Did you know that Katy Perry’s album “Teenage Dream” became the first album in history recorded by a female artist to spawn 5 number one Billboard Hot 100 hits (“California Gurls”, “Teenage Dream”, “Firework”, “E.T.” and “Last Friday Night (T.G.I.F)”?
That’s impressive.
Sam Cooke, deemed by many as the “King Of Soul” who died too early at 33, was one of the first black artists to attend to the business side of his music career starting both a record label and publishing company for his music.
During his short life, he was active in the Civil Rights Movement, and perhaps wrote on of the most poignant compositions of his era: “A Change Is Gonna Come”, which was listed as #12 on Rolling Stone’s “500 Greatest Songs of All Time”. It is a song that still resonates today as a call for people to take action to chance society’s general indifference to those who have no voice.
The lyrics of “A Change Is Gonna Come” is posted below:
“I was born by the river in a little tent
Oh and just like the river I’ve been running ever since
It’s been a long, a long time coming
But I know a change gonna come, oh yes it will
It’s been too hard living but I’m afraid to die
‘Cause I don’t know what’s up there beyond the sky
It’s been a long, a long time coming
But I know a change gonna come, oh yes it will
I go to the movie and I go downtown
Somebody keep telling me, “Don’t hang around”
It’s been a long, a long time coming
But I know a change gonna come, oh yes it will
Then I go to my brother
And I say, “Brother, help me please”
But he winds up knockin’ me
Back down on my knees
Oh there been times that I thought I couldn’t last for long
But now I think I’m able to carry on
It’s been a long, a long time coming
But I know a change gonna come, oh yes it will”
I lost my cell phone yesterday. Today, I spent about 4 hours retracing my steps, revisiting the various businesses that I stopped by the day before, hoping that some good samaritan found it and gave it to the business proprietor to put in the “lost and found” box.
Well, it didn’t happen.
On the way home, the first song that popped in my head was Robin Thicke’s “Lost Without U”.
I have/had an unhealthy relationship with my cell phone. Cell phones are worse than crack.
Wow. I was eating lunch and surfing the web when I stopped what I was doing to post this video. I don’t know much, if anything, about this singer-songwriting, but I was immediately floored by her sound.
Born in Birmingham, United Kingdom (why does it seem like all of the great soul singers these days are coming from England… lol), this 26 year old talent simply floors me. I’ll be sure to pick up her album (on CD and Vinyl, if available) when it comes out because I have a sneaky suspicion that it’s going to be a classic.
Thank you internet. You made my day with this find.
Did you know that in 1970, Grand Funk Railroad sold more albums than any other American band. By 1971, Grand Funk broke The Beatles‘ Shea Stadium attendance record by selling out in just 72 hours.
This is one of my favorite DJ Quik singles. Quik can write and spit lyrics with the best of them. He’s also a bad-ass producer.
Here are the lyrics to my favorite verse of DJ Quik’s “You’z A Ganxta”:
See some don’t realize the power of lyrics
’cause when you rap about death you talkin’ to spirits
You see you can say the things that can help us all ball
or you can say things that make it bad for us all
fix the problem the only way is come to the source
don’t be a Trojan Horse help us change the course
everybody knows that it’s bad in the ‘hood
so check what you rappin’ about if it ain’t to the good
I did my part a long time ago I changed my views
ain’t no gang bangin’ & slangin’ just hangin’ with trues
give it up to my Creator & that you can quote
but mothafuckas still see me as a scapegoat
yeah like that night when Biggie died at Quincy Jones spot
like 400 other people yeah I heard some shots
broke away with the crowd nervous obviously
& the mothafuckas blamed it on me
What the hell!?!
I saw No Doubt perform at the Gibson Amphitheater on November 30, 2012 and I though they were awesome (Gwen Stefani, let me be your cabana boy… lol) but what I would give to have seen them perform back when they were starting out … back when they were performing in dive bars and college campuses when they were just getting their careers started … sigh.
Thank the music gods for youtube. At least I can see what they were like back then. Pure musical and performance awesomeness.
In my personal opinion: Older No Doubt Music > Newer No Doubt Music. But I digress….
Here’s a video I found from April 17th, 1993 of one of my older favorite No Doubt songs “Get On The Ball” performed at Cal Poly Pomona.
I may have to report for jury duty tomorrow…. Felt compelled to take Sade’s “Is It A Crime” for a spin…
Today, January 15th, is Martin Luther King, Jr.’s birthday. He was an prominent leader in the Civil Rights Movement and is probably “best known for his role in the advancement of civil rights using nonviolent civil disobedience” (quoted from Wikipedia’s entry on Dr. King). But even before the activism in the 50s and 60s, there were other forms of non-violent civil rights activism that was already stirring the flame, and that was through music.
The other day, I stepped into a second-hand book store to pass some time and I stumbled upon a copy of the “Strange Fruit: Billie Holiday, Cafe Society, and An Early Cry For Civil Rights”. It is a quick read, and gives a certain perspective on the origins and effect of the song made famous by the legendary singer Billie Holiday: “Strange Fruit”. The lyrics of the composition are below for reference.
“Strange Fruit”
(Wiggins, Pearl, Allan)
Southern trees bear a strange fruit,
Blood on the leaves and blood at the root,
Black bodies swinging in the southern breeze,
Strange fruit hanging from the poplar trees.
Pastoral scene of the gallant south,
The bulging eyes and the twisted mouth,
Scent of magnolias, sweet and fresh,
Then the sudden smell of burning flesh.
Here is fruit for the crows to pluck,
For the rain to gather, for the wind to suck,
For the sun to rot, for the trees to drop,
Here is a strange and bitter crop.
Strange Fruit lyrics (c) Warner/Chappell Music, Inc., EMI Music Publishing
The way we, the consumer, take in media and entertainment today is so different than it was in the past. In the book, I read accounts of when Billie Holiday performed at the Cafe Society, how patrons would stop in their tracks in the middle of the smoke filled room, rendered silent, to listen to the songstress croon this painful song, and how the venue would be silent for minutes after the conclusion because of how powerful the music was. For some reason, I simply can’t imagine a song having that kind of effect on today’s audience. I mean, a song that carries so much weight that it simultaneously scares, enrages and educates people all at the same time.
Maybe “Strange Fruit” is one of the anomalies. Maybe it was the perfect song for the perfect time and place… a song that hits the musical trifecta…. Now THAT must have been something. That’s a feeling I’d love to soak in. I don’t think I’ve ever personally experienced it … and truth be told, I doubt I ever will get to experience something like it.
Don’t get me wrong, there are lots of great songwriters out there, and I want to be in an audience one night, in an intimate venue, where the lights are low, and the singer blows my mind with powerful lyrics that shake up and stir a deep societal pain. I want to be there when a singer is singing to me some truth that can’t be denied … some truth that makes it uneasy for me to listen, but I can’t not listen to it because it’s verity. But I just don’t know if music can do what it did back in 1939. Music is powerful, but I don’t know if music can hit that kind of nerve anymore. And if it does, how can it rise up from the hundreds of thousands of other songs that flood the internet? Cream used to rise to the top, but does it anymore?
I can hope. There seems to be so many problems in society these days, maybe some songwriter can bring it on home for me … write some lyrics that could stand alone as poetry … write some lyrics whose essence is coaxed out through the melodic and rhythmic flow of the music. I’m looking for music that means something and speaks to a greater evil in our society that needs fixing…. something that everybody can related to, and gets people to start talking about ways to get it right…
You got something for me?
Nothing like listening to demos and alternate versions of some classic Depeche Mode music on vinyl to recharge the work battery before buckling down to finish off the work day.
#DKLPHOTOS 