What The Godfather Meant
January 10, 2007
Tribute
What the Godfather of Soul Meant to Me
Aretha Franklin, Ice Cube, Reverend Run, and other peers and disciples remember James Brown
SOUL POWER Brown in 1964
All About
James Brown
By Leah Greenblatt
Say it loud! Following the Dec. 25 passing of James Brown, a.k.a. the Godfather of Soul, the Hardest Working Man In Show Business, Soul Brother Number One, among many other monikers — most of which he coined himself — EW’s music team gathered a rich and varied collection of never-before-published quotes from his admirers. Be they contemporaries, musical descendents, or merely bystanders, all were touched in some way by his supreme funkiness. Here we offer an extended recollection of the memories and moments that made the man The Man, from some of his biggest bold-faced fans.
Aretha Franklin, the Queen of Soul
”His performance, you just can’t get away from that. Whatever else you might think of, you cannot get away from that. He was one-of-a-kind, an original, [like] a Rembrandt or a Picasso. The first time I heard him, I was traveling with my father as a teenager, and [Brown] had just joined the Famous Flames, I believe. We were driving in Florida and I heard this record, ”It Was You,” on the radio, and I just loved it instantly.
”And then I must have been about 19 or 20 when I first met him in person. We never actually performed much together, though I remember a show [we did] here in Detroit around ‘86 or ‘87 [with] me and Wilson Pickett. Oh my Lord.
”He was a showman extraordinaire, a social activist, and he was certainly concerned with the human condition. When I first heard about [the passing of] Gerald Ford, I thought oh, wow, that’s very sad, but I also thought that James might be overshadowed by that, but I don’t think he was at all. I think that the media and the people at large absolutely gave him his respect.”
Greg Tate On James Brown
January 4, 2007
Eulogy for Black Caesar
James Brown, 1933–2006
by Greg Tate
January 2nd, 2007
Eeeeeeyow. Gud gaad. Aintit fonkeenah? James Brown knew how to freak the tribal speak and the tribal feet alike—the tribal neckbone and irrepressible tribal hambone too. Being a poet, a boxer, and a onetime Pentecostal supplicant, the Godfather knew a thing or two about being hit with the spirit and hit with the quickness; he also knew how to hit back, how to respond in kind in a New York minute. Bold, Black, and Beautiful things just happened faster in the world according to Brown. Tempos, terpsichore, tantrums, tangents, even jail time. They didn’t call him Mr. Dynamite for nothing. Word is that when the Hardest Working Man in Showbiz did his three-year bid, he stayed industrious, organized a choir, ran the kitchen and laundry detail. Sit-down time for Black Caesar? Fuhgeddaboudit. And unlike so many of our fallen fighters whom dust and base cocaine dropped to the mat in the ’80s and ’90s, JB came back up as superbaaad as ever. Lest we forget, he transitioned to another world tour by straight stealing Jesus’ thunder on Xmas Day. He wasn’t ever a puny human to begin with anyway, so don’t act surprised.
Happy Birthday Jimi!!!
November 27, 2006
Jimi Hendrix – Band of Gypsys – Who Knows
Today is Jimi Hendrix’s birthday! The greatest guitarist, most potent color and texture specialist and freaky freedom diver would have been 64.
LA Times Feature On Jimmy Iovine
November 25, 2006
The LA Times did a piece on music industry executive Jimmy Iovine. Mr. Iovine is a founder of Interscope Records home to some of everyone’s favorite gangsta rappers. Death Row’s initial power boost from Iovine has a trajectory traceable to the careers of Eminem, 50 Cent and The Game. He also produced John Lennon’s Mind Games album.
