Rare 'Retha

[Harold_Z]

For my money Two Steps From The Blues is Bobby Blue Bland's best record. I've got almost all my Bobby Bland on the original Duke vinyl.

One day not too long I heard Lovelights on the fm. I assume it was a cd reissue. It wasn't the original mix. I don't recall now exactly what, but I think it had something to do with the piano being more audible than on the original - to the detriment of the guitar parts. Which on that particular recording SHOULD NOT be messed with.

[Alexander]

Up for Clem, (especially since the 'Retha discussion died out) who never told me where he thinks Jimmy McCracklin fits in the soul genre. I'm also now curious about Little Junior Parker, as I just started listening to three different LP comps of his Duke recordings ... smooth but powerful vocals the way label-mate (and touring partner) Bobby Bland was - and really really great!

Speaking of Bland, I also just found a Japanese CD of two of his Duke LPs - almost no overlap with "Two Steps From The Blues" but I'd never heard his cover (there's that word again) of Fulson's "Reconsider Baby" but it struck me as an all-time great recording.

Bland is one of the all-time great voices of blues/R&B. His "Reconsider" is an AMAZING recording. When I first heard him, I was heavily into Delta/Country Blues recordings and found Bland a little too "slick," but I've long since come to see the error of my ways...

[John L]

For my money Two Steps From The Blues is Bobby Blue Bland's best record. I've got almost all my Bobby Bland on the original Duke vinyl.

One day not too long I heard Lovelights on the fm. I assume it was a cd reissue. It wasn't the original mix. I don't recall now exactly what, but I think it had something to do with the piano being more audible than on the original - to the detriment of the guitar parts. Which on that particular recording SHOULD NOT be messed with.

Yea, "Two Steps From the Blues" was certainly his breakthrough record. Up until that time, Bland sounded quite a lot like Roy Brown (IMO), and made few really distinctive recordings. That record established him once and for all as one of the greats.

While Bland's Duke period is justly celebrated, I love a lot of what he did after that as well. His voice narrowed, but the lower range deepened, and became even more distinctive. Songs like Ain't No Love in the Heart of the City, Members' Only, & You've Got to Hurt Before You Heal can stand with the best (IMO). Speaking of covers, Bland's relatively recording recording of Ain't No Sunshine When She's Gone is also prime.

Edited November 11, 2007 by John L

[The Magnificent Goldberg]

Bump, I'm back.

I never said Ree wasn't great - just that not everything she did was great. No one seems to have disagreed with that.

Got to say that JGW is someone I don't have enough albums of (only 4) - but you can't buy everything

Also, why didn't anyone mention Irma Thomas while I was away?

Irma Thomas, Irma Thomas, Irma Thomas.

MG

[jazzbo]

Don't really have anything pertinent to add to this thread (so what else is new) except. . . WELCOME BACK!

[The Magnificent Goldberg]

Thanks folks.

Context. Part 1.

"Amazing grace" is a great album. But it has to be seen as a Gospel album. So how does it stack up against other Gospel albums of the period? - Inez Andrews' "The need of prayer" or "Lord, don't move my mountain"; The Jackson Southernaires' "Too late"; The Salem Travellers' "Tell it like it is", "Give me liberty or death", "Children gone astray"; Johnny Jones' "He walks with me, he talks to me"; "Rev Reuben Willingham's "I go to prepare a place"; "The Dixie Hummingbirds live". Well, it stacks up well against them - and many others. But it's not exceptional. Gospel music was in FINE shape in those days. And remained and remains so. For those who think that the be all and end all of Gospel is the classic quartets of the forties & fifties, I'm here to say that it isn't.

Part 2.

I referred earlier to the development work on Soul being done in the period 1959-62. Of course, there were earlier performances leading up to that period - some of Clyde McPhatter's work with Billy Ward & the Dominos; much of Ray Charles' work post December 1953; Little Willie John; Jackie Wilson & so on. But here's a bunch of stuff from the 1959-62 period that I thought at the time were doing more than showing the way forward; they were on that road, creating a popular music out of the broad idea of bringing Gospel music into R&B.

End 1958

Jackie Wilson - Lonely teardrops (hm, written by Berry Gordy)

1959

Ray Charles - The right time

Ray Charles - What'd I say

Ray Charles - Drown in my own tears (live in Atlanta)

The Drifters - There goes my baby

The Shirelles - Dedicated to the one I love

Isley Brothers - Shout

1960

Jackie Wilson - Doggin' around

Jackie Wilson - A woman, a lover, a friend

Bobby Marchan - There is something on your mind

Etta Jones & Harvey Fuqua (oh yes!) - If I can't have you

1961

Gladys Knight & the Pips - Every beat of my heart

Ben E King - Stand by me

The Mar-Keys - Last night

James Brown - Lost someone

Ike & Tina Turner - It's gonna work out fine

1962

Solomon Burke - Cry to me

Solomon Burke - Down in the valley/I'm hanging up my heart for you

Booker T & the MGs - Green onions

Etta James - Somethin's gotta hold on me

The Falcons - I found a love

The Falcons, at this time were: Wilson Pickett, Eddie Floyd, Sir Mack Rice, Joe Stubbs (Eli's bro) and Ben Night. The backing band was the Ohio Untouchables, later known as the Ohio Players. This was actually recorded in 1961, but didn't come out until 1962.

(One could also add, from 1963, The Rivingtons' "Deep water", but I won't.)

Ree didn't really go BEYOND what had been put down in that period (any more than Sonny Criss went beyond Charlie Parker). She was just surpassingly GOOD at it (as was Sonny Criss). But, unlike jazz, Soul music is very much a singles-oriented music; so there's much more unevenness in Ree's albums than in Sonny's.

Finally; "A rose is still a rose" is a very good album, but I wouldn't agree with whatsisname that it's quite as good as "Young, gifted and black" - her tone is often slightly too whiney and sorry for herself. But, again, the title track is one of Ree's greatest performances (and Lauren Hill at that period was a killer).

MG

[JSngry]

"Amazing grace" is a great album. But it has to be seen as a Gospel album.

Well...yes and no.

If you want evaluate the music purely as "music" and eliminate all context provided by "person" (and you can), then yeah.

But how do you evaluate an "Aretha Franklin Gospel Album" without considering that it is Aretha Franklin? And even if you can, does that create a real or less real picture of what the music "is"?

It's like The Beatles - like it or not, whether it "should" or "shouldn't" be like that, The Beatles are THE BEATLES and will be until history fades to a point where nobody knows anything about them except the sounds coming outta the records. And will such a time ever come without some major, probably malevolently inspired, revising of history?

Like it or not, an "Aretha Franklin Gospel Album" comes with a lot of backstory. Of course, almost all music does (I mean, just reading the AMG bio of Steam sent my jaw dropping...), but certain entities, and Aretha is one of them, carry a backstory that you almost have to will yourself into ignoring to ignore. And yeah, sure, that's a good thing for a little while, but how....real is it, really? Not in terms of assessing "talent" or anything like this, but in terms of knowing just where this fits in the "real world" scheme of things.

EDC made the point a few months ago that by the time The Beatles released the "White Album" that they were no longer "relevant". To which I countered (and still believe) that you can't be The Most Popular And Respected And Influential Band In the World and be irrelevant. It just don't work that way, not in The Macroculture of The Popular Arena. We can all create our own little Personal Comfortable Microverses, but if we do so pretending that The Macroculture of The Popular Arena does not exist, or that it is somehow "meaningless", then we are kidding ourselves big time.

Now sure, Aretha's Gospel work has been good-to-great, and yeah, others have hit it harder and longer. But for every person that, say, Inez Andrews has "touched", Aretha has done the same 100 X (or more) over. So when Aretha makes a Gospel album like Amazing Grace, one that gets heard by a lot more people than would hear anything by Inez Andrews, how it does or doesn't copmpare to Inez Andrews' work is at once germane and totally, totally irrelevant, if for no other reason than what difference does it make to somebody who is moved/touched/whatever by Aretha's work who will never ever hear anything by Inez Andrews? Not what doffernce does it make to "us", what differnce does it make to them?

I'm ok with co-exisiting in "my world" and "Popular Culture". Render unto Caesar, and all that. But attempting to reconcile them in such a way that one is ultimately "more real" than the other in comparison to anything but itself is a bit of fool's game, akin to playing baseball in a full swimming pool and thinking that the game will get easier as soon a the rain lets up.

[JSngry]

Marketing (and its effects) is what it is, and what it is is part of the whole picture.

If that (the marketing) is all or most you see, then you're not seeing the whole picture. Obviously.

But if you try to look at something without it, you're not seeing the whole picture either. Perhaps not so obviously.

The big picture is not the whole picture.

[JSngry]

F-Troop touched a lot of people, Gomer Pyle U.S.M.C. touched even more.

Well hey, Forrest Tucker alone probably touched people without really trying to...

[The Magnificent Goldberg]

"Amazing grace" is a great album. But it has to be seen as a Gospel album.

Well...yes and no.

If you want evaluate the music purely as "music" and eliminate all context provided by "person" (and you can), then yeah.

But how do you evaluate an "Aretha Franklin Gospel Album" without considering that it is Aretha Franklin? And even if you can, does that create a real or less real picture of what the music "is"?

It's like The Beatles - like it or not, whether it "should" or "shouldn't" be like that, The Beatles are THE BEATLES and will be until history fades to a point where nobody knows anything about them except the sounds coming outta the records. And will such a time ever come without some major, probably malevolently inspired, revising of history?

Like it or not, an "Aretha Franklin Gospel Album" comes with a lot of backstory. Of course, almost all music does (I mean, just reading the AMG bio of Steam sent my jaw dropping...), but certain entities, and Aretha is one of them, carry a backstory that you almost have to will yourself into ignoring to ignore. And yeah, sure, that's a good thing for a little while, but how....real is it, really? Not in terms of assessing "talent" or anything like this, but in terms of knowing just where this fits in the "real world" scheme of things.

EDC made the point a few months ago that by the time The Beatles released the "White Album" that they were no longer "relevant". To which I countered (and still believe) that you can't be The Most Popular And Respected And Influential Band In the World and be irrelevant. It just don't work that way, not in The Macroculture of The Popular Arena. We can all create our own little Personal Comfortable Microverses, but if we do so pretending that The Macroculture of The Popular Arena does not exist, or that it is somehow "meaningless", then we are kidding ourselves big time.

Now sure, Aretha's Gospel work has been good-to-great, and yeah, others have hit it harder and longer. But for every person that, say, Inez Andrews has "touched", Aretha has done the same 100 X (or more) over. So when Aretha makes a Gospel album like Amazing Grace, one that gets heard by a lot more people than would hear anything by Inez Andrews, how it does or doesn't copmpare to Inez Andrews' work is at once germane and totally, totally irrelevant, if for no other reason than what difference does it make to somebody who is moved/touched/whatever by Aretha's work who will never ever hear anything by Inez Andrews? Not what doffernce does it make to "us", what differnce does it make to them?

I'm ok with co-exisiting in "my world" and "Popular Culture". Render unto Caesar, and all that. But attempting to reconcile them in such a way that one is ultimately "more real" than the other in comparison to anything but itself is a bit of fool's game, akin to playing baseball in a full swimming pool and thinking that the game will get easier as soon a the rain lets up.

I think you're saying one of two things.

1 "Amazing grace" is different from other Gospel albums because it's Aretha and she can reach far more people than regular Gospel singers can. I'm not sure that's true; million selling Gospel albums are not all that rare. Gospel sells a whole lot better than is generally thought to be the case because only a third of Gospel records are sold in record shops (1/3 church, 1/3 Christian bookshops).

2 "Amazing grace" is different from other Gospel albums because it's Aretha and she can reach a different bunch of people from those whom regular Gospel singers can. Well, in many (most) cases that may be true, but it wouldn't apply to Mahalia, who also reached the parts other beers couldn't reach. Nor would it apply to the many Gospel singers/groups who've made big inroads into the R&B chart in the last several decades, of whom Kirk Franklin is probably the most celebrated, and whose work I'm sure you know.

To me, just 'cos she was a Soul icon didn't mean that Ree got a free pass if she wanted to make a Gospel album, any more than she'd get one from you if she picked up a sax and started playing "Lonely woman" (or if she'd started singing the song).

MG

[paul secor]

"Amazing grace" is a great album. But it has to be seen as a Gospel album.

Well...yes and no.

If you want evaluate the music purely as "music" and eliminate all context provided by "person" (and you can), then yeah.

But how do you evaluate an "Aretha Franklin Gospel Album" without considering that it is Aretha Franklin? And even if you can, does that create a real or less real picture of what the music "is"?

It's like The Beatles - like it or not, whether it "should" or "shouldn't" be like that, The Beatles are THE BEATLES and will be until history fades to a point where nobody knows anything about them except the sounds coming outta the records. And will such a time ever come without some major, probably malevolently inspired, revising of history?

Like it or not, an "Aretha Franklin Gospel Album" comes with a lot of backstory. Of course, almost all music does (I mean, just reading the AMG bio of Steam sent my jaw dropping...), but certain entities, and Aretha is one of them, carry a backstory that you almost have to will yourself into ignoring to ignore. And yeah, sure, that's a good thing for a little while, but how....real is it, really? Not in terms of assessing "talent" or anything like this, but in terms of knowing just where this fits in the "real world" scheme of things.

EDC made the point a few months ago that by the time The Beatles released the "White Album" that they were no longer "relevant". To which I countered (and still believe) that you can't be The Most Popular And Respected And Influential Band In the World and be irrelevant. It just don't work that way, not in The Macroculture of The Popular Arena. We can all create our own little Personal Comfortable Microverses, but if we do so pretending that The Macroculture of The Popular Arena does not exist, or that it is somehow "meaningless", then we are kidding ourselves big time.

Now sure, Aretha's Gospel work has been good-to-great, and yeah, others have hit it harder and longer. But for every person that, say, Inez Andrews has "touched", Aretha has done the same 100 X (or more) over. So when Aretha makes a Gospel album like Amazing Grace, one that gets heard by a lot more people than would hear anything by Inez Andrews, how it does or doesn't copmpare to Inez Andrews' work is at once germane and totally, totally irrelevant, if for no other reason than what difference does it make to somebody who is moved/touched/whatever by Aretha's work who will never ever hear anything by Inez Andrews? Not what doffernce does it make to "us", what differnce does it make to them?

I'm ok with co-exisiting in "my world" and "Popular Culture". Render unto Caesar, and all that. But attempting to reconcile them in such a way that one is ultimately "more real" than the other in comparison to anything but itself is a bit of fool's game, akin to playing baseball in a full swimming pool and thinking that the game will get easier as soon a the rain lets up.

I hear what you're saying, Jim, and agree in theory/in part. But I gave up on sociology as a young man. Don't think that the "Macroculture" is "meaningless" - just not worth wasting my emotions and time over. America has always fed its people the line that bigger is better, and over the past 30 years or so, it seems that more and more people are buying into that (figuratively and literally). I may be playing a fool's game, but then so are a number of other people, including musicians, I admire.

Just as a matter of personal taste - Aretha's gospel records may have reached 100 X as many people, but I'll keep listening to Inez Andrews. Never bought an Aretha gospel, and unless they get better, never will.

[JSngry]

I think you're saying one of two things.

1 "Amazing grace" is different from other Gospel albums because it's Aretha and she can reach far more people than regular Gospel singers can. I'm not sure that's true; million selling Gospel albums are not all that rare. Gospel sells a whole lot better than is generally thought to be the case because only a third of Gospel records are sold in record shops (1/3 church, 1/3 Christian bookshops).

2 "Amazing grace" is different from other Gospel albums because it's Aretha and she can reach a different bunch of people from those whom regular Gospel singers can. Well, in many (most) cases that may be true, but it wouldn't apply to Mahalia, who also reached the parts other beers couldn't reach. Nor would it apply to the many Gospel singers/groups who've made big inroads into the R&B chart in the last several decades, of whom Kirk Franklin is probably the most celebrated, and whose work I'm sure you know.

I'm saying that "Amazing grace" is no different from other Gospel albums because it's Aretha and that "Amazing grace" is completely different from other Gospel albums because it's Aretha.

Simple as that.

[JSngry]

I hear what you're saying, Jim, and agree in theory/in part. But I gave up on sociology as a young man. Don't think that the "Macroculture" is "meaningless" - just not worth wasting my emotions and time over. America has always fed its people the line that bigger is better, and over the past 30 years or so, it seems that more and more people are buying into that (figuratively and literally). I may be playing a fool's game, but then so are a number of other people, including musicians, I admire.

Just as a matter of personal taste - Aretha's gospel records may have reached 100 X as many people, but I'll keep listening to Inez Andrews. Never bought an Aretha gospel, and unless they get better, never will.

Of course bigger isn't better, not intrinsically, but sometimes bigger gets bigger for a reason other than just marketing. It's a reason that has nothing to do with "better", but you can only market turds for so long before people start to realize that, hey, these turd things taste like shit!

All I'm saying is that attempts to bring Aretha "down to size", or whatever they are without confronting/accepting the notion (I call it fact, but that's just me) that, ok, she might well be an icon becasue of "marketing", but that without some intrinsic something that has absolutely nothing to do with hype, she'd not be an icon, she'd just be a... "star", "celebrety", "diva", or some similar lesser quantity.

I mean hell, I hate Elvis. Fuck Elvis. Elvis didn't mean shit to me and still doesn't. But as much as I hate that motherfucker, I can and will admit that he had something "above and beyond", and that his near-god status is due to something more than just hype. What it is, I don't know, don't want to know, don't need to know, but hey, I know it's there.

So it is with Aretha. We can all sit hear and play Objective Critic from now until yesterday, but it doesn't matter. If we think that denying that Aretha had something...different about her that propelled her into Iconhood, something that maybe a gajillion other Soul & Gospel singers who sang just as well or better and who felt just as much or more and maybe even put across just as well or better didn't have, and that that something might have everything to do with why the marketing worked but that that the existence of that something might well have had nothing to do with the marketing, makes it so, if we can't deal with things on this level (I don't mean that we gotta "like" them, just that we gotta understand that they do exist and that they are what they are no matter what, "like" don't enter into it), then I gotta wonder if we really understand human nature and how music interacts with it other than from the perspective of me, myself, and I.

[The Magnificent Goldberg]

You're right, but I don't think anyone has been saying that Aretha is "just another soul singer". Clearly, she was one of the few performers who was completely representative of her audience and at the same time a great artist who could go way beyond that. In post-war black music, she's a member of a club whose other members may be as limited as L Jordan, R Charles, J Brown, N Cole and, perhaps, G Clinton (though I wouldn't wish to get into an argument about that).

But I don't cut any of those guys any slack when it comes to appreciating their music, or deciding whether to buy it, and I don't for Ree (though I do for Grant Green, Les McCann, Ouza, Fallou Dieng, Jimmy McGriff, Jug, Lou Donaldson, Sekouba Bambino and lots of others, so I can understand why people DO for others and just don't feel it necessary to be terribly consistent in this).

MG

[JSngry]

You're right, but I don't think anyone has been saying that Aretha is "just another soul singer". Clearly, she was one of the few performers who was completely representative of her audience and at the same time a great artist who could go way beyond that. In post-war black music, she's a member of a club whose other members may be as limited as L Jordan, R Charles, J Brown, N Cole and, perhaps, G Clinton (though I wouldn't wish to get into an argument about that).

George would go in retroactively. I can tell you with absolute certainty that at the peak of the P-Funk juggernaut of roughly 1974-1980 that it was very much a non-white thing. In fact, I saw more than one white dancefloor at the time come to an abrupt, screeching, grinding, hostile (!!!!) halt when "Flashlight" or "Not Just Knee Deep" would get played. And even today, I wonder how many white folk who think that something like "Tear The Roof Off The Sucka" is all, like, SO HIP and shit have gotten their heads wrapped around stuff like "Chocolate City", "March To The Witches Castle", or "Let Me Be", much less know about Mister Wiggles like they do Star Child & Sir Nose.

But I digress...

The thing with discussions about folk like Aretha, The Beatles, sinatra, etc. is that for me, the semantical implications of "Sure, ASDEF GERT is a cultural icon, unique talent, and a great artist, but.... consider questionable iniquities A-Z" are slighlty (or more) different than those of "Sure, ASDEF GERT did questionable iniquities A-Z, but.... they remain a cultural icon, unique talent, and a great artist in spite of all that."

Me, I'd prefer that the conjunction in both of those stateements be "and" instead of "but", but forced to choose, I'm probablly going with the latter form of declaration more often than not. Just because.

And also because how can you have something like "mass success" and not have things like "commercial pressures", "questionable artistic decisions", "power of marketing" and other things come into play? And how can you have an artist who is at once "highly regarded" and "massively popular" over a long period of time without there being something there beyond "great talent", and even "great artistry"? These ambiguities & conflicts are at the core of ordinary life in the mainstream for anybody who thinks and feels of their own volition, so to expect relief, escape, or solace from them in any type of art/entertainment that functions in that same realm is a little unrealistic, no? Embrace them, I say, because to do otherwise is to create a "conflict" where there really is none. It's Yin and Yang, not Yin vs. Yang.

And one last(?) note about the Aretha/Inez/Gospel thing - what might be being overlooked here is that a lot, a whole lot of Gospel singers from the Golden Age would have had a bitch of a time dealing with the funkier rhtymic underpinnings that Aretha's Atlantic music had pretty much from jump. The rhythms of "Soul Music" weren't all that much differnt from those of Gospel, but when you get to things like "Chain Of Fools", "Respect", and later on, the Full Funk of "Rock Steady", you're getting into a zone where somebody like Inez would have foundered, and founderd badly. I've got later a later recording by Inez where some of the tracks kind go there, and it just ain't right. She can't go there, she needs that deep, basic, steady 4 to lean into and push against (although, she finds it on "This Is Not The First Time", and the results are gripping, to put it mildly. but htat's hardly a FUNK groove...). Ditto Clarence Fountain. And The Dixie Hummingbirds' version of "Jesus Children Of America" works so damn well precisely because they don't try and cop Stevie's groove on it, kickin' it back Old Skool instead.

Sure, there were others of Aretha's approximate generation, like Johnnie Tayor & Lou Rawls, who came out of Gospel and had no problem adapting to the post-JB syncopatic sensibilities. But also note that they (and any others that I can think of) came up in groups, quartets, etc. Aretha was a soloist from day one, and that's a whole 'nother bag. The way her rhythmic sensibility migrated/transferred from Gospel to Soul to Pop is nothing to be casually dismissed and is at the root of any cliams made in her behalf as a true innovator. She had an interior rhythmic fluidity that allowed her to...fly over the basic beat that virtually none of her Gospel peers had, but that almost all of her successors do (and I think those successors would openly credit her for that). I do think that the R&B sides bring it out more, as they should, but it's there in the Gospel stuff too.

Again, her sins are multitudinous, but in the end, her redemptive powers are too. Deny neither, accept both, and Hello World, Doggone Ya'!

[The Magnificent Goldberg]

The thing with discussions about folk like Aretha, The Beatles, sinatra, etc. is that for me, the semantical implications of "Sure, ASDEF GERT is a cultural icon, unique talent, and a great artist, but.... consider questionable iniquities A-Z" are slighlty (or more) different than those of "Sure, ASDEF GERT did questionable iniquities A-Z, but.... they remain a cultural icon, unique talent, and a great artist in spite of all that."

Me, I'd prefer that the conjunction in both of those stateements be "and" instead of "but", but forced to choose, I'm probablly going with the latter form of declaration more often than not. Just because.

Er... OK.

And also because how can you have something like "mass success" and not have things like "commercial pressures", "questionable artistic decisions", "power of marketing" and other things come into play? And how can you have an artist who is at once "highly regarded" and "massively popular" over a long period of time without there being something there beyond "great talent", and even "great artistry"? These ambiguities & conflicts are at the core of ordinary life in the mainstream for anybody who thinks and feels of their own volition, so to expect relief, escape, or solace from them in any type of art/entertainment that functions in that same realm is a little unrealistic, no? Embrace them, I say, because to do otherwise is to create a "conflict" where there really is none. It's Yin and Yang, not Yin vs. Yang.

Do you misunderstand? In my view, commercial pressures and power of marketing are GOOD things, whether they give rise to questionable artistic decisions or not. Don't forget, I think I'd possibly like and enjoy more people like Monk, Ornette, Rollins and many others had they deliberately striven for mass acceptance as did Jug, Illinois, McDuff & Jimmy Smith etc.

And one last(?) note about the Aretha/Inez/Gospel thing - what might be being overlooked here is that a lot, a whole lot of Gospel singers from the Golden Age would have had a bitch of a time dealing with the funkier rhtymic underpinnings that Aretha's Atlantic music had pretty much from jump. The rhythms of "Soul Music" weren't all that much differnt from those of Gospel, but when you get to things like "Chain Of Fools", "Respect", and later on, the Full Funk of "Rock Steady", you're getting into a zone where somebody like Inez would have foundered, and founderd badly. I've got later a later recording by Inez where some of the tracks kind go there, and it just ain't right. She can't go there, she needs that deep, basic, steady 4 to lean into and push against (although, she finds it on "This Is Not The First Time", and the results are gripping, to put it mildly. but htat's hardly a FUNK groove...). Ditto Clarence Fountain. And The Dixie Hummingbirds' version of "Jesus Children Of America" works so damn well precisely because they don't try and cop Stevie's groove on it, kickin' it back Old Skool instead.

Sure, there were others of Aretha's approximate generation, like Johnnie Tayor & Lou Rawls, who came out of Gospel and had no problem adapting to the post-JB syncopatic sensibilities. But also note that they (and any others that I can think of) came up in groups, quartets, etc. Aretha was a soloist from day one, and that's a whole 'nother bag. The way her rhythmic sensibility migrated/transferred from Gospel to Soul to Pop is nothing to be casually dismissed and is at the root of any cliams made in her behalf as a true innovator. She had an interior rhythmic fluidity that allowed her to...fly over the basic beat that virtually none of her Gospel peers had, but that almost all of her successors do (and I think those successors would openly credit her for that). I do think that the R&B sides bring it out more, as they should, but it's there in the Gospel stuff too.

Again, her sins are multitudinous, but in the end, her redemptive powers are too. Deny neither, accept both, and Hello World, Doggone Ya'!

I agree, generally. Would that Inez album be "This is not the frst time I've been last"? Some of those cuts come off very well, others aren't so good, I think.

But Gospel music and Soul have definitely different objectives and, therefore, different means of achieving their aims musically. (This is at the heart of what the Gospel world thinks of as "sinful music" and why. Ree was about the only person who could nip back and forth with a fair degree of impunity and that's another thing that makes her very unique.) So it's unsurprising that dyed-in-the-wool Gospel artists had grown up and developed musically in a different way. (I suspect that Hip Hop may have changed things in that way, though I wouldn't like to speculate about how much was the music and how much was a revision of the mission - geared more to outreach than to preaching to the converted - were black church attendances falling in the 80s/90s?)

MG

[Alexander]

I mean hell, I hate Elvis. Fuck Elvis. Elvis didn't mean shit to me and still doesn't. But as much as I hate that motherfucker, I can and will admit that he had something "above and beyond", and that his near-god status is due to something more than just hype. What it is, I don't know, don't want to know, don't need to know, but hey, I know it's there.

It's all a matter of personal taste, of course, but I do think you're missing out if you don't want to know what it was that made Elvis great. I don't know if you've ever sampled his Sun recordings (I can't imagine that you haven't), but I highly recommend them as a starting point. The trick, for me, is to listen to those records as an historian (meaning, try to forget everything that happened after). Just listen to this kid. Just out of high school, has NOT been honing his chops in performance (Elvis was notoriously shy about singing for pretty much anyone but his family until this point). Yet he seems to leap, like Athena, fully formed from the twin heads of country music and rhythm and blues. His version of Arthur Crudup's "That's All Right" is so full of confidence, so perfectly conceived, yet it sounds completely spontanious. Listen to his versions of "Mystery Train," "Blue Moon of Kentucky," and "Milkcow Blues." There was raw talent behind the later hype. For my money, if Elvis had only recorded those Sun sides and never recorded one note thereafter, he would STILL be a legendary figure. Forget the bad movies, the questionable soundtracks ("Do The Clam"), the jumpsuits...concentrate on the voice and the power it implies. Had he disappeared after recording those Sun records, I contend that he'd be thought of as the white Robert Johnson...

[The Magnificent Goldberg]

But he was also a LOT sexier than Robert Johnson.

MG

[JSngry]

I know Elvis' work very well. I just don't get it the way that a lot of people do. I understand it, I just don't get it. And that's ok with me. Believe me.

As for post-Hip Hop Gospel, I really do think that there is such a thing as post-Aretha Gospel in terms of both singing and production style (and the fact that "production style" enters into discussion about Gospel is telling in sooooo many ways....)

And the Inez album I'm specifically referring to is a later thing on Paula. Her voice was "old" but still strong, and that realy drove home from whence her phrasing sprung. And it was a different place than did Aretha's, which goes back to the notion of there being such a thing as post-Aretha Gospel.

Here's one more thought - to raise another pop/R&B/crossover issue - Gladys Knight made vastly more-better singles than did Aretha. Unquestionably. Yet a great Gladys Knight record is just that - a great record. A mediocre Aretha record from the same time is nowhere near as good a record or performance, yet it still carries more subliminal drama. It might well be the more compelling listen even as it is the less satisfying. Now, sure, some of that is backstory created by a combination of past performances and hype/marketing/image. But some of it is just that Aretha, even mediocre-to-bad Aretha can get to wondering in a way that most people can't. That's the kind of thing that at once goes beyond "music" and at the same time goes to the very core of it's intent and function.

So waht does that mean? Hell if I know, other than my answers are mine, yours are yours, and who's right depends on who's wrong, and good luck on that one.

[The Magnificent Goldberg]

As for post-Hip Hop Gospel, I really do think that there is such a thing as post-Aretha Gospel in terms of both singing and production style (and the fact that "production style" enters into discussion about Gospel is telling in sooooo many ways....)

Yes, I think you're right, there.

And the Inez album I'm specifically referring to is a later thing on Paula.

I don't know that one; thanks.

Here's one more thought - to raise another pop/R&B/crossover issue - Gladys Knight made vastly more-better singles than did Aretha. Unquestionably. Yet a great Gladys Knight record is just that - a great record. A mediocre Aretha record from the same time is nowhere near as good a record or performance, yet it still carries more subliminal drama. It might well be the more compelling listen even as it is the less satisfying. Now, sure, some of that is backstory created by a combination of past performances and hype/marketing/image. But some of it is just that Aretha, even mediocre-to-bad Aretha can get to wondering in a way that most people can't. That's the kind of thing that at once goes beyond "music" and at the same time goes to the very core of it's intent and function.

So waht does that mean? Hell if I know, other than my answers are mine, yours are yours, and who's right depends on who's wrong, and good luck on that one.

I don't think Gladys made more better singles than Ree, but I'm not going to dispute what you say. I know that no Gladys Knight singles, apart from "Every beat of my heart", moved me the way lots of Ree's singles did. I think that's got something to do with the fact (well, I think it's a fact) that Ree was BAD and Gladys was good.

MG

[JSngry]

And the Inez album I'm specifically referring to is a later thing on Paula.

I don't know that one; thanks.

It's this one: http://wc10.allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&...10:kjfqxq95ldhe

And it's on Jewel, not Paula. My bad, even though both are "the same thing".

[John L]

MG: We have both said our pieces, but I think that we will just need to agree to disagree about Aretha, her innovativeness, and importance as a soul singer.

As long as this thread has drifted to the general subject of soul divas, I would like to put in a word for Peggy Scott-Adams. Her case is just the opposite of that of Aretha. She was a good singer in the 60s and 70s, but has only recently reached her potential as a great singer: distinctive, powerful, bluesy, soulful - the whole package. She is as good as it gets in today's southern soul scene.

[The Magnificent Goldberg]

re: gospel hip-hop, it's a not nearly as interesting or weird as it should be

(deeply unhappy) I expect you're right about that. One of the problems Gospel has for us for us left wing Jewish atheists is all the conventional stuff that comes with it. (Some days, I just ARGUE back to sermons )

MG

[Alexander]

re: gospel hip-hop, it's a not nearly as interesting or weird as it should be

(deeply unhappy) I expect you're right about that. One of the problems Gospel has for us for us left wing Jewish atheists is all the conventional stuff that comes with it. (Some days, I just ARGUE back to sermons )

MG

See, as a left-wing Jewish atheist, I think I like Gospel a lot better than I would if I were religious. As it stands right now, I have more invested in practically ANYTHING ELSE than I do in the actual "message" of a Gospel song. I listen to it, I understand the words, but they have about as much meaning to me as if they were sung in pig-latin. I laugh so hard when I hear relgious types saying that "if only atheists heard our message, they would convert." I hear it everyday. Often, several times in the same day (just got finished listening to disc four (the sacred songs) of the "Anthology of American Folk Music", as a matter of fact). It doesn't make a difference in my belief system. I've probably heard about how Jesus sacrificed himself for me more than most Christians do (if they only attend church on Sunday), and I STILL don't give a flying fuck. I just like how the music SOUNDS. As suppose that's just as bad as people who tell Alan Moore (the great comic book writer) that they just read comics to look at the pictures, but there it is.

[The Magnificent Goldberg]

re: gospel hip-hop, it's a not nearly as interesting or weird as it should be

(deeply unhappy) I expect you're right about that. One of the problems Gospel has for us for us left wing Jewish atheists is all the conventional stuff that comes with it. (Some days, I just ARGUE back to sermons )

MG

See, as a left-wing Jewish atheist, I think I like Gospel a lot better than I would if I were religious. As it stands right now, I have more invested in practically ANYTHING ELSE than I do in the actual "message" of a Gospel song. I listen to it, I understand the words, but they have about as much meaning to me as if they were sung in pig-latin. I laugh so hard when I hear relgious types saying that "if only atheists heard our message, they would convert." I hear it everyday. Often, several times in the same day (just got finished listening to disc four (the sacred songs) of the "Anthology of American Folk Music", as a matter of fact). It doesn't make a difference in my belief system. I've probably heard about how Jesus sacrificed himself for me more than most Christians do (if they only attend church on Sunday), and I STILL don't give a flying fuck. I just like how the music SOUNDS. As suppose that's just as bad as people who tell Alan Moore (the great comic book writer) that they just read comics to look at the pictures, but there it is.

Well, I do agree to some extent, though I was really moaning about how conventional much of the message content is, compared to the almost anarchic views that appear to be what Christ's supposed activities indicate. But, to me, the commitment of the singers and musicians to this message is a most important element, so I can't really ignore it.

MG