Rod Temperton is Dead

[DracoM]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b07yk4b9/newsnight-05102016

37 mins in.

[cloughie]

Yes, well, this is the "proper soul" debate.

Off the top of my head, I have Booker T and the MGs, Otis Redding and The Staple Singers on CD plus compilations of a whole host of those people - William Bell, Albert King, Little Milton, Carla Thomas, Rufus Thomas etc. I have been lucky enough to see Al Green, Mavis Staples and Isaac Hayes - originally on Stax - live. I love it but I'm not for either/or in this regard. Motown, for example, was pop soul but a part of its enduring appeal is the joyousness. That largely emanated from gospel traditions and - look at the clips of the best of it - it contrasts extraordinarily with the cynical/maudlin mainstreams now. Then when it all got more serious "What's Going On" etc which speaks for itself. It's getting late!

(Actually so late that I quite forgot Rev Solomon Burke who was utterly fantastic - CDs aplenty and one of the best live performances I have ever witnessed. Thanks very much.)

And of course Aretha, whose late sixties, early seventies output was excellent, and whose post late seventies stuff was mediocre to disappointing - I blame her musical management! Another singer who I have always really rated, but is she 'soul' or something more and different - Roberta Flack. She had the ability to stretch out a song without becoming boring or repetitive. I really hate the way some singers can only extend a song by endless repetition of a phrase accompanyed by mindless blowing from the band.

[Lat-Literal]

And of course Aretha, whose late sixties, early seventies output was excellent, and whose post late seventies stuff was mediocre to disappointing - I blame her musical management! Another singer who I have always really rated, but is she 'soul' or something more and different - Roberta Flack. She had the ability to stretch out a song without becoming boring or repetitive. I really hate the way some singers can only extend a song by endless repetition of a phrase accompanyed by mindless blowing from the band.

Oh no Cloughie, I knew this would all become tricky. I have nothing against Aretha Franklin but have a bit of a blind spot there. Have never shared the massive enthusiasm from almost every pundit - and she's from a gospel background too. I do have Roberta Flack for clarity. There's no real justification for my favourites beyond what has been written before - Minnie Riperton and Tammi Terrell both of whom died very young, Mavis Staples for grit, Marlena Shaw and especially Nina Simone although there we are pushing the boundaries of categorization. That is women from the 1960s onwards. There are a lot of others but I won't list them all as many of them aren't proper soul. It's not an area where I have a high credibility score. I suppose what I could do is set out where, Daptone etc aside, I feel soul ended. I accept right thinking people will feel my cut off point is too late.

I love these:

The Winans - Let My People Go (12') - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sp1zvo4dLCI

(Surely the book end to the Impressions' wonderful People Get Ready)

Isley Jasper Isley - Caravan of Love - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4wibyuGQlyo

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode...night-05102016
37 mins in.

Many thanks.

I'm pleased they mentioned the harp.

(Perfection - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NdKEbnS1eBE)

[Serial_Apologist]

Did anyone here see Black Nativity at the Piccadilly Theatre in, I think it would have been 1963? Marion Williams was the most powerful singer by far in that, belting her stuff out from the back chorus line. My into to genuine Gospel music, having previously heard Ray Charles's derivations from it!

[Lat-Literal]

Did anyone here see Black Nativity at the Piccadilly Theatre in, I think it would have been 1963? Marion Williams was the most powerful singer by far in that, belting her stuff out from the back chorus line. My into to genuine Gospel music, having previously heard Ray Charles's derivations from it!

Interesting - and no, not me - but she features in "500 Songs That Shaped Rock" -

http://www.infoplease.com/ipea/A0150472.html

The other name that immediately springs to mind in this context is Mahalia Jackson and then Van Morrison who has name checked these people and many blues artists in songs.

I do have CDs in my collection of most of the key gospel singers including the great Sister Rosetta Tharpe.

One of the interesting things is that some of the strongest pop soul albums - and there aren't many - since the mid 1980s by the very big artists from previous decades have a sort of gospel connotation, ie Rev Al Green and especially the terrific albums by Rev Solomon Burke in the early 2000s. I suppose they just outlived many of the others. Al's still here.

Solomon Burke - None Of Us Are Free - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eFkmRp_G2uo

You speak about an introduction into gospel music which is a fascinating point. Similarly, I didn't wake up one morning and think I'm for gospel or I'm for spirituals. It sort of crept up on me over many decades as if that hue was in my blood. And I have a slightly unusual take on it which is woolly beyond belief. It's not that I am religious but I don't listen to it from a secular perspective. I have the strong feeling that music is the closest thing to what I will know of religion and it is religion to me so the gospel things drive that point home.

[Boilk]

Well, I will reply in view of my soul leanings.

The songs of Rod Temperton:

Heatwave
Boogie Nights - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ob9sDpmRuqc
Mind Blowing Decisions - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r86_2FI6dTA
Always and Forever - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kvEVurJpa9M

Lat-Literal, you forgot Temperton's The Groove Line which was a hit for Heatwave, possibly after he'd left the band:

Temperton was more worthy of a knighthood than certain eminent British musicians
of the 1970s/80s I could mention.

[Lat-Literal]

Lat-Literal, you forgot Temperton's The Groove Line which was a hit for Heatwave, possibly after he'd left the band:

Temperton was more worthy of a knighthood than certain eminent British musicians
of the 1970s/80s I could mention.

Thanks Boilk - and there was "Gangsters of the Groove" too. Re "Boogie Nights",there must be more than half a dozen parts to it from the harp onwards not that it would be obvious from a dance floor because it so skilfully put together as a whole. The sort of imagination required is surely one of the things that divides pre and post (circa) 2000.