When I got up on Christmas morning and got online to check the news, I found out that James Brown had died. Wow. He was just 72 or so, and he was still performing. Had just taken part in a toy giveaway in Atlanta and was preparing for a New Year's Eve show in New York. The news reports say he was detected with pneumonia, was taken to a hospital and died a few hours later.
Now don't think that I feel James Brown was a tremendously admirable man. He had his problems with drugs and guns and spousal abuse. He saw time inside a prison late in life after a high-speed chase. But if you ever read about his early years, you'll realize that he wasn't given a lot of advantages when he was young.
Lord knows he wasn't perfect. But what a gifted performer! Unnh! (That's the grunt you heard often during his performances.)
I had heard about James Brown when I was in high school--about the time he came out with his "Live at the Apollo" albums (which I picked up on over 35 years later). Some kids in our school knew his music pretty well, but only a few. I was raised in a Milwaukee suburb, for which the term "lily white" fits accurately. (I have to laugh--today, living in the woods of the Upper Peninsula, I see many more black people than I ever did as a kid.)
My personal discovery of James Brown started maybe 10 years ago. I had gotten to know a little about him over the years, of course, but gravitated towards the classic blues singers.
My first James Brown CD was the "Star Time" compilation from the early '90s. By now I had heard what an electric performer he was. (Years earlier, when I was in high school, my mom had seen him performing "Please, Please, Please" on TV and was absolutely aghast. I wasn't home that night, unfortunately.)
The breakthrough came when I purchased his "Live at the Apollo" CD, recorded in 1962. (I'm listening to it as I'm writing this.) That told me everything I needed to know about James Brown. It was incredible, the power he had in his voice and the effect he had on his audience. "Lost Someone" made chills go down my spine. A long medley ending with "Please, Please, Please."
The effect on his audience ... incredible, and not at all artificial. Maybe only Elvis, when he was in his prime, had that kind of power on stage. That album was ranked #24 on Rolling Stone's list of the 500 greatest albums of all time. It's worth looking for.
Later, I found a different "Live at the Apollo" album, from about 1966, and I was even more convinced after hearing "Prisoner of Love" and an 11-minute version of "It's a Man's Man's Man's World." Incredible performances. Re-released in the last few years as a two-CD set. Another excellent investment in your music library. Unnh!
For some time I had heard about his incredible performance at the TAMI Show in 1964. Two years or so ago, I found a DVD of the TAMI Show, which featured many of the top pop music stars from that time. The Rolling Stones closed the show. James Brown was the act just before the Stones.
The audio is only fair, and the resolution of the black-and-white kinescope is, frankly, poor. That takes nothing away from his performance. He did "Prisoner of Love." He closed with "Night Train" as he did incredibly fast dance steps. In between he did "Please, Please, Please."
That's when I finally got to see what had grossed out my mom so much. There he was, collapsing to his knees, holding the microphone, screaming Please, please, please, don't go. Ohhhh, I love you so!
After a while, his backup singers come up to him, covered his shoulders with a cape and led this obviously despondent creature (overcome with heartbreak, of course) off the stage ... only to have him break away and return to the microphone for another chorus of his heartbreak.
This happened three or four times. If you have never seen it, you can't imagine how worked up the audience got. I mean, these are teenage girls, and they were moved. I mean moved. They were in it. Unnh!
And that's just the kind of reaction you heard--in quality audio--on those "Live at the Apollo" CDs. A showstopping performer. You could only pity the poor act--such as the Rolling Stones at the TAMI Show--who had to try to follow that!
James Brown--and his music--went through a lot of phases, but my favorite James Brown is the same as my favorite Elvis: The young version, the extremely virile one, the one who held the audience in the palm of his hand with excitement echoing everywhere.
One other thing about James Brown: He had a VERY tight band. The arrangements had to be done precisely, and his musicians--the instrumentalists and the singers--were spot-on in their performances. They had to be. Their boss would fine them if they missed a cue. Unnh!
So now James Brown has moved on. Here's wishing him well and that he has a happier life the next time around. He make a lot of his fans happy, that's for sure. And that includes me.
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