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When James Brown was King

By Chris Stevenson

Archives - Dates and Topics

2006 – online

November – December 2006

Dec. 25 – Dec. 31 click here for related stories: racism, civil rights and equality

12-26-06, 8:48 am

A friend of mine recently told me, "Leave it to James to die on Christmas." That pretty much sums up the career of James Joseph Brown Jr. He came in with a bang, and went out in flying colors. A black Christmas if I ever saw one. Most people just limit Brown to just a Soul Music icon, little attention is made of the fact that he began his professional career back in '53 during the period when Chuck Berry, and Little Richard were still going strong, making him a rock music forerunner. He recorded his breakthrough hit "Please, Please," three years later in '56. Back in the '70's I bought an Aerosmith bootleg LP at "Play it Again Sam's." Not unusual for me to do that back then, especially since that store housed tons of bootleg rock albums, and rare collectibles. Though a bit raw sounding, this particular recording was of pretty good quality for an illegally recorded live performance. This captured the band back during their best period, their early years. The years when two of their first five albums were among rock music's best, "Get Your Wings," and "Rocks." The bootleg had a rendition of one of Brown's old songs; "Popcorn." Front-man Steven Tyler tried his best to imitate Brown's vocal histrionics, but to little avail. Brown simply can't be duplicated. When the song was finished Tyler waited for his small barroom audience to finish their applause, and then he said something along the lines of: "that was dedicated to the King, we know who the King is, you know who the King is." Not a bad tribute for a band of white boys from Boston, but that sums up the influence of James Brown, the hardest working man in show business. He simply was and is… the King.

Brown's kingdom was within the various black communities that he frequently visited. During the early '60's every time his tour stopped in Buffalo, I recall his convoy of limousines driving down Eagle St. and Clinton Ave., with him and his entourage waving to his fans, his kids, those of us who really mattered to him. I'd never forget that. Unfortunately I never got the chance to see him perform live, but my friends would always come back from one of his shows mesmerized. I still have the old Ed Sullivan recordings of him courtesy of VH1. I saw how large and elaborate his band was, I remember him creating the "Funk" music genre (a style of music that maintains the continuation of the introductory notes throughout the song, "on the one" as Brown called it. Funk was also a merging of rock and R&B), and the countless bands and performers that would imitate this in various styles back in the '70's (Funkadelic's George Clinton would at times raid Brown's best band-members like the brothers Bootsy and Phelps Collins, Fred Wesley, Maceo Parker etc., during the 2nd formation of Parliament). But most importantly, I remember his politics. This is important because in the next few days, the major media is going to play up Brown's bouts with the police.

Back in '98 I interviewed Abio Dune of the original rap group the Last Poets. Dune told me a wonderful story about the formation of one of Brown's biggest hits; "Say it Loud, I'm Black and I'm Proud:" This was back in the days when Brown spent time in Jamaica Queens , and Harlem NY , and he was soaking in the local Black political consciousness movements:

"…I mean everything was moving into a lot of overt revolutionary activity. We made James Brown change his song he done called 'I love America' or 'I'm American too,' or something, and we thought that was some kind of integrationist madness that we didn't want to hear. So he came back, and came up with "Say it loud I'm black and I'm Proud." So that became a very big statement at that time, so everybody was being loud, black, and proud. That was the call of the day, that's how we were acting."

Understand that by 1968 regard for Brown was so high among Blacks of all ages, that even when my big Sis bought the record, my parents (old-school medieval-southern who didn't care for Motown, Stax, or the British Invasion) didn't object. Brown caught a lot of backlash from the black community for his endorsement of Richard Nixon for President, but little attention was paid to his inspirational business initiatives. Brown would eventually own his own record label, he also owned several radio stations. Even hip-hop started out as a continuation of Brown's lyrical raps, he was always on the one. How ironic that we lose him on Christmas. "Santa Claus, go straight to the ghetto." Job well done my brother.

--Chris Stevenson is a columnist for the Buffalo Criterion , Contact him at pointblankdta@yahoo.com