘Positive,' she'd say. I'd set up the dates and typically she wouldn't show up for the first or second sessions. Carolyn or Erma would call me to say, ‘Ree's under the weather.' That was tough because we'd have asked people like Joe South and Bobby Womack to play on the sessions. Then I'd reschedule in the hopes she'd show." That third album she recorded in 1967, Lady Soul, was possibly her greatest achievement. The opening track, and second single, "Chain of Fools", released in November, was written by Don Covay -- or at least it's credited as having been written by Covay. There's a gospel record that came out around the same time on a very small label based in Houston -- "Pains of Life" by Rev. E. Fair And The Sensational Gladys Davis Trio: [Excerpt: Rev. E. Fair And The Sensational Gladys Davis Trio, "Pains of Life"] I've seen various claims online that that record came out shortly *before* "Chain of Fools", but I can't find any definitive evidence one way or the other -- it was on such a small label that release dates aren't available anywhere. Given that the B-side, which I haven't been able to track down online, is called "Wait Until the Midnight Hour", my guess is that rather than this being a case of Don Covay stealing the melody from an obscure gospel record he'd have had little chance to hear, it's the gospel record rewriting a then-current hit to be about religion, but I thought it worth mentioning. The song was actually written by Covay after Jerry Wexler asked him to come up with some songs for Otis Redding, but Wexler, after hearing it, decided it was better suited to Franklin, who gave an astonishing performance: [Excerpt: Aretha Franklin, "Chain of Fools"] Arif Mardin, the arranger of the album, said of that track “I was listed as the arranger of ‘Chain of Fools,' but I can't take credit. Aretha walked into the studio with the chart fully formed inside her head. The arrangement is based around the harmony vocals provided by Carolyn and Erma. To add heft, the Sweet Inspirations joined in. The vision of the song is entirely Aretha's.” According to Wexler, that's not *quite* true -- according to him, Joe South came up with the guitar part that makes up the intro, and he also said that when he played what he thought was the finished track to Ellie Greenwich, she came up with another vocal line for the backing vocals, which she overdubbed. But the core of the record's sound is definitely pure Aretha -- and Carolyn Franklin said that there was a reason for that. As she said later “Aretha didn't write ‘Chain,' but she might as well have. It was her story. When we were in the studio putting on the backgrounds with Ree doing lead, I knew she was singing about Ted. Listen to the lyrics talking about how for five long years she thought he was her man. Then she found out she was nothing but a link in the chain. Then she sings that her father told her to come on home. Well, he did. She sings about how her doctor said to take it easy. Well, he did too. She was drinking so much we thought she was on the verge of a breakdown. The line that slew me, though, was the one that said how one of these mornings the chain is gonna break but until then she'll take all she can take. That summed it up. Ree knew damn well that this man had been doggin' her since Jump Street. But somehow she held on and pushed it to the breaking point." [Excerpt: Aretha Franklin, "Chain of Fools"] That made number one on the R&B charts, and number two on the hot one hundred, kept from the top by "Judy In Disguise (With Glasses)" by John Fred and his Playboy Band -- a record that very few people would say has stood the test of time as well. The other most memorable track on the album was the one chosen as the first single, released in September. As Carole King told the story, she and Gerry Goffin were feeling like their career was in a slump. While they had had a huge run of hits in the early sixties through 1965, they had only had two new hits in 1966 -- "Goin' Back" for Dusty Springfield and "Don't Bring Me Down" for the Animals, and neither of those were anything like as massive as their previous hits. And up to that point in 1967, they'd only had one -- "Pleasant Valley Sunday" for the Monkees. They had managed to place several songs on Monkees albums and the TV show as well, so they weren't going to starve, but the rise of self-contained bands that were starting to dominate the charts, and Phil Spector's temporary retirement, meant there simply wasn't the opportunity for them to place material that there had been. They were also getting sick of travelling to the West Coast all the time, because as their children were growing slightly older they didn't want to disrupt their lives in New York, and were thinking of approaching some of the New York based labels and seeing if they needed songs. They were particularly considering Atlantic, because soul was more open to outside songwriters than other genres. As it happened, though, they didn't have to approach Atlantic, because Atlantic approached them. They were walking down Broadway when a limousine pulled up, and Jerry Wexler stuck his head out of the window. He'd come up with a good title that he wanted to use for a song for Aretha, would they be interested in writing a song called "Natural Woman"? They said of course they would, and Wexler drove off. They wrote the song that night, and King recorded a demo the next morning: [Excerpt: Carole King, "(You Make Me Feel Like) A Natural Woman (demo)"] They gave Wexler a co-writing credit because he had suggested the title. King later wrote in her autobiography "Hearing Aretha's performance of “Natural Woman” for the first time, I experienced a rare speechless moment. To this day I can't convey how I felt in mere words. Anyone who had written a song in 1967 hoping it would be performed by a singer who could take it to the highest level of excellence, emotional connection, and public exposure would surely have wanted that singer to be Aretha Franklin." She went on to say "But a recording that moves people is never just about the artist and the songwriters. It's about people like Jerry and Ahmet, who matched the songwriters with a great title and a gifted artist; Arif Mardin, whose magnificent orchestral arrangement deserves the place it will forever occupy in popular music history; Tom Dowd, whose engineering skills captured the magic of this memorable musical moment for posterity; and the musicians in the rhythm section, the orchestral players, and the vocal contributions of the background singers—among them the unforgettable “Ah-oo!” after the first line of the verse. And the promotion and marketing people helped this song reach more people than it might have without them." And that's correct -- unlike "Chain of Fools", this time Franklin did let Arif Mardin do most of the arrangement work -- though she came up with the piano part that Spooner Oldham plays on the record. Mardin said that because of the song's hymn-like feel they wanted to go for a more traditional written arrangement. He said "She loved the song to the point where she said she wanted to concentrate on the vocal and vocal alone. I had written a string chart and horn chart to augment the chorus and hired Ralph Burns to conduct. After just a couple of takes, we had it. That's when Ralph turned to me with wonder in his eyes. Ralph was one of the most celebrated arrangers of the modern era. He had done ‘Early Autumn' for Woody Herman and Stan Getz, and ‘Georgia on My Mind' for Ray Charles. He'd worked with everyone. ‘This woman comes from another planet' was all Ralph said. ‘She's just here visiting.'” [Excerpt: Aretha Franklin, "(You Make Me Feel Like) A Natural Woman"] By this point there was a well-functioning team making Franklin's records -- while the production credits would vary over the years, they were all essentially co-productions by the team of Franklin, Wexler, Mardin and Dowd, all collaborating and working together with a more-or-less unified purpose, and the backing was always by the same handful of session musicians and some combination of the Sweet Inspirations and Aretha's sisters. That didn't mean that occasional guests couldn't get involved -- as we discussed in the Cream episode, Eric Clapton played guitar on "Good to Me as I am to You": [Excerpt: Aretha Franklin, "Good to Me as I am to You"] Though that was one of the rare occasions on one of these records where something was overdubbed. Clapton apparently messed up the guitar part when playing behind Franklin, because he was too intimidated by playing with her, and came back the next day to redo his part without her in the studio. At this point, Aretha was at the height of her fame. Just before the final batch of album sessions began she appeared in the Macy's Thanksgiving Parade, and she was making regular TV appearances, like one on the Mike Douglas Show where she duetted with Frankie Valli on "That's Life": [Excerpt: Aretha Franklin and Frankie Valli, "That's Life"] But also, as Wexler said “Her career was kicking into high gear. Contending and resolving both the professional and personal challenges were too much. She didn't think she could do both, and I didn't blame her. Few people could. So she let the personal slide and concentrated on the professional. " Her concert promoter Ruth Bowen said of this time "Her father and Dr. King were putting pressure on her to sing everywhere, and she felt obligated. The record company was also screaming for more product. And I had a mountain of offers on my desk that kept getting higher with every passing hour. They wanted her in Europe. They wanted her in Latin America. They wanted her in every major venue in the U.S. TV was calling. She was being asked to do guest appearances on every show from Carol Burnett to Andy Williams to the Hollywood Palace. She wanted to do them all and she wanted to do none of them. She wanted to do them all because she's an entertainer who burns with ambition. She wanted to do none of them because she was emotionally drained. She needed to go away and renew her strength. I told her that at least a dozen times. She said she would, but she didn't listen to me." The pressures from her father and Dr King are a recurring motif in interviews with people about this period. Franklin was always a very political person, and would throughout her life volunteer time and money to liberal political causes and to the Democratic Party, but this was the height of her activism -- the Civil Rights movement was trying to capitalise on the gains it had made in the previous couple of years, and celebrity fundraisers and performances at rallies were an important way to do that. And at this point there were few bigger celebrities in America than Aretha Franklin. At a concert in her home town of Detroit on February the sixteenth, 1968, the Mayor declared the day Aretha Franklin Day. At the same show, Billboard, Record World *and* Cash Box magazines all presented her with plaques for being Female Vocalist of the Year. And Dr. King travelled up to be at the show and congratulate her publicly for all her work with his organisation, the Southern Christian Leadership Conference. Backstage at that show, Dr. King talked to Aretha's father, Reverend Franklin, about what he believed would be the next big battle -- a strike in Memphis: [Excerpt, Martin Luther King, "Mountaintop Speech" -- "And so, as a result of this, we are asking you tonight, to go out and tell your neighbors not to buy Coca-Cola in Memphis. Go by and tell them not to buy Sealtest milk. Tell them not to buy—what is the other bread?—Wonder Bread. And what is the other bread company, Jesse? Tell them not to buy Hart's bread. As Jesse Jackson has said, up to now, only the garbage men have been feeling pain; now we must kind of redistribute the pain. We are choosing these companies because they haven't been fair in their hiring policies; and we are choosing them because they can begin the process of saying, they are going to support the needs and the rights of these men who are on strike. And then they can move on downtown and tell Mayor Loeb to do what is right."] The strike in question was the Memphis Sanitation Workers' strike which had started a few days before. The struggle for Black labour rights was an integral part of the civil rights movement, and while it's not told that way in the sanitised version of the story that's made it into popular culture, the movement led by King was as much about economic justice as social justice -- King was a democratic socialist, and believed that economic oppression was both an effect of and cause of other forms of racial oppression, and that the rights of Black workers needed to be fought for. In 1967 he had set up a new organisation, the Poor People's Campaign, which was set to march on Washington to demand a program that included full employment, a guaranteed income -- King was strongly influenced in his later years by the ideas of Henry George, the proponent of a universal basic income based on land value tax -- the annual building of half a million affordable homes, and an end to the war in Vietnam. This was King's main focus in early 1968, and he saw the sanitation workers' strike as a major part of this campaign. Memphis was one of the most oppressive cities in the country, and its largely Black workforce of sanitation workers had been trying for most of the 1960s to unionise, and strike-breakers had been called in to stop them, and many of them had been fired by their white supervisors with no notice. They were working in unsafe conditions, for utterly inadequate wages, and the city government were ardent segregationists. After two workers had died on the first of February from using unsafe equipment, the union demanded changes -- safer working conditions, better wages, and recognition of the union. The city council refused, and almost all the sanitation workers stayed home and stopped work. After a few days, the council relented and agreed to their terms, but the Mayor, Henry Loeb, an ardent white supremacist who had stood on a platform of opposing desegregation, and who had previously been the Public Works Commissioner who had put these unsafe conditions in place, refused to listen. As far as he was concerned, he was the only one who could recognise the union, and he wouldn't. The workers continued their strike, marching holding signs that simply read "I am a Man": [Excerpt: Stevie Wonder, "Blowing in the Wind"] The Southern Christian Leadership Conference and the NAACP had been involved in organising support for the strikes from an early stage, and King visited Memphis many times. Much of the time he spent visiting there was spent negotiating with a group of more militant activists, who called themselves The Invaders and weren't completely convinced by King's nonviolent approach -- they believed that violence and rioting got more attention than non-violent protests. King explained to them that while he had been persuaded by Gandhi's writings of the moral case for nonviolent protest, he was also persuaded that it was pragmatically necessary -- asking the young men "how many guns do we have and how many guns do they have?", and pointing out as he often did that when it comes to violence a minority can't win against an armed majority. Rev Franklin went down to Memphis on the twenty-eighth of March to speak at a rally Dr. King was holding, but as it turned out the rally was cancelled -- the pre-rally march had got out of hand, with some people smashing windows, and Memphis police had, like the police in Detroit the previous year, violently overreacted, clubbing and gassing protestors and shooting and killing one unarmed teenage boy, Larry Payne. The day after Payne's funeral, Dr King was back in Memphis, though this time Rev Franklin was not with him. On April the third, he gave a speech which became known as the "Mountaintop Speech", in which he talked about the threats that had been made to his life: [Excerpt: Martin Luther King, "Mountaintop Speech": “And then I got to Memphis. And some began to say the threats, or talk about the threats that were out. What would happen to me from some of our sick white brothers? Well, I don't know what will happen now. We've got some difficult days ahead. But it doesn't matter with me now. Because I've been to the mountaintop. And I don't mind. Like anybody, I would like to live a long life. Longevity has its place. But I'm not concerned about that now. I just want to do God's will. And He's allowed me to go up to the mountain. And I've looked over. And I've seen the promised land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight, that we, as a people, will get to the promised land. So I'm happy, tonight. I'm not worried about anything. I'm not fearing any man. Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord."] The next day, Martin Luther King was shot dead. James Earl Ray, a white supremacist, pled guilty to the murder, and the evidence against him seems overwhelming from what I've read, but the King family have always claimed that the murder was part of a larger conspiracy and that Ray was not the gunman. Aretha was obviously distraught, and she attended the funeral, as did almost every other prominent Black public figure. James Baldwin wrote of the funeral: "In the pew directly before me sat Marlon Brando, Sammy Davis, Eartha Kitt—covered in black, looking like a lost, ten-year-old girl—and Sidney Poitier, in the same pew, or nearby. Marlon saw me, and nodded. The atmosphere was black, with a tension indescribable—as though something, perhaps the heavens, perhaps the earth, might crack. Everyone sat very still. The actual service sort of washed over me, in waves. It wasn't that it seemed unreal; it was the most real church service I've ever sat through in my life, or ever hope to sit through; but I have a childhood hangover thing about not weeping in public, and I was concentrating on holding myself together. I did not want to weep for Martin, tears seemed futile. But I may also have been afraid, and I could not have been the only one, that if I began to weep I would not be able to stop. There was more than enough to weep for, if one was to weep—so many of us, cut down, so soon. Medgar, Malcolm, Martin: and their widows, and their children. Reverend Ralph David Abernathy asked a certain sister to sing a song which Martin had loved—“Once more,” said Ralph David, “for Martin and for me,” and he sat down." Many articles and books on Aretha Franklin say that she sang at King's funeral. In fact she didn't, but there's a simple reason for the confusion. King's favourite song was the Thomas Dorsey gospel song "Take My Hand, Precious Lord", and indeed almost his last words were to ask a trumpet player, Ben Branch, if he would play the song at the rally he was going to be speaking at on the day of his death. At his request, Mahalia Jackson, his old friend, sang the song at his private funeral, which was not filmed, unlike the public part of the funeral that Baldwin described. Four months later, though, there was another public memorial for King, and Franklin did sing "Take My Hand, Precious Lord" at that service, in front of King's weeping widow and children, and that performance *was* filmed, and gets conflated in people's memories with Jackson's unfilmed earlier performance: [Excerpt: Aretha Franklin, "Take My Hand, Precious Lord (at Martin Luther King Memorial)"] Four years later, she would sing that at Mahalia Jackson's funeral. Through all this, Franklin had been working on her next album, Aretha Now, the sessions for which started more or less as soon as the sessions for Lady Soul had finished. The album was, in fact, bookended by deaths that affected Aretha. Just as King died at the end of the sessions, the beginning came around the time of the death of Otis Redding -- the sessions were cancelled for a day while Wexler travelled to Georgia for Redding's funeral, which Franklin was too devastated to attend, and Wexler would later say that the extra emotion in her performances on the album came from her emotional pain at Redding's death. The lead single on the album, "Think", was written by Franklin and -- according to the credits anyway -- her husband Ted White, and is very much in the same style as "Respect", and became another of her most-loved hits: [Excerpt: Aretha Franklin, "Think"] But probably the song on Aretha Now that now resonates the most is one that Jerry Wexler tried to persuade her not to record, and was only released as a B-side. Indeed, "I Say a Little Prayer" was a song that had already once been a hit after being a reject. Hal David, unlike Burt Bacharach, was a fairly political person and inspired by the protest song movement, and had been starting to incorporate his concerns about the political situation and the Vietnam War into his lyrics -- though as with many such writers, he did it in much less specific ways than a Phil Ochs or a Bob Dylan. This had started with "What the World Needs Now is Love", a song Bacharach and David had written for Jackie DeShannon in 1965: [Excerpt: Jackie DeShannon, "What the "World Needs Now is Love"] But he'd become much more overtly political for "The Windows of the World", a song they wrote for Dionne Warwick. Warwick has often said it's her favourite of her singles, but it wasn't a big hit -- Bacharach blamed himself for that, saying "Dionne recorded it as a single and I really blew it. I wrote a bad arrangement and the tempo was too fast, and I really regret making it the way I did because it's a good song." [Excerpt: Dionne Warwick, "The Windows of the World"] For that album, Bacharach and David had written another track, "I Say a Little Prayer", which was not as explicitly political, but was intended by David to have an implicit anti-war message, much like other songs of the period like "Last Train to Clarksville". David had sons who were the right age to be drafted, and while it's never stated, "I Say a Little Prayer" was written from the perspective of a woman whose partner is away fighting in the war, but is still in her thoughts: [Excerpt: Dionne Warwick, "I Say a Little Prayer"] The recording of Dionne Warwick's version was marked by stress. Bacharach had a particular way of writing music to tell the musicians the kind of feel he wanted for the part -- he'd write nonsense words above the stave, and tell the musicians to play the parts as if they were singing those words. The trumpet player hired for the session, Ernie Royal, got into a row with Bacharach about this unorthodox way of communicating musical feeling, and the track ended up taking ten takes (as opposed to the normal three for a Bacharach session), with Royal being replaced half-way through the session. Bacharach was never happy with the track even after all the work it had taken, and he fought to keep it from being released at all, saying the track was taken at too fast a tempo. It eventually came out as an album track nearly eighteen months after it was recorded -- an eternity in 1960s musical timescales -- and DJs started playing it almost as soon as it came out. Scepter records rushed out a single, over Bacharach's objections, but as he later said "One thing I love about the record business is how wrong I was. Disc jockeys all across the country started playing the track, and the song went to number four on the charts and then became the biggest hit Hal and I had ever written for Dionne." [Excerpt: Dionne Warwick, "I Say a Little Prayer"] Oddly, the B-side for Warwick's single, "Theme From the Valley of the Dolls" did even better, reaching number two. Almost as soon as the song was released as a single, Franklin started playing around with the song backstage, and in April 1968, right around the time of Dr. King's death, she recorded a version. Much as Burt Bacharach had been against releasing Dionne Warwick's version, Jerry Wexler was against Aretha even recording the song, saying later “I advised Aretha not to record it. I opposed it for two reasons. First, to cover a song only twelve weeks after the original reached the top of the charts was not smart business. You revisit such a hit eight months to a year later. That's standard practice. But more than that, Bacharach's melody, though lovely, was peculiarly suited to a lithe instrument like Dionne Warwick's—a light voice without the dark corners or emotional depths that define Aretha. Also, Hal David's lyric was also somewhat girlish and lacked the gravitas that Aretha required. “Aretha usually listened to me in the studio, but not this time. She had written a vocal arrangement for the Sweet Inspirations that was undoubtedly strong. Cissy Houston, Dionne's cousin, told me that Aretha was on the right track—she was seeing this song in a new way and had come up with a new groove. Cissy was on Aretha's side. Tommy Dowd and Arif were on Aretha's side. So I had no choice but to cave." It's quite possible that Wexler's objections made Franklin more, rather than less, determined to record the song. She regarded Warwick as a hated rival, as she did almost every prominent female singer of her generation and younger ones, and would undoubtedly have taken the implication that there was something that Warwick was simply better at than her to heart. [Excerpt: Aretha Franklin, "I Say a Little Prayer"] Wexler realised as soon as he heard it in the studio that Franklin's version was great, and Bacharach agreed, telling Franklin's biographer David Ritz “As much as I like the original recording by Dionne, there's no doubt that Aretha's is a better record. She imbued the song with heavy soul and took it to a far deeper place. Hers is the definitive version.” -- which is surprising because Franklin's version simplifies some of Bacharach's more unusual chord voicings, something he often found extremely upsetting. Wexler still though thought there was no way the song would be a hit, and it's understandable that he thought that way. Not only had it only just been on the charts a few months earlier, but it was the kind of song that wouldn't normally be a hit at all, and certainly not in the kind of rhythmic soul music for which Franklin was known. Almost everything she ever recorded is in simple time signatures -- 4/4, waltz time, or 6/8 -- but this is a Bacharach song so it's staggeringly metrically irregular. Normally even with semi-complex things I'm usually good at figuring out how to break it down into bars, but here I actually had to purchase a copy of the sheet music in order to be sure I was right about what's going on. I'm going to count beats along with the record here so you can see what I mean. The verse has three bars of 4/4, one bar of 2/4, and three more bars of 4/4, all repeated: [Excerpt: Aretha Franklin, "I Say a Little Prayer" with me counting bars over verse] While the chorus has a bar of 4/4, a bar of 3/4 but with a chord change half way through so it sounds like it's in two if you're paying attention to the harmonic changes, two bars of 4/4, another waltz-time bar sounding like it's in two, two bars of four, another bar of three sounding in two, a bar of four, then three more bars of four but the first of those is *written* as four but played as if it's in six-eight time (but you can keep the four/four pulse going if you're counting): [Excerpt: Aretha Franklin, "I Say a Little Prayer" with me counting bars over verse] I don't expect you to have necessarily followed that in great detail, but the point should be clear -- this was not some straightforward dance song. Incidentally, that bar played as if it's six/eight was something Aretha introduced to make the song even more irregular than how Bacharach wrote it. And on top of *that* of course the lyrics mixed the secular and the sacred, something that was still taboo in popular music at that time -- this is only a couple of years after Capitol records had been genuinely unsure about putting out the Beach Boys' "God Only Knows", and Franklin's gospel-inflected vocals made the religious connection even more obvious. But Franklin was insistent that the record go out as a single, and eventually it was released as the B-side to the far less impressive "The House That Jack Built". It became a double-sided hit, with the A-side making number two on the R&B chart and number seven on the Hot One Hundred, while "I Say a Little Prayer" made number three on the R&B chart and number ten overall. In the UK, "I Say a Little Prayer" made number four and became her biggest ever solo UK hit. It's now one of her most-remembered songs, while the A-side is largely forgotten: [Excerpt: Aretha Franklin, "I Say a Little Prayer"] For much of the
Over the course of his 35-year career, Damon Albarn has reached international fame with two very different bands. In 1988, Damon created the rock band Blur with four friends in his native London. Blur started out as what Damon calls a “classic art school band” before quickly moved to the forefront of the ‘90s Britpop explosion along with their formal rivals, Oasis. After a series of successful albums with Blur, Damon started Gorillaz in 1998 with cartoonist Jamie Hewlett. Dubbed as the world's first virtual band, the Gorillaz rotating lineup includes collaborations with De La Soul, Stevie Nicks, Bobby Womack and Lou Reed. The band pulls influence from electronic music, hip-hop and world music, and over the last 25 years, Gorillaz has been wildly successful—selling over 30 million albums worldwide. Despite having found such success, Damon has never stopped exploring his artistic potential. He's written an opera, released solo and side projects, and recently, he reunited with Blur to release the band's latest album called The Ballad Of Darren. On today's episode Leah Rose talks to Damon Albarn about what it's like for Blur to headline international music festivals in 2023. Damon also reveals how Gorillaz are about to undergo a major paradigm shift. And he explains how, according to family lore, John Lennon and Yoko Ono first met at his dad's counterculture art gallery in London. You can hear a playlist of some of our favorite Damon Albarn songs HERE. Take the Pushkin Audience Survey and receive a code to redeem a free audiobook: https://bit.ly/3pAAQxZSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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