0:00:02 > 0:00:04# Boy, you hear me calling your name The bridge is your time
0:00:04 > 0:00:05# Your engine rolls hot
0:00:05 > 0:00:07# If the bridges fall down
0:00:07 > 0:00:11# Don't lose your head of steam... #
0:00:11 > 0:00:15The voice. It's the one instrument we're all born with.
0:00:15 > 0:00:16We all love to sing.
0:00:16 > 0:00:19# Oh, young man... #
0:00:19 > 0:00:22Singing is my life. It's what I do and who I am.
0:00:22 > 0:00:24# I didn't make it too far
0:00:24 > 0:00:26# But, baby, you are... #
0:00:26 > 0:00:29I'm going to take you on a 100-year celebration of the mystery,
0:00:29 > 0:00:32joy and pain that lies behind the soul's instrument.
0:00:32 > 0:00:34# Boy, you hear me calling your name
0:00:34 > 0:00:36# The bridge is your time... #
0:00:36 > 0:00:40I'm Gregory Porter and these are my Popular Voices.
0:00:40 > 0:00:43# Young man
0:00:43 > 0:00:44# I'm counting on you
0:00:44 > 0:00:47# And whoa... #
0:00:47 > 0:00:50Hey, you. Yes, you.
0:00:50 > 0:00:52Come here. I'm talking to you.
0:00:52 > 0:00:56I want to tell you a story about a century of street jive -
0:00:56 > 0:00:58how the blues' original growlers
0:00:58 > 0:01:01gave us the rhyme and flow of hip-hop,
0:01:01 > 0:01:05how the truth became a quest of rock and roll's greatest poets,
0:01:05 > 0:01:08and how great voices don't have to be technically perfect to be truly
0:01:08 > 0:01:13great. This is the story of talking voices.
0:01:15 > 0:01:17# Right, shake it over I heard a humming... #
0:01:17 > 0:01:21# Everything you touch is gold
0:01:21 > 0:01:23# I'm in love with your soul
0:01:23 > 0:01:27# Everything that you're sayin' is all
0:01:27 > 0:01:30# I love you. #
0:01:30 > 0:01:32CHEERING AND APPLAUSE
0:01:42 > 0:01:45Everybody loves a magnificent voice.
0:01:48 > 0:01:52But not all popular singing is about virtuosity.
0:01:52 > 0:01:56Sometimes, the message takes centre stage.
0:01:56 > 0:02:02And for 100 years, great singers have shouted, moaned, groaned,
0:02:02 > 0:02:07and even just talked, in an attempt to tell us the truth.
0:02:10 > 0:02:14So this time, I'm on the hunt for singers with something to say.
0:02:14 > 0:02:18It's all about telling it like it is and keeping it real.
0:02:18 > 0:02:21# Judge, Your Honour
0:02:21 > 0:02:23# Hear my plea
0:02:23 > 0:02:27# Before you open up your... #
0:02:27 > 0:02:31And my search begins with the Empress of the Blues.
0:02:31 > 0:02:35Born in Chattanooga in 1894,
0:02:35 > 0:02:39Bessie Smith was one of the first stars of the recording era,
0:02:39 > 0:02:43whose life was laid bare in her guttural growl.
0:02:45 > 0:02:47Aiding me is an actor and a singer
0:02:47 > 0:02:51who has devoted her professional life to playing Bessie -
0:02:51 > 0:02:53Miche Braden.
0:02:53 > 0:02:55- Hi.- Glad to be with you.
0:02:55 > 0:03:00- Thank you.- Who was Bessie Smith and why was she so important?
0:03:00 > 0:03:02Bessie Smith was the baddest woman
0:03:02 > 0:03:05that you would ever want to hear, or see.
0:03:05 > 0:03:07# No, no
0:03:07 > 0:03:10# I wouldn't pay 25 cents to go in nowhere
0:03:10 > 0:03:12# Cos listen here
0:03:12 > 0:03:16# Up in Harlem every Saturday night... #
0:03:16 > 0:03:19You may as well say she was a shouter. Blues shouter.
0:03:19 > 0:03:22Because they didn't have the microphones and things we have now.
0:03:22 > 0:03:24- Yeah.- So she had to be powerful.
0:03:24 > 0:03:28And she's doing tent shows for 1,500 people.
0:03:28 > 0:03:29She was just one of those kinds.
0:03:29 > 0:03:33She just, bam, it was there! Bam!
0:03:33 > 0:03:35I don't need to be doing a woman's job!
0:03:38 > 0:03:41There was a lot of things she talked about, as far as being abused,
0:03:41 > 0:03:44actually. Because a lot of women were dealing with that.
0:03:44 > 0:03:46- Yeah.- And then the men in general, you know,
0:03:46 > 0:03:47they were the players and that.
0:03:47 > 0:03:50So she was singing about their lives.
0:03:50 > 0:03:52So when they recognised themselves...
0:03:52 > 0:03:53- Mm-hm.- ..they were at home.
0:03:53 > 0:03:55- Yeah.- They were at home.
0:03:55 > 0:03:57And it was too wonderful.
0:03:58 > 0:04:00# I don't care
0:04:00 > 0:04:04# I feel just like I wanna clown
0:04:04 > 0:04:09# Give the piano player a drink because he's bringing me down
0:04:09 > 0:04:14# He's gotta rhythm, yeah, when he stomps his feet. #
0:04:14 > 0:04:16Bessie's truth-telling approach to singing
0:04:16 > 0:04:20made her both a star of record and screen.
0:04:20 > 0:04:24# My man's got a heart
0:04:24 > 0:04:26# That's a rock
0:04:26 > 0:04:30# Cast in the sea... #
0:04:30 > 0:04:33In 1929, she made a film appearance -
0:04:33 > 0:04:37a two-reeler shot in Queens, St Louis Blues.
0:04:37 > 0:04:41# Cast in the sea. #
0:04:42 > 0:04:46This is a really rare piece of footage.
0:04:46 > 0:04:51This is the only time I've ever seen Bessie Smith moving.
0:04:51 > 0:04:53And I'm really struck by
0:04:53 > 0:04:58really the sound and the quality of her voice as well.
0:04:58 > 0:05:03# Feelin' tomorrow like I feel today
0:05:03 > 0:05:09# Feelin' like I did today... #
0:05:09 > 0:05:10When I think of Bessie Smith,
0:05:10 > 0:05:15I think of just this powerful and commanding presence...
0:05:15 > 0:05:16Yes, she was.
0:05:16 > 0:05:19..that says, "This is how it is and this is what I think."
0:05:19 > 0:05:24As I listened to music, I needed to believe what I was hearing.
0:05:24 > 0:05:27I needed to know that maybe some kind of way,
0:05:27 > 0:05:30their life had something to do with the song they're singing.
0:05:30 > 0:05:34Now, Billie Holiday used to say, if she hadn't lived the song,
0:05:34 > 0:05:36she couldn't sing it.
0:05:36 > 0:05:37And I totally understand that.
0:05:37 > 0:05:42And you can definitely tell that Bessie Smith lived these songs.
0:05:45 > 0:05:47Like a modern-day MC,
0:05:47 > 0:05:50Bessie Smith spoke to the lives of the audience
0:05:50 > 0:05:52that bought her records,
0:05:52 > 0:05:54100 years before hip-hop.
0:05:54 > 0:05:59She died in a car crash in 1937, at the age of 43.
0:05:59 > 0:06:02# The man I love
0:06:02 > 0:06:06# He would not gone nowhere
0:06:06 > 0:06:09# Gone nowhere... #
0:06:14 > 0:06:17Even though it's a Hollywood,
0:06:17 > 0:06:23er, concoction, if you will, it still is great to see her sing.
0:06:23 > 0:06:27And quite frankly, it's actually beautiful to see
0:06:27 > 0:06:30these talented black people from a film in 1929.
0:06:33 > 0:06:35And nice suits too!
0:06:37 > 0:06:44# St Louis woman with her diamond rings
0:06:44 > 0:06:47# Oooh, yeah
0:06:47 > 0:06:52# Pulls that man round
0:06:52 > 0:06:55by her apron strings
0:06:55 > 0:06:59SHE VOCALISES
0:06:59 > 0:07:03# If it wasn't for powder
0:07:03 > 0:07:08# And her store-bought hair
0:07:08 > 0:07:13# The man, the man
0:07:13 > 0:07:18# He wouldn't go nowhere
0:07:18 > 0:07:22- # Nowhere - Yeah. #
0:07:26 > 0:07:27Yeah, cool.
0:07:35 > 0:07:37The blues was all about frank truth-telling,
0:07:37 > 0:07:41and it gave rise to a form of speech-singing -
0:07:41 > 0:07:43the talking blues.
0:07:43 > 0:07:46And we can actually pinpoint the very first time
0:07:46 > 0:07:48the talking voice was immortalised in wax.
0:07:51 > 0:07:53# Standing in the corner by the mantelpiece
0:07:53 > 0:07:55# Up in the corner by a bucket of grease
0:07:55 > 0:07:57# I greased my feet with a little axle grease
0:07:57 > 0:08:00# Went slippin' up and down that mantelpiece. #
0:08:00 > 0:08:05Christopher Bouchillon was a white country blues musician from Carolina,
0:08:05 > 0:08:08who was billed as the "Talking Comedian of the South."
0:08:08 > 0:08:13In 1926, he recorded the song Talking Blues.
0:08:13 > 0:08:15It's rumoured he talked on the recording
0:08:15 > 0:08:17simply because he couldn't sing.
0:08:20 > 0:08:23Could this guy really be the godfather of hip-hop?
0:08:25 > 0:08:29Conversational singing was a major influence on my next truth-teller...
0:08:29 > 0:08:32# When the moon's kinda dreamy... #
0:08:32 > 0:08:34..Billie Holiday.
0:08:34 > 0:08:36# Starry-eyed and dreamy
0:08:36 > 0:08:39# And nights are luscious and long
0:08:42 > 0:08:46# If you're kinda lonely
0:08:46 > 0:08:49# And nobody only
0:08:49 > 0:08:53# Then nothing but blues are brewin'... #
0:08:53 > 0:08:56Jazz diva Annie Ross was a very close friend of Billie Holiday.
0:08:57 > 0:09:00Lady...
0:09:00 > 0:09:01..was extraordinary.
0:09:03 > 0:09:05She was very down-home.
0:09:06 > 0:09:10She was very definite in her opinion.
0:09:10 > 0:09:13Once you heard Lady,
0:09:13 > 0:09:15you could never forget that voice.
0:09:17 > 0:09:19It was...
0:09:19 > 0:09:23..as if a higher being had spoken.
0:09:23 > 0:09:27# ..nothing but the blues are brewin'
0:09:27 > 0:09:30# The blues are brewin'... #
0:09:30 > 0:09:36Billie possessed a vocal style that hovered effortlessly between speech
0:09:36 > 0:09:40and jazz singing. She pulled the listener into her world with her
0:09:40 > 0:09:41conversational phrasing.
0:09:41 > 0:09:46# You only got a gleam in your eye... #
0:09:46 > 0:09:49I would just say Billie was like, you know, a great saxophonist.
0:09:49 > 0:09:52She reminds me of Lester Young, who I know she recorded with a lot.
0:09:59 > 0:10:02She's not always singing on the beat, it doesn't feel like.
0:10:02 > 0:10:05It feels like she's just kind of there, moving slowly through it,
0:10:05 > 0:10:08at her own pace. The music has to follow her,
0:10:08 > 0:10:10she's not following the music.
0:10:15 > 0:10:17It feels like she's always teetering on, er,
0:10:17 > 0:10:19not just being in the pocket, vocally.
0:10:19 > 0:10:23But it's there. Because there's a cry, there's an emotion,
0:10:23 > 0:10:28there's a sadness, a melancholy, that's just so powerful.
0:10:28 > 0:10:33# He wears high-draped pants
0:10:33 > 0:10:37# Stripes are really yellow... #
0:10:37 > 0:10:40You hear every bad thing that ever happened to her in her voice.
0:10:40 > 0:10:44# He wears high-draped pants
0:10:46 > 0:10:51# Stripes are really yellow
0:10:53 > 0:10:57# But when he starts in to love me... #
0:10:57 > 0:10:59Like Bessie Smith before her,
0:10:59 > 0:11:02Billie's voice had a lived-in feel to it.
0:11:02 > 0:11:06As she grew older, a world-weariness chipped away
0:11:06 > 0:11:08at the range and tone of her instrument.
0:11:08 > 0:11:13You can hear it in the speech-song confessional of her final album,
0:11:13 > 0:11:15recorded in 1958.
0:11:16 > 0:11:19- Lady In Satin.- Yeah.
0:11:22 > 0:11:27# I'm a fool to want you
0:11:29 > 0:11:31# I'm a fool to want you... #
0:11:31 > 0:11:34She made every word count.
0:11:36 > 0:11:38The expression
0:11:38 > 0:11:41of agony,
0:11:41 > 0:11:44of hurt, of love,
0:11:44 > 0:11:46of being,
0:11:46 > 0:11:49came through in her voice.
0:11:50 > 0:11:52And she reached me and she touched me.
0:11:54 > 0:11:55And it was...
0:11:58 > 0:12:04It was kind of inexplicable, but you would listen to her
0:12:04 > 0:12:07and once she was finished,
0:12:07 > 0:12:11you would say, "Oh, wow!"
0:12:11 > 0:12:14# ..not mine alone... #
0:12:14 > 0:12:17I love the way the orchestra waits for her.
0:12:17 > 0:12:20- Yeah.- Those moments, er...
0:12:20 > 0:12:23There's moments where there's nothing but her.
0:12:23 > 0:12:25"Fool. Fool."
0:12:25 > 0:12:28- Just...- Her phrasing...
0:12:28 > 0:12:31- These moments. "Time."- "Time."
0:12:31 > 0:12:33- Yeah.- It's like...
0:12:34 > 0:12:36..it's screaming without screaming.
0:12:36 > 0:12:38- Inside.- Yeah. Yeah.
0:12:40 > 0:12:43# Time and time again... #
0:12:43 > 0:12:47When you hear Billie's voice when it was, like, in its worst -
0:12:47 > 0:12:52in the later '50s - erm, that's what we're hearing, in my opinion.
0:12:52 > 0:12:54- Yeah.- It's her soul singing.- Yeah.
0:12:54 > 0:12:57Because she sounded like she had been chewing rocks
0:12:57 > 0:12:59and swallowing fire.
0:12:59 > 0:13:02- Yeah!- Because her voice was so raspy.
0:13:02 > 0:13:04But you could feel the emotion in it.
0:13:04 > 0:13:06You know?
0:13:07 > 0:13:10# My tender love
0:13:12 > 0:13:18# Without you. #
0:13:21 > 0:13:22That's real.
0:13:25 > 0:13:27You just said it, that's real.
0:13:28 > 0:13:30That's real.
0:13:30 > 0:13:32- Billie Holiday.- Yeah.
0:13:35 > 0:13:40And now a tune written specially for me, Strange Fruit.
0:13:41 > 0:13:46In February 1959, with just three months left to live,
0:13:46 > 0:13:49a weakening Billie performed her bestselling record
0:13:49 > 0:13:51for an ITV variety show.
0:13:51 > 0:13:58Her performance was a masterclass of unflinching understatement.
0:13:58 > 0:14:01# Southern trees
0:14:01 > 0:14:06bear strange fruit
0:14:09 > 0:14:16# Blood on the leaves and blood at the root
0:14:18 > 0:14:24# Black bodies swinging in the southern breeze
0:14:27 > 0:14:35# Strange fruit hanging from the poplar trees... #
0:14:39 > 0:14:41Strange Fruit - it's...
0:14:41 > 0:14:46..they're hanging the body of a... of a black man...
0:14:46 > 0:14:47er...
0:14:49 > 0:14:52..for some unnecessary reason.
0:14:52 > 0:14:59# The bulging eyes and the twisted mouth
0:15:01 > 0:15:08# Scent of magnolias, sweet and fresh... #
0:15:08 > 0:15:15Nobody's face, or eyes, could so...
0:15:18 > 0:15:21..dryly tell the story
0:15:21 > 0:15:23of such a painful thing.
0:15:23 > 0:15:26# Here is fruit
0:15:27 > 0:15:32# For the crows to pluck... #
0:15:32 > 0:15:39This is the point at which jazz becomes this
0:15:39 > 0:15:40thing of
0:15:40 > 0:15:43social and political import.
0:15:45 > 0:15:49# For the sun to rot
0:15:51 > 0:15:59# For the trees to drop... #
0:16:03 > 0:16:08I feel like Billie Holiday was put on Earth for this song.
0:16:08 > 0:16:16# ..and bitter crop. #
0:16:19 > 0:16:25It almost feels uncomfortable clapping after Strange Fruit.
0:16:37 > 0:16:38Singing in a colloquial style,
0:16:38 > 0:16:43in an effort to reveal a deeper truth about the world around you,
0:16:43 > 0:16:46wasn't just limited to African-American jazz and blues.
0:16:49 > 0:16:52This is Bakersfield, California, where I'm from.
0:16:52 > 0:16:56It's an oil town and there are nodding donkeys everywhere.
0:16:56 > 0:17:01People came here originally as part of the Gold Rush but, in 1899,
0:17:01 > 0:17:06oil was discovered by migrants from Texas and Oklahoma.
0:17:06 > 0:17:10Okies came here looking for work and cheap land.
0:17:10 > 0:17:14It was a time of economic depression for America,
0:17:14 > 0:17:17and its great artists chronicled the times.
0:17:19 > 0:17:23Photographer Dorothea Lange took pictures of economic refugee camps
0:17:23 > 0:17:25around Bakersfield.
0:17:25 > 0:17:28And the great folk singer Woody Guthrie
0:17:28 > 0:17:31travelled with the dispossessed, going West.
0:17:33 > 0:17:36# Well, the Captain said to John Henry
0:17:36 > 0:17:39# I'm gonna bring my steam drill around
0:17:39 > 0:17:43# I'm gonna bring my steam drill out on the job
0:17:43 > 0:17:47# Gonna whup that steel on down... #
0:17:47 > 0:17:49Guthrie's style of three chords and the truth
0:17:49 > 0:17:52set the template for folk music.
0:17:52 > 0:17:55His best-known song, This Land Is Your Land,
0:17:55 > 0:18:00was a response to Irving Berlin's God Bless America.
0:18:03 > 0:18:06# As I was walking that ribbon of highway
0:18:06 > 0:18:11# I saw above me that endless skyway
0:18:11 > 0:18:15# I saw below me that golden valley
0:18:16 > 0:18:19# This land was made for you and me... #
0:18:19 > 0:18:24We listened to this song when I was in second, third grade.
0:18:24 > 0:18:26We learned it. We sang it.
0:18:26 > 0:18:29In a way, it felt very...
0:18:29 > 0:18:33..Bakersfield. Erm, very hometown for me.
0:18:33 > 0:18:36It was like a farmer singing in the open plain.
0:18:36 > 0:18:38# ..her diamond deserts
0:18:38 > 0:18:42# And all around me a voice was sounding... #
0:18:42 > 0:18:47An alternative national anthem of the heart, in a way.
0:18:49 > 0:18:54Guthrie would inspire legions of folkies, including one future poet,
0:18:54 > 0:18:58who would start his career as a Woody Guthrie disciple.
0:18:58 > 0:19:00Bob Dylan was from Minnesota,
0:19:00 > 0:19:01but that didn't stop him
0:19:01 > 0:19:05from adopting Guthrie's talking-blues twang.
0:19:05 > 0:19:07# Well, I got up and walked around
0:19:07 > 0:19:09# Up and down the lonesome town
0:19:09 > 0:19:12# Just a-wondering which way to go
0:19:12 > 0:19:15# I lit a cigarette on a parking meter and walked on down the road
0:19:15 > 0:19:17# It was a normal day
0:19:24 > 0:19:27# Well, I rung me a fallout shelter bell
0:19:27 > 0:19:29# And I leaned my head and gave a big yell... #
0:19:29 > 0:19:37It's great. I love how Bob Dylan is conversational in his delivery
0:19:37 > 0:19:41of the lyrics, which are...
0:19:41 > 0:19:44..which seem to be just something that he's doing.
0:19:44 > 0:19:48He's throwing out some, in a way, very serious,
0:19:48 > 0:19:49very cutting things.
0:19:51 > 0:19:53# Down at the corner by a hot-dog stand
0:19:53 > 0:19:57# I seen a man I said, howdy, friend, I guess there's just us two
0:19:57 > 0:20:00# He screamed and down the road he flew
0:20:00 > 0:20:02# Thought I was a Communist... #
0:20:04 > 0:20:06You have something to say,
0:20:06 > 0:20:09but you just throw it out there and keep moving.
0:20:09 > 0:20:12It's a very profound thing that he just said,
0:20:12 > 0:20:14but he's moved on to the next thing.
0:20:14 > 0:20:17And it's up to you to rewind the tape to listen to what he said
0:20:17 > 0:20:18over and over again.
0:20:18 > 0:20:20# I got into the driver's seat
0:20:20 > 0:20:23# And I drove down 42nd Street
0:20:23 > 0:20:25# In my Cadillac
0:20:25 > 0:20:28# Good car to drive after a war... #
0:20:28 > 0:20:34You're not intrigued by the flutter of his melisma, in a way.
0:20:34 > 0:20:38You're intrigued by the unfurling flower of his lyrics.
0:20:38 > 0:20:44In a way, he almost sounds like he's from Oklahoma in his delivery.
0:20:44 > 0:20:46It's very American.
0:20:46 > 0:20:48And it's, er... It's precious, in a way.
0:20:48 > 0:20:50It's precious to me.
0:20:50 > 0:20:53When I was in my teens and listening to a lot of Bob Dylan,
0:20:53 > 0:20:56I tried to write a poem about how he made me feel.
0:20:56 > 0:21:01And I said his voice reminded me of bark, of sand and corduroy.
0:21:01 > 0:21:03And all of those are, like, rough things.
0:21:03 > 0:21:07- Yeah.- And then there's the beauty of the way it all sounds, you know.
0:21:07 > 0:21:10The flow of the language and the alliteration,
0:21:10 > 0:21:12and the rhythms that he...
0:21:12 > 0:21:13..that he taps into.
0:21:13 > 0:21:16- Yeah.- So it's not just about, like, an image,
0:21:16 > 0:21:19but it's the way you tell the story as well.
0:21:21 > 0:21:23In his shape-shifting career,
0:21:23 > 0:21:26Dylan brought the art of poetry to the talking voice.
0:21:26 > 0:21:29As much as he was concerned with truth,
0:21:29 > 0:21:31he could also be equally enigmatic.
0:21:34 > 0:21:36# Early one mornin' the sun was shinin'
0:21:36 > 0:21:38# She was lyin' in bed
0:21:38 > 0:21:40# Wondering if she'd changed at all
0:21:40 > 0:21:42# If her hair was still red
0:21:42 > 0:21:46# Her folks, they sit their lives together... #
0:21:46 > 0:21:48So, if you think about Billie Holiday
0:21:48 > 0:21:51and the way that she hits pitch and swoops on one note,
0:21:51 > 0:21:53you notice it in Dylan a lot.
0:21:53 > 0:21:58He'll take something and he'll go, "Aaah!" on it. "Aaah!"
0:21:58 > 0:22:02And that swoo-oop thing there - that you find in Billie Holiday.
0:22:02 > 0:22:05# Tangled up in blue... #
0:22:05 > 0:22:08I think Tangled Up In Blue is a really good example of it.
0:22:10 > 0:22:14It's almost like singing conversation. So, suddenly,
0:22:14 > 0:22:17you find the place to put your pitch and say what you want to say.
0:22:17 > 0:22:20# But I used a little too much force
0:22:20 > 0:22:22# They drove that car as far as they could
0:22:22 > 0:22:24# Abandoned it out west... #
0:22:24 > 0:22:27These things are statements that are important,
0:22:27 > 0:22:31because it makes them seem so, because you're talk-singing them.
0:22:31 > 0:22:32The things all sit together.
0:22:32 > 0:22:35They all kind of bind together in a cluster.
0:22:35 > 0:22:39And they reinforce the message that, what I speak is the truth.
0:22:39 > 0:22:42What I speak is the truth because I'm not dressing it,
0:22:42 > 0:22:46I'm not refining it, I'm not putting some beautiful wig and Mozart on it.
0:22:46 > 0:22:49I'm just giving it to you from my heart, my naked heart,
0:22:49 > 0:22:51and that's it.
0:22:51 > 0:22:53Monsieur Cohen? Onze heures.
0:22:53 > 0:22:55Temps de vous lever.
0:22:55 > 0:22:56Merci.
0:22:59 > 0:23:02A lady journalist in Winnipeg once described him as having
0:23:02 > 0:23:04"the stoop of an aged crop picker
0:23:04 > 0:23:07"and the face of a curious little boy".
0:23:07 > 0:23:13# Suzanne takes you down to her place near the river
0:23:13 > 0:23:20# You can hear the boats go by, you can spend the night beside her
0:23:20 > 0:23:23# And you know that she's half-crazy... #
0:23:23 > 0:23:26Leonard Cohen began as a poet.
0:23:26 > 0:23:29I think music was an afterthought with him.
0:23:29 > 0:23:34I first came to his music from his novel Beautiful Losers.
0:23:34 > 0:23:38And, in fact, Lou Reed once told me that it was one of his favourite
0:23:38 > 0:23:42books, so there is a kind of continuum there.
0:23:45 > 0:23:47As a singer, he's very simple.
0:23:47 > 0:23:51And actually, as a lyricist, his imagery is pretty simple.
0:23:51 > 0:23:53He's not, er...
0:23:53 > 0:23:57as abstruse a poet perhaps as some.
0:23:57 > 0:24:01He's very of the common mind, of the common touch.
0:24:05 > 0:24:11Dylan came to poetry via the world of folk music, but for Cohen,
0:24:11 > 0:24:12it was the other way around.
0:24:12 > 0:24:15At the age of 32, he moved to New York,
0:24:15 > 0:24:17to pursue a career on the folk scene.
0:24:17 > 0:24:20There, he would have an epiphany.
0:24:20 > 0:24:23I remember saying to my lawyer...
0:24:23 > 0:24:26In a state of panic, I said,
0:24:26 > 0:24:29"I don't know what I'm doing here, I can't sing."
0:24:29 > 0:24:32And he said, "None of you guys can sing.
0:24:32 > 0:24:36"When I wanna hear singers, I go to the Metropolitan Opera."
0:24:36 > 0:24:40And I think that's more or less the position I had anyways.
0:24:40 > 0:24:41I never thought we were singers.
0:24:43 > 0:24:45I certainly never had any...
0:24:46 > 0:24:50..musical standard to, er...
0:24:52 > 0:24:53..tyrannise me.
0:24:53 > 0:24:57I thought that it was something to do with the truth.
0:24:57 > 0:25:01That if you told your story, that's what, er...
0:25:03 > 0:25:06That's what...the song was about.
0:25:06 > 0:25:09# It's true that all the men you knew
0:25:09 > 0:25:14# Were dealers who said they were through with dealing
0:25:14 > 0:25:17# Every time you gave them shelter
0:25:18 > 0:25:20# I know that kind of man
0:25:20 > 0:25:23# It's hard to hold the hand of anyone
0:25:23 > 0:25:27# Who is reaching for the sky just to surrender... #
0:25:27 > 0:25:30Leonard Cohen, a singer of song.
0:25:30 > 0:25:33The most important thing here
0:25:33 > 0:25:35is the words. The poetry.
0:25:35 > 0:25:39# And then sweeping up the jokers that he left behind
0:25:39 > 0:25:43# You'll find he did not leave you very much
0:25:43 > 0:25:44# Not even laughter... #
0:25:44 > 0:25:47It makes me lean in and listen.
0:25:47 > 0:25:49# Like any dealer he was watching
0:25:49 > 0:25:52# For the card that is so high and wild
0:25:52 > 0:25:55# He'll never need to deal another
0:25:57 > 0:26:01# He was just some Joseph looking for a manger
0:26:03 > 0:26:07# He was just some Joseph looking for a manger... #
0:26:07 > 0:26:10You always heard every word.
0:26:10 > 0:26:13There was never any kind of breath issues, you know.
0:26:13 > 0:26:16Or, you know, he never over-extended himself.
0:26:16 > 0:26:21- Yeah.- He always managed to kind of present this sort of...
0:26:21 > 0:26:24I'm not going to say it's a mask, but it's kind of a...
0:26:24 > 0:26:30..a mist before him that obscured his true self.
0:26:30 > 0:26:36# I told you when I came I was a stranger... #
0:26:36 > 0:26:40In terms of this mystery and in terms of this construct,
0:26:40 > 0:26:42- it's a cathedral. You know?- Mm-hm.
0:26:42 > 0:26:46And the voice is whoever did, you know, the gargoyles!
0:26:48 > 0:26:51# I said to Hank Williams
0:26:51 > 0:26:54# How lonely does it get?
0:26:54 > 0:26:57# Hank Williams hasn't answered yet
0:26:57 > 0:27:01# But I hear him coughing all night long
0:27:07 > 0:27:10# A hundred floors above me
0:27:10 > 0:27:14# In the Tower of Song... #
0:27:16 > 0:27:18When Leonard Cohen sings his own songs,
0:27:18 > 0:27:23you get this beautiful sense of intimacy, of, er...
0:27:23 > 0:27:25It's very sensual.
0:27:25 > 0:27:27It's very, again, very plain-spoken.
0:27:27 > 0:27:31And there's a lovely, again, sense of flow, er...
0:27:31 > 0:27:35It's not that hard-driving way that Bob Dylan does.
0:27:35 > 0:27:37- Mm-hm. - It's a little more melancholy.
0:27:37 > 0:27:40- Yes. Mm-hm.- Yeah, and there's a little more sense of finesse.
0:27:40 > 0:27:44# I was born like this, I had no choice
0:27:44 > 0:27:49# I was born with the gift of a golden voice
0:27:49 > 0:27:54# And 27 angels from the Great Beyond... #
0:27:54 > 0:27:57I just fell in love with him, with his whole world,
0:27:57 > 0:28:00with the world that he sang about, with the sound of his guitar,
0:28:00 > 0:28:01the sound of his voice.
0:28:01 > 0:28:03And, of course, those angels that he always had.
0:28:03 > 0:28:05The female singers singing behind him.
0:28:05 > 0:28:08THEY HARMONISE
0:28:10 > 0:28:12Some people say, "Oh, he couldn't really sing," or,
0:28:12 > 0:28:17"He kind of had," you know, "a mediocre voice,"
0:28:17 > 0:28:20in the sense that he just didn't have this huge range or whatever.
0:28:20 > 0:28:24- Mm-hm.- But I do feel like the tone that he started with, and certainly,
0:28:24 > 0:28:27the one that he ended up with at the end,
0:28:27 > 0:28:29which was one of the great basso profundos...
0:28:29 > 0:28:34- Mm-hm.- ..of our era, was just...astounding.
0:28:34 > 0:28:39Cohen's last album was released in October 2016,
0:28:39 > 0:28:40three weeks before he died.
0:28:42 > 0:28:44If you listen to him in his early years
0:28:44 > 0:28:48and then you come to You Want It Darker, what happens is this,
0:28:48 > 0:28:50this trajectory of down is going on.
0:28:50 > 0:28:52And when you get to the end,
0:28:52 > 0:28:55it's like a dark preacher riding into town.
0:28:55 > 0:28:58And it's, erm... Somebody said, what did they call him?
0:28:58 > 0:29:00The Velour Fog.
0:29:04 > 0:29:08# If you are the dealer, I'm out of the game
0:29:08 > 0:29:12# If you are the healer, it means I'm broken and lame
0:29:12 > 0:29:18# If thine is the glory then mine must be the shame
0:29:18 > 0:29:20# You want it darker
0:29:20 > 0:29:22# We kill the flame. #
0:29:22 > 0:29:24It's almost speech-singing at the end.
0:29:24 > 0:29:25It's almost...
0:29:25 > 0:29:27It's almost Brechtian.
0:29:27 > 0:29:31But it's got all this quality of the cantor in it as well.
0:29:31 > 0:29:35Then, of course, he's talking about candles, and redemption.
0:29:37 > 0:29:41They bind together again in this whole of
0:29:41 > 0:29:44Leonard "man who knows everything".
0:29:44 > 0:29:47You know, the confessor that you can come to,
0:29:47 > 0:29:49the person who knows your soul,
0:29:49 > 0:29:51because his soul is right there for you to see,
0:29:51 > 0:29:53right there in the voice.
0:29:55 > 0:29:57# I'm ready, my Lord. #
0:30:08 > 0:30:11In the late '60s, as Dylan and Cohen were taking off,
0:30:11 > 0:30:16a new style of rock and roll street jive was also growing in New York.
0:30:20 > 0:30:22Lou began as a poet.
0:30:22 > 0:30:28He took education from Delmore Schwartz when he was up in Syracuse.
0:30:28 > 0:30:31He always loved the printed word.
0:30:33 > 0:30:36In a sense, his music sometimes is really simple.
0:30:36 > 0:30:39He would always say that if it has more than two chords,
0:30:39 > 0:30:40it's getting complicated.
0:30:43 > 0:30:46# I don't know
0:30:49 > 0:30:52# Just where I'm going... #
0:30:59 > 0:31:02What spoke to me about Lou Reed was his bluntness.
0:31:02 > 0:31:05He's not a guy who really used a lot of metaphor.
0:31:05 > 0:31:09But the other people I was listening to, like, I would say Leonard Cohen,
0:31:09 > 0:31:14for example, very metaphoric, beautiful imagery, mysterious.
0:31:14 > 0:31:16- Yes.- Lou was not like that.
0:31:16 > 0:31:20Very frontal. He always let you know exactly where he stood.
0:31:20 > 0:31:24Some of it was his style, but some of it was that he was
0:31:24 > 0:31:27writing about violent things that happened in New York City.
0:31:29 > 0:31:31Real things that happened in the street,
0:31:31 > 0:31:33- and also writing of his time.- Yeah.
0:31:33 > 0:31:37# Paralysed by hatred and a piss-ugly soul
0:31:39 > 0:31:44# If he murdered his father he thought he'd become whole... #
0:31:44 > 0:31:47So, when I listened to Woody Guthrie and I was daydreaming
0:31:47 > 0:31:49and fantasising about being on a freight train, like,
0:31:49 > 0:31:52getting out of New York, it was a fantasy I had.
0:31:52 > 0:31:56So that was kind of what I would listen to to fuel those fantasies.
0:31:56 > 0:31:57But Lou Reed was about reality.
0:31:59 > 0:32:02# In the gay bars in the back of the bar
0:32:06 > 0:32:10# He consummated hatred on a cold sawdust floor
0:32:11 > 0:32:16# While the jukebox played backbeats, he sniffed coke off a jar
0:32:18 > 0:32:22# While they danced to a rock minuet... #
0:32:22 > 0:32:26And as his music progressed toward the end of his life,
0:32:26 > 0:32:31it was pretty much like chords, and he would be talking his music.
0:32:31 > 0:32:33# It must be nice
0:32:33 > 0:32:36# To disappear
0:32:36 > 0:32:40# To have a vanishing act
0:32:40 > 0:32:45# To always be looking forward
0:32:48 > 0:32:53# And never looking back... #
0:32:53 > 0:32:55Lou Reed's voice was so distinctive.
0:32:56 > 0:32:59It was so cool and so dry.
0:32:59 > 0:33:04That made his presentation even stronger, because he never shouted.
0:33:04 > 0:33:06He was edgy but he never yelled.
0:33:06 > 0:33:09He wasn't like some of these other punk rockers who were always, like,
0:33:09 > 0:33:10screaming into the microphone
0:33:10 > 0:33:13or using distortion to get their point across.
0:33:13 > 0:33:18Lou was always understated, dry, cool, and straight.
0:33:18 > 0:33:20He had no vibrato in his voice.
0:33:20 > 0:33:22Sometimes he wasn't even really singing.
0:33:22 > 0:33:25He wasn't projecting.
0:33:25 > 0:33:27It was just a straight, cool, dry voice.
0:33:27 > 0:33:33# How nice it is to disappear
0:33:34 > 0:33:39# Float into a mist
0:33:40 > 0:33:45# With a young lady on your arm
0:33:47 > 0:33:51# Looking for a kiss. #
0:33:51 > 0:33:53New York is the thing that seduced me
0:33:53 > 0:33:56New York is the thing that formed me
0:33:56 > 0:33:58New York is the thing that deformed me
0:33:58 > 0:34:00New York is the thing that perverted me
0:34:00 > 0:34:02New York is the thing that converted me
0:34:04 > 0:34:06And New York's the thing I love, too.
0:34:09 > 0:34:12The first time I played with Patti was at a poetry reading,
0:34:12 > 0:34:16over at St Marks on East Tenth Street,
0:34:16 > 0:34:1946 amazing years ago.
0:34:21 > 0:34:23All I did as a guitar player,
0:34:23 > 0:34:27and in those days I was a pretty simplistic guitar player,
0:34:27 > 0:34:29I haven't moved further from that,
0:34:29 > 0:34:32I would just kind of listen to her breathe.
0:34:34 > 0:34:39To follow when her delivery would slow, and then it would speed up,
0:34:39 > 0:34:41and it would rise in intensity.
0:34:41 > 0:34:44# He drove it in, he drove it home, he drove it deep in Johnny
0:34:44 > 0:34:48# The boy disappeared, Johnny fell on his knees
0:34:48 > 0:34:52# Started crashing his head against the locker... #
0:34:52 > 0:34:56So we became more into our improvisations.
0:34:56 > 0:35:00It became a way to negotiate a song.
0:35:00 > 0:35:06# When suddenly Johnny gets the feeling he's being surrounded by
0:35:06 > 0:35:10# Horses, horses, horses, horses
0:35:10 > 0:35:11# Coming in in all directions
0:35:11 > 0:35:15# White shining, silver studs with their nose... #
0:35:15 > 0:35:16And as it turned out,
0:35:16 > 0:35:20what we would do would be to segue into a song
0:35:20 > 0:35:24as the poetry reached its emotional peak.
0:35:24 > 0:35:30# Do you know how to pony like Bony Maroney?
0:35:30 > 0:35:35# Do you know how to twist? Well, it goes like this
0:35:35 > 0:35:37# It goes like this
0:35:37 > 0:35:43# Baby, mash potato, do the alligator, do the alligator... #
0:35:43 > 0:35:47There's a tradition of the talking singer.
0:35:47 > 0:35:51Do you... Do you consider yourself one of those?
0:35:53 > 0:35:54I do.
0:35:54 > 0:35:56# If you want me
0:35:56 > 0:35:57# You can find me
0:35:57 > 0:35:59# Left of centre
0:35:59 > 0:36:01# Off of the strip... #
0:36:01 > 0:36:05In the '80s, Suzanne Vega emerged from Greenwich Village
0:36:05 > 0:36:07with a cool take on the poetic voice.
0:36:07 > 0:36:09# If you want me
0:36:09 > 0:36:11# You can find me
0:36:11 > 0:36:12# Left of centre
0:36:12 > 0:36:14# Off of the strip
0:36:14 > 0:36:16# In the outskirts
0:36:16 > 0:36:17# In the fringes
0:36:17 > 0:36:19# In the corner
0:36:19 > 0:36:21# Out of the grip... #
0:36:21 > 0:36:24There's a kind of history of the talking singer.
0:36:24 > 0:36:27And you can hear it in some of the work of, like, Bertolt Brecht,
0:36:27 > 0:36:30who had the great Lotte Lenya singing.
0:36:30 > 0:36:33I happen to know for a fact that Lou Reed was influenced by
0:36:33 > 0:36:35Bertolt Brecht and Lotte Lenya,
0:36:35 > 0:36:38and she had one of those crazy voices.
0:36:38 > 0:36:40High and weird.
0:36:40 > 0:36:42And, again, very plain-spoken.
0:36:42 > 0:36:46# Show us the way to the next whisky bar
0:36:46 > 0:36:49# Oh, don't ask why
0:36:49 > 0:36:52# Oh, don't ask why
0:36:52 > 0:36:56# We must find the next pretty boy for you
0:36:56 > 0:36:59# If we don't find a nice, pretty boy
0:36:59 > 0:37:01# I tell you we must die
0:37:01 > 0:37:03# I tell you we must die
0:37:03 > 0:37:06# I tell you I tell you
0:37:06 > 0:37:08# I tell you we must die. #
0:37:08 > 0:37:12One of the first songs I wrote back in the '80s
0:37:12 > 0:37:16that became really popular was a song called Tom's Diner.
0:37:16 > 0:37:19And I used to sing it a cappella.
0:37:19 > 0:37:21An a cappella song for me is...
0:37:23 > 0:37:25One imagines it could be kind of tricky
0:37:25 > 0:37:27because I have this small voice.
0:37:27 > 0:37:28But it always worked.
0:37:28 > 0:37:31So I used to begin my shows with it.
0:37:31 > 0:37:32Singing...
0:37:32 > 0:37:37# I am sitting in the morning at the diner on the corner...
0:37:37 > 0:37:42# I am waiting at the counter for the man to pour the coffee
0:37:42 > 0:37:44# And he fills it only halfway
0:37:44 > 0:37:46# And before I even argue
0:37:46 > 0:37:51# He is looking out the window at somebody coming in. #
0:37:51 > 0:37:53And people would stop drinking and stop talking
0:37:53 > 0:37:56and they would turn around and they would watch the show.
0:37:56 > 0:37:58Suzanne Vega, especially,
0:37:58 > 0:38:03when I worked with her on her first couple of records,
0:38:03 > 0:38:06it was very interesting to see her cadences.
0:38:06 > 0:38:09How words flow.
0:38:09 > 0:38:12How they can become poetic images.
0:38:12 > 0:38:17And become...music that talks.
0:38:17 > 0:38:21MUSIC: Tom's Diner by Suzanne Vega
0:38:21 > 0:38:23On the trail of my final New York street poet,
0:38:23 > 0:38:26I'm off to a neighbourhood that is very close to my heart -
0:38:26 > 0:38:28Harlem.
0:38:33 > 0:38:36We are now at St Nick's Pub.
0:38:36 > 0:38:42This is where I got my feet, in a way, in terms of singing.
0:38:42 > 0:38:46And St Nick's pub was instrumental for me because
0:38:46 > 0:38:52the neighbourhood people come here, and pay 3.50 for a beer.
0:38:52 > 0:38:56- "Where's the CD at, man?"- Oh! It's coming, soon, soon, brother.
0:38:56 > 0:39:00# I found out on my way to Harlem
0:39:00 > 0:39:05# Ellington, you don't live 'round here
0:39:05 > 0:39:09# He moved away one day so they say
0:39:09 > 0:39:14# Away from Harlem. #
0:39:14 > 0:39:16Yeah.
0:39:16 > 0:39:19One, two, three, four...
0:39:19 > 0:39:24MUSIC: I'm New Here by Gil Scott-Heron
0:39:27 > 0:39:30# I did not become someone different
0:39:32 > 0:39:34# That I did not want to be... #
0:39:34 > 0:39:38Gil Scott-Heron combined a political voice with a poet's skill.
0:39:38 > 0:39:41His spoken word was on the money for the times,
0:39:41 > 0:39:44like a CNN for the streets of Harlem.
0:39:44 > 0:39:47# No matter how far you've gone
0:39:51 > 0:39:54# You can always turn around... #
0:39:54 > 0:39:55He had a special gift,
0:39:55 > 0:40:00his voice managed to reach back to the blues and forward to hip-hop.
0:40:00 > 0:40:03The revolution will not be televised.
0:40:06 > 0:40:08This is the original recording
0:40:08 > 0:40:10of The Revolution Will Not Be Televised.
0:40:10 > 0:40:14Gil Scott-Heron, just a voice and a couple of congas.
0:40:14 > 0:40:17# You will not be able to stay home, brother
0:40:17 > 0:40:21# You will not be able to plug in, turn on, and cop out
0:40:21 > 0:40:24# You will not be able to lose yourself on scag
0:40:24 > 0:40:26# And skip out for beer during commercials
0:40:26 > 0:40:29# Because the revolution will not be televised
0:40:29 > 0:40:31# The revolution will not be televised
0:40:31 > 0:40:33# The revolution will not be brought to you by Xerox
0:40:33 > 0:40:35# In four parts without... #
0:40:35 > 0:40:37Gil Scott-Heron was at the cutting edge of
0:40:37 > 0:40:40an African-American revolutionary consciousness
0:40:40 > 0:40:43that took a hold over poetry, art, music,
0:40:43 > 0:40:46and Black Power politics in the late 1960s.
0:40:51 > 0:40:52Is that Gregory Porter?
0:40:52 > 0:40:55Yeah, brother Brian Jackson.
0:40:55 > 0:40:56- How are you, brother? - I'm great, man.
0:40:56 > 0:41:00- Good to see you.- All right, yeah.
0:41:00 > 0:41:01Thanks for having me.
0:41:01 > 0:41:04For Gil Scott-Heron and his long-term musical partner,
0:41:04 > 0:41:08Brian Jackson, Harlem was where it was at.
0:41:08 > 0:41:14Harlem was the repository of African-American knowledge.
0:41:16 > 0:41:21Gil saw himself as someone who could verbalise those traditions.
0:41:21 > 0:41:24And that was called the griot.
0:41:24 > 0:41:30A griot is someone who can take those cultural perspectives
0:41:30 > 0:41:34and relate them to what is going on now.
0:41:34 > 0:41:39# Looking for a way... #
0:41:39 > 0:41:46Can you tell me about the timbre and tone of Gil Scott's voice?
0:41:46 > 0:41:49One of the things that I think was...
0:41:49 > 0:41:56..was so hypnotic, or compelling about Gil's tone,
0:41:56 > 0:42:01his rich baritone, was that it was kind of soothing, you know?
0:42:01 > 0:42:06Which was really important to someone who might be giving you
0:42:06 > 0:42:09some news that might be a little hard to swallow.
0:42:12 > 0:42:16Gil Scott-Heron was raised by his grandmother in Kentucky.
0:42:16 > 0:42:20And grew up hearing a lot of blues music in the house.
0:42:20 > 0:42:22It really set the bar for him
0:42:22 > 0:42:25in terms of truth telling in conversation.
0:42:25 > 0:42:27# See that black boy over there, runnin' scared
0:42:27 > 0:42:30# His ol' man's in a bottle
0:42:32 > 0:42:34# He done quit his 9 to 5
0:42:34 > 0:42:36# He drink full time
0:42:36 > 0:42:38# So now he's livin' in the bottle... #
0:42:40 > 0:42:46There's something unique to the way black Americans put trauma
0:42:46 > 0:42:49into their popular music.
0:42:49 > 0:42:54This is the sound of people who've experienced a great deal of loss,
0:42:54 > 0:42:57a great deal of pain, a great deal of violence,
0:42:57 > 0:43:01and it keeps occurring through Gil Scott-Heron
0:43:01 > 0:43:03all the way through to Kendrick Lamar.
0:43:06 > 0:43:09Originally, Winter In America was an album that we wanted to do
0:43:09 > 0:43:13as a musical novel.
0:43:13 > 0:43:15And it was about
0:43:15 > 0:43:17a vet who had come back from the war.
0:43:17 > 0:43:19And some of the trials and tribulations
0:43:19 > 0:43:22that he had experienced. But it was songs about us, really -
0:43:22 > 0:43:25it was songs about our own lives and what we experienced
0:43:25 > 0:43:29as young 20-something black men in America.
0:43:29 > 0:43:31And what we saw happening to the country,
0:43:31 > 0:43:34how it was falling down around our ears.
0:43:34 > 0:43:38# They never had a chance to go
0:43:38 > 0:43:41# Cos somebody won't know
0:43:41 > 0:43:44# Tell them it's winter... #
0:43:44 > 0:43:46You kind of saw the handwriting on the wall.
0:43:46 > 0:43:52# Nothing goes in the winter in America... #
0:43:52 > 0:43:56Gil Scott-Heron, first of all, his music hit us before he did.
0:43:56 > 0:43:59Obviously the song The Revolution Will Not Be Televised,
0:43:59 > 0:44:02a couple of other songs, as well, those were like
0:44:02 > 0:44:04what we would call hood favourites.
0:44:04 > 0:44:06# ..something wrong
0:44:06 > 0:44:08# Hate in your heart, it's winter
0:44:10 > 0:44:15# I can see you like winter in America... #
0:44:15 > 0:44:20It was beyond anything that we were getting as young people.
0:44:20 > 0:44:25This was early rap, you could even say.
0:44:25 > 0:44:28People on the street corner spitting poetry
0:44:28 > 0:44:32about their socio-political condition at the time.
0:44:32 > 0:44:36# When it come to making music and, sure enough, making news
0:44:36 > 0:44:40# People who just don't make sense and people making do
0:44:40 > 0:44:45# Seems a mass of contradictions, pulling different ways
0:44:45 > 0:44:50# Between the folks who come and go, and ones who've got to stay
0:44:50 > 0:44:54# It's a massive irony for all the world to see
0:44:54 > 0:44:59# It's the nation's capital, it's Washington DC. #
0:44:59 > 0:45:02Heron became known as the godfather of hip-hop.
0:45:02 > 0:45:05But the man himself was ambivalent.
0:45:05 > 0:45:09"I don't know if I can take the blame for rap music," he quipped.
0:45:09 > 0:45:12MUSIC: The Message by Grandmaster Flash
0:45:15 > 0:45:20Hip-hop began as a home-brew party culture, based around DJing,
0:45:20 > 0:45:23break dancing, graffiti writing, and MCing.
0:45:26 > 0:45:30Rap was new technique of talk singing, based on wordplay,
0:45:30 > 0:45:33candour, and flow.
0:45:33 > 0:45:35# It's like a jungle sometimes it makes me wonder
0:45:35 > 0:45:37# How I keep from going under... #
0:45:37 > 0:45:42The first cut of political records are Hard Times by Run DMC.
0:45:42 > 0:45:44And then, you know, The Message.
0:45:44 > 0:45:48Most of the time until The Message it was, like, an album cut.
0:45:48 > 0:45:52Melle Mel put out a record called The Message.
0:45:52 > 0:45:55"Broken glass everywhere, people pissing on the stage."
0:45:55 > 0:45:57# No, they just don't care
0:45:57 > 0:45:59# I can't take the smell, can't take the noise
0:45:59 > 0:46:00# Got no money to move out
0:46:00 > 0:46:02# I guess I got no choice
0:46:02 > 0:46:04# Rats in the front room, roaches in the back
0:46:04 > 0:46:06# Junkies in the alley with the baseball bat
0:46:06 > 0:46:08# I tried to get away, but I couldn't get far
0:46:08 > 0:46:11# Cos a man with a tow-truck repossessed my car
0:46:11 > 0:46:15# Don't push me cos I'm close to the edge
0:46:15 > 0:46:20# I'm trying not to lose my head, ah huh-huh-huh... #
0:46:20 > 0:46:23That hit us like a bolt of lightning.
0:46:23 > 0:46:25It energised us.
0:46:25 > 0:46:30Because that was the first time we really heard, in our language,
0:46:30 > 0:46:35somebody describing our socio-political condition.
0:46:38 > 0:46:40The Message was released in 1982,
0:46:40 > 0:46:44but it wouldn't be until the late '80s that rap's protest voice
0:46:44 > 0:46:46would be truly crystallised.
0:46:47 > 0:46:48# 1989
0:46:48 > 0:46:50- # The number, another summer - Get down
0:46:50 > 0:46:52# Sound of the funky drummer
0:46:52 > 0:46:55# Music hittin' your heart, cos I know you got soul
0:46:55 > 0:46:56# Brothers and sisters
0:46:56 > 0:46:58# Listen if you're missin' y'all
0:46:58 > 0:47:00- # Swingin' while I'm singin' - Hey!
0:47:00 > 0:47:01# Givin' whatcha gettin'
0:47:01 > 0:47:03# Knowin' what I know and
0:47:03 > 0:47:04# While the black bands sweatin'
0:47:04 > 0:47:06- # And the rhythm rhymes - Rollin'
0:47:06 > 0:47:07# Got to give us what we want... #
0:47:07 > 0:47:09Public Enemy came along
0:47:09 > 0:47:13and they really made it their entire reason for being.
0:47:13 > 0:47:15# We've got to fight the powers that be
0:47:15 > 0:47:17# Fight the power... #
0:47:18 > 0:47:21I guess it's Chuck who drew that incredible logo.
0:47:22 > 0:47:26The combination of the logo and then the lyrics.
0:47:26 > 0:47:28There was a visual component to it that said, you know,
0:47:28 > 0:47:30"This is what we're about philosophically."
0:47:30 > 0:47:33The entire visual spectacle that they presented
0:47:33 > 0:47:35was war about politics,
0:47:35 > 0:47:39war about social commentary, war about battling white supremacy,
0:47:39 > 0:47:41war about a kind of black nationalism.
0:47:41 > 0:47:43It was a number of stances.
0:47:43 > 0:47:45It wasn't just making a record.
0:47:45 > 0:47:46# Woop-woop
0:47:46 > 0:47:48# That's the sound of da police
0:47:48 > 0:47:49# Woop-woop
0:47:49 > 0:47:50# That's the sound of da beast
0:47:50 > 0:47:51# Woop-woop
0:47:51 > 0:47:53# That's the sound of da police
0:47:53 > 0:47:54# Woop-woop
0:47:54 > 0:47:57# That's the sound of da beast... #
0:47:57 > 0:47:59This is the trick to MCing -
0:47:59 > 0:48:02believability, it's everything.
0:48:02 > 0:48:05We're probably one of the only art forms
0:48:05 > 0:48:08that you have to actually be believed.
0:48:08 > 0:48:12Like, it's not about your rhyme, it's not about your talent.
0:48:12 > 0:48:14First, are you real? That's the first thing people want...
0:48:14 > 0:48:16Are you real?
0:48:16 > 0:48:17# Stand clear!
0:48:17 > 0:48:18# Don man a-talk
0:48:18 > 0:48:21# You can't stand where I stand, you can't walk where I walk
0:48:21 > 0:48:22# Watch out!
0:48:22 > 0:48:23# We run New York
0:48:23 > 0:48:26# Policeman come, we bust him out the park
0:48:26 > 0:48:28# I know this for a fact, you don't like how I act
0:48:28 > 0:48:30# You claim I'm sellin' crack, but you be doin' that
0:48:30 > 0:48:32# I'd rather say, see ya
0:48:32 > 0:48:33# Cos I would never be ya
0:48:33 > 0:48:35# Be a officer? You WICKED overseer!
0:48:35 > 0:48:38# Ya hotshot, wanna get props and be a saviour
0:48:38 > 0:48:40# First show a little respect, change your behaviour
0:48:40 > 0:48:43# Change your attitude, change your plan
0:48:43 > 0:48:45# There could never really be justice on stolen land
0:48:45 > 0:48:48# Are you really for peace and equality?
0:48:48 > 0:48:51# Or when my car is hooked up, you know you wanna follow me... #
0:48:51 > 0:48:54You may go down as a legendary artist,
0:48:54 > 0:48:58but the real truth of it is that you yourself know,
0:48:58 > 0:49:03to yourself when you go to bed at night, "I sang for freedom.
0:49:03 > 0:49:05"I sang for justice."
0:49:06 > 0:49:07# Woop-woop
0:49:07 > 0:49:09# That's the sound of da police
0:49:09 > 0:49:10# Woop-woop
0:49:10 > 0:49:11# That's the sound of da beast... #
0:49:11 > 0:49:13Anybody can say anything they want to say about me,
0:49:13 > 0:49:16about my music, they can rate me, they cannot buy my music,
0:49:16 > 0:49:19but I go to bed at night knowing
0:49:19 > 0:49:22that I'm the force for change and good.
0:49:22 > 0:49:27Good change. I'm the force for revolutionary thought.
0:49:27 > 0:49:29And that puts you to bed at night.
0:49:29 > 0:49:33That's... And I'm quite sure Bob Dylan sleeps well.
0:49:33 > 0:49:39MUSIC: Smells Like Teen Spirit by Nirvana
0:49:39 > 0:49:43The idea of keeping it real in the 1990s
0:49:43 > 0:49:46wasn't purely just a hip-hop notion.
0:49:46 > 0:49:50One rock band emerged whose entire ethos was based
0:49:50 > 0:49:55on frontman Kurt Cobain's ability to mirror the inner lives and feelings
0:49:55 > 0:49:56of his audience.
0:49:59 > 0:50:01- How are you?- I'm great, man, thanks.
0:50:01 > 0:50:03- Good to see you. - I'm glad to be with you.
0:50:03 > 0:50:06- Thank you.- I always felt like
0:50:06 > 0:50:12Nirvana was, like, Generation X blues, man.
0:50:12 > 0:50:16The punk rock scene that we all grew up in
0:50:16 > 0:50:21was sort of like our generation's folk music.
0:50:21 > 0:50:26The songs that we were writing and playing when we were teenagers,
0:50:26 > 0:50:29they were really emotional and direct, and political.
0:50:29 > 0:50:32There was this honesty and integrity to everything
0:50:32 > 0:50:34that we just wanted to be real.
0:50:34 > 0:50:35# ..hello, hello
0:50:35 > 0:50:39# With the lights out it's less dangerous
0:50:39 > 0:50:43# Here we are now, entertain us
0:50:43 > 0:50:44# I feel stupid... #
0:50:44 > 0:50:47Kurt is one of my favourite singers of all time,
0:50:47 > 0:50:54because he had such a beautiful tone in his voice.
0:50:54 > 0:50:56It's kind of stuck in his throat, in a way.
0:50:56 > 0:50:59# ..my libido
0:50:59 > 0:51:00# Yeah... #
0:51:02 > 0:51:04When we would record,
0:51:04 > 0:51:09you know, he was singing so hard because he felt it,
0:51:09 > 0:51:12that you'd get a couple of takes out of him and then you have to
0:51:12 > 0:51:15take a break. I think that's one of the reasons why, to this day,
0:51:15 > 0:51:18you listen to those records and it still has that same feeling,
0:51:18 > 0:51:20because it was for real, you know?
0:51:20 > 0:51:22# He's the one
0:51:22 > 0:51:26# Who likes all our pretty songs
0:51:26 > 0:51:29# And he likes to sing along
0:51:29 > 0:51:32# And he likes to shoot his gun
0:51:32 > 0:51:35# But he don't know what it means... #
0:51:35 > 0:51:41I'm pretty sure that he never had any formal training in singing.
0:51:41 > 0:51:43But I don't think he needed it.
0:51:43 > 0:51:46- He just had it.- You don't need it if you ARE at it.
0:51:46 > 0:51:50Actually, it's funny, when we were making the record Nevermind,
0:51:50 > 0:51:55he started blowing out his voice, so he went to see this vocal coach.
0:51:55 > 0:52:00And he comes back from this vocal coach and we said, "How did it go?"
0:52:00 > 0:52:02And he said, "Check this out."
0:52:02 > 0:52:05And he put this cassette in the cassette player
0:52:05 > 0:52:08of the warm-ups this guy was wanting him to do.
0:52:09 > 0:52:11And it was, like...
0:52:11 > 0:52:13# Mi, mi, mi, mi, mi, mi, mi
0:52:13 > 0:52:15# Boy, boy, boy, boy, boy. #
0:52:15 > 0:52:18And we sat and we laughed like hell as we listened to it.
0:52:18 > 0:52:20And then threw the cassette away.
0:52:20 > 0:52:23- Because it was, like, you know...- I can just see Kurt Cobain doing that.
0:52:23 > 0:52:24It didn't really, no. Yeah, no.
0:52:26 > 0:52:31In November 1993, Nirvana appeared on MTV Unplugged.
0:52:31 > 0:52:35Cobain chose to include songs by artists that had influenced him,
0:52:35 > 0:52:38including the blues number Where Did You Sleep Last Night?
0:52:41 > 0:52:48The Leadbelly song, that song is, it's a beautiful song, that's dark,
0:52:48 > 0:52:51you know? It's about heartbreak and death.
0:52:51 > 0:52:54# My girl, my girl
0:52:54 > 0:52:58# Where will you go... #
0:52:58 > 0:53:03So, when we did the song that night, we'd rehearsed it before,
0:53:03 > 0:53:06I don't know if we'd done it live before,
0:53:06 > 0:53:08but you could feel it in the room when we were doing it.
0:53:08 > 0:53:11# Where the sun don't ever shine... #
0:53:11 > 0:53:12And you could hear a pin drop.
0:53:12 > 0:53:16So, you could hear every last bubble in Kurt's throat
0:53:16 > 0:53:18as we were doing it.
0:53:18 > 0:53:21# My girl, my girl
0:53:21 > 0:53:24# Don't lie to me
0:53:24 > 0:53:29# Tell me where did you sleep last night?
0:53:31 > 0:53:34# In the pines, in the pines
0:53:34 > 0:53:37# Where the sun don't ever shine
0:53:37 > 0:53:43# I would shiver the whole night through... #
0:53:43 > 0:53:46And that's when we knew, after we were done with that, we thought,
0:53:46 > 0:53:48"OK, that worked."
0:53:48 > 0:53:50# ..where will you go
0:53:50 > 0:53:55# I'm going where the cold wind blows
0:53:57 > 0:53:59# In the pines, in the pines
0:53:59 > 0:54:04# Where the sun don't ever shine
0:54:05 > 0:54:10# I'd shiver
0:54:10 > 0:54:18# The whole night through. #
0:54:21 > 0:54:24When Kurt Cobain goes to that place,
0:54:24 > 0:54:28it's almost like the screams that you might hear in a horror film.
0:54:30 > 0:54:31Straight out of Central Casting.
0:54:31 > 0:54:35It's like, you know, we need the scream, the scream, you know?
0:54:35 > 0:54:37He almost screams in a chord.
0:54:39 > 0:54:44There's more than one note coming out when he goes to that, you know,
0:54:44 > 0:54:46that place that he goes. And it's...it's...
0:54:48 > 0:54:50It shakes you.
0:54:50 > 0:54:51And yet, it's satisfying.
0:54:53 > 0:54:54CHEERING AND APPLAUSE
0:54:58 > 0:55:02# Up in the morning
0:55:02 > 0:55:04# Out on the job
0:55:05 > 0:55:09# Work like the devil for my pay... #
0:55:12 > 0:55:17Keeping it real, writing about what you know, and where you're from,
0:55:17 > 0:55:21these are the key ingredients of the talking voice,
0:55:21 > 0:55:24but there's one other thing I've learned
0:55:24 > 0:55:27from exploring my favourite truth tellers.
0:55:27 > 0:55:33Leonard Cohen, Bob Dylan, Bessie Smith, Billie Holiday,
0:55:33 > 0:55:39these are all singers that worked within a set of limitations.
0:55:39 > 0:55:42But that didn't inhibit their ability
0:55:42 > 0:55:45to express extraordinary emotion.
0:55:45 > 0:55:50They proved you don't have to have a perfect voice to be great.
0:55:56 > 0:55:58Welcome, everybody.
0:55:58 > 0:56:01We are here, Legendary Cyphers, Union Square.
0:56:01 > 0:56:04Normally we're here every Friday night from May to November.
0:56:04 > 0:56:06As you can see, this is a special Cypher,
0:56:06 > 0:56:10we have our guests here from the BBC, my main man right here,
0:56:10 > 0:56:12Gregory Porter, you know what I mean?
0:56:12 > 0:56:14So we're going to show him what we do.
0:56:17 > 0:56:19# Party people, are you ready, ready, ready?
0:56:19 > 0:56:22# Party people, are you ready, ready, ready?
0:56:22 > 0:56:24# Party people, are you ready, ready?
0:56:24 > 0:56:25# Say hell yeah!
0:56:25 > 0:56:27# Hell yeah!
0:56:27 > 0:56:29# If you lovin' the Cypher then throw your fist up
0:56:29 > 0:56:32# If you lovin' the Cypher then throw your fist up
0:56:32 > 0:56:34# And if you lovin' the Cypher then throw your fist up
0:56:34 > 0:56:36# And say hell yeah!
0:56:36 > 0:56:37# Hell yeah... #
0:56:37 > 0:56:42To speak in the language of how we speak
0:56:42 > 0:56:47makes something, sometimes, more impressionable
0:56:47 > 0:56:52than the most flowery and imagistic poetry.
0:56:52 > 0:56:54# We do this in the spring, summer and fall
0:56:54 > 0:56:56# But we chillin' on that winter tip
0:56:56 > 0:56:57# We never been with this
0:56:57 > 0:56:59# I'm like a genius but I take it to the Genesis
0:56:59 > 0:57:02# I've been to Geneseo in my jeans again
0:57:02 > 0:57:04# I sound like...
0:57:04 > 0:57:07# I lost my memory like Wolverine and my exile to me is a game
0:57:07 > 0:57:08# You ain't seen no game
0:57:08 > 0:57:10# Stick it to the programme
0:57:10 > 0:57:11# Rip my shirt like I'm Hogan
0:57:11 > 0:57:14# And at the worst, I'm more like the Hulk, man
0:57:14 > 0:57:16# Sipping on that green juice, now, tell me what you mean... #
0:57:16 > 0:57:19I feel like...it's not so much truth telling
0:57:19 > 0:57:22in the sense of some intellectual desire to tell truth,
0:57:22 > 0:57:24it's people really writing about what they know...
0:57:24 > 0:57:27# I'm so official, you woulda thought I worked at Footlocker... #
0:57:27 > 0:57:31..and finding the poetry in that experience.
0:57:32 > 0:57:34# Got to understand, the way to try and defeat me
0:57:34 > 0:57:36# Never that
0:57:36 > 0:57:37# Understand the way this got to be
0:57:37 > 0:57:38# Shout-out to the people
0:57:38 > 0:57:41# Understanding's a starter, it's a slaughter
0:57:41 > 0:57:43# Shout-out to the homie Gregory Porter
0:57:43 > 0:57:44# You gotta understand, man
0:57:44 > 0:57:45# I'm not a sinner
0:57:45 > 0:57:48# And by the way, he's a Grammy award-winner...
0:57:48 > 0:57:50# Tell 'em how you spitting Nina Simone to boot
0:57:50 > 0:57:52# I'm getting tired of seeing my brothers
0:57:52 > 0:57:54# Hanging from them strange fruits... #
0:57:54 > 0:57:59I noticed in a lot of modern music, the words are very...
0:57:59 > 0:58:02..they're very of the moment, and I like that.
0:58:02 > 0:58:07Because it preserves the speech patterns of the time,
0:58:07 > 0:58:12as, in some ways, the speech patterns of Appalachian English
0:58:12 > 0:58:16balladry were transmitted over the seas
0:58:16 > 0:58:20and took root in the mountains of North Carolina.
0:58:20 > 0:58:22# Take it over
0:58:22 > 0:58:25# I hear the humming in the back, he 'bout to take it off...
0:58:25 > 0:58:27# Everything you touch is gold
0:58:27 > 0:58:29# I'm in love with your soul
0:58:29 > 0:58:31# Everything that you're saying is
0:58:31 > 0:58:33# Oh-h
0:58:33 > 0:58:36# I love yo-o-ou
0:58:36 > 0:58:37# Mama always said
0:58:37 > 0:58:40# Money lasts forever so I'm better well-bred
0:58:40 > 0:58:42# I love you
0:58:42 > 0:58:45# So watch, I'll catch the come-up
0:58:45 > 0:58:48# As your chief-in-commander that flies over the desert
0:58:48 > 0:58:51# Lost souls and minds that reflect something deeper... #
0:58:51 > 0:58:53The talking voice,
0:58:53 > 0:58:56that voice that places high value on the lyric,
0:58:56 > 0:59:02on the words that he or she is trying to communicate.
0:59:02 > 0:59:03Make some noise for them.
0:59:03 > 0:59:05THEY CHEER
0:59:07 > 0:59:11# Magnified, sanctified, be thy holy name
0:59:11 > 0:59:15# Vilified, crucified, in the human frame
0:59:16 > 0:59:19# A million candles burning for the love that never came
0:59:21 > 0:59:22You want it darker
0:59:24 > 0:59:25# We kill the flame. #