File under: R&B Danny Baker's Great Album Showdown

Welcome, everyone, and thank you for joining me

on what is an improbable, impossible,

even impish musical quest that I hope you'll enjoy.

This tumultuous plate, this two ounces of black plastic with a hole in the middle,

is one of the noblest, nuttiest creations

in the field of human achievement.

It's an LP.

To extend those initials further, it's an R&B LP.

Are you confused, kids? Allow me and a suitably hip gaggle of soul-searchers be your guides,

as we examine the rhythm-and-blues long-player

and why it sits at the centre of our lives. I feel good.

-# One, two

-# Ah, freak out

# Le freak, c'est chic

# Freak out

# Ah, freak out

-# Le freak, c'est chic

-# Freak out #

Barely 15 years old, my first job was in a record shop, a real one,

not just sitting on the till

but expected to know my stuff, as a great chef would know his ingredients.

Now, in our shop, we sold a lot of what I'm frankly calling 'black music'.

ZZ Hill, Ohio Players, Luther Ingram...

Talk about your labour of love.

It is possible that R&B albums run deeper than any other sounds committed to wax.

I'm joined by vinyl freak, soulman and club DJ

since before George Clinton reached for his hair colour,

-there's Trevor Nelson!

-LAUGHTER

Over there, with a voice to die for

and then a back catalogue to resurrect the spirit,

she's surely Britain's finest soul and gospel singer,

here's Mica Paris.

And also, Motown aficionado, vinyl archivist,

selfless seeker of the dance-floor groove,

oh, and now pretty-boy big-shot international film-star

-Martin Freeman!

-Hello.

Welcome, everyone. Little settling question...

What would you say is the first R&B album you bought with your own money?

Oh! Own money...

-I went into Our Price records...

-Yes.

..and I bought, this is no lie,

Roy Ayers Lifeline album, with that brilliant track Running Away on it.

Went home, it was shrink-wrapped, opened it all excited,

out popped a country and western album!

I ran back to the shop on the 73 bus, didn't run, got the 73 bus, and they had none left

-so I got The Best of Earth, Wind & Fire.

-OK.

-The red one?

-Yes, The Best of Earth, Wind & Fire.

-Mica?

-My very first record, with my own pocket money that I saved up,

-was Tom Browne - Funkin' for Jamaica.

-Oh!

I can't tell you... That record, I wore it out,

I mean, played it till it was warped, scratched, everything.

When the first two trumpet notes come in, you're gone!

-Gone!

-Solid gold.

-Martin?

-Erm, on the R&B side of things,

it would've been Beggars Banquet Records in Kingston,

20 Motown Mod Classics, with a big target on the front.

So old Motown records from '63, '64...

-Of course.

-..that the original Mods would've been digging.

I'm probably the same as you. It'd be Motown Chartbusters Vol 3,

-with that cover that was like a starburst.

-Yes!

-It was silver.

-I've got that! That's brilliant!

-And also, What Is Soul. There's a lot to be said for those old Motown compilations.

-Yes.

The term "R&B" can mean different things to different generations,

and thus leads to brusque language, fruity dancing

and strange looks!

"Good evening. Do not attempt to adjust your radio. There is nothing wrong.

"We have taken control as to bring you this special show.

"We will return it to you as soon as you are grooving."

RECORD SCRATCHES

So, what is rhythm and blues?

Is it the result of some kind of musical alchemy which combines rhythm and emotion

and filters it through the African-American experience, some say mojo?

-Well, if it is...

-# The moment I wake up...

..it's in the soulful sound of Aretha Franklin...

# Before I put on my makeup... #

..it's in BB King's guitar Lucille...

..and Stevie Wonder gives it off in waves.

MUSIC: "Living For The City" by Stevie Wonder

Ah, man! You're talkin' about funk!

And Bootsy's quite right to use the F-word when describing it.

Prince screams it.

R&B artists have produced some of the most wonderfully pleasurable, innovative

and inspirational albums of the last 50 years.

Brother Ray and his seminal song What'd I Say

kicked off a golden age of R&B,

and with his album Let's Get It On,

"Distant Lover" Marvin Gaye seemed to refine it to perfection.

The church of R&B astonished and seduced millions all over the world

through continual reinvention.

MUSIC: "Paid In Full" by Eric B & Rakim

And in this church,

the hymn book...

..was the vinyl LP.

MUSIC: "Everything Is Everything" by Lauryn Hill

Trevor, what do you reckon? Can you define it?

It's a slippery old concept saying anything comes under an umbrella,

but it seems to me R&B can actually have parameters.

-Do you reckon?

-I think it's all of the above on that clip, all of that,

from even Jimi Hendrix to Prince

to Michael Jackson to hip-hop.

But I remember going on Radio 1, my first show,

and I used the term R&B, because Americans have never stopped using it, we don't...

In the '90s, we liked to say soul or swing,

but we didn't say R&B in this country that much.

And so I got all these angry letters. I played Fugees Killing Me Softly. "That's not R&B! That's blasphemy!"

I thought, "This is going to be awkward"

because every generation treats that term differently, I believe.

What R&B is not to me -

it's easier to say what it's not - it's not dance music.

The problem I have right now, a lot of people are saying R&B is the four-to-the-floor dance scene,

but I think anything from Usher to Sam Cooke, anything from, you know,

anything that's got that gospel, bluesy rhythm...

Can you detect it, though?

In a blind testing, could you say "Yes, that's got soul"?

I think you can, and I think you have to be a fan to be able to do it.

But I don't like trying to define R&B

-because it's just a marketing term now, unfortunately.

-Yes.

That's what it is. It's like rock'n'roll. Try and define rock'n'roll.

When you've got a ballad going on, I'm thinking, "Is that rock?" and someone says, "Yes."

What I was going to say, when you think about the root of it,

like, where I go with it is more this...

There was a moment where gospel music suddenly changed

because what happened was, these singers came from church

and decided to keep the same style of music

-but change the lyric.

-Yes.

So this is really where it came out, you know, organically. It came that way.

That's why there was so much feeling, because it was coming from gospel in the beginning.

To be fair, they all said "We want to earn a few dollars."

Think about James Brown, Chuck Berry, Little Richard,

these guys were basically taking the same sound in church,

which was inspirational music, and putting different lyrics on it.

Are you putting a period on R&B? Are you saying it's only of a certain decade?

No, not at all. What I'm saying, the way it evolved,

it evolved in a way that...

You could go back to Scott Joplin if you're going to go back to ragtime.

It still came from the church first and then it evolved.

And then what started to happen is, they kept the music very similar to church music

but just changed the lyric.

-We're not going to get bogged down in the semantics and historics.

-Not at all.

But something like St James Infirmary,

which is a set of both crooners and great soul singers, it's actually a song from London!

It was written about St James and it was a street song.

You just take your roots from wherever you like.

Martin, not that you need to qualify any bona fides,

but someone could sit with you and only find out at the end you do a bit of acting.

-You love the music. It is what I first knew about you.

-I adore music, yes.

From the age of five or six, it was the thing that I wanted to do.

I'm not good enough at it, but I'm a big appreciator of it.

And in terms of R&B, you empathise with it.

Yes, I mean, because I started buying R&B and soul, I suppose,

once I'd already bought ska and punk and 2 tone and reggae.

So it came to me at a bit of a left turn from that,

as a sort of Mod thing, I suppose. It was in that sort of tradition.

Did you seek out the originals? You bought compilations, but did you go, "I need the authentic stuff"?

I wanted albums. And then after a while, I wanted the original first press.

Then I got more snobby about that.

-Now I'm a bit older, I think, "I don't really care."

-Oh, I do!

-It's a lot of fun, all that!

-It is. But you need a few bob to do it, as well.

When you're first buying records, you get it wherever you can.

Is there a voice that sang from the vinyl that made you think,

"This ain't The Who"?

With all due respect, "This ain't Chicory Tip."

What was your Damascene moment in terms of R&B? What was the voice that sang to you first?

Probably Marvin Gaye overall. Probably.

There were lots.

R&B - wasn't it coined in the late '40s by Jerry Wexler, allegedly?

This is before Ray Charles came through.

-There was already that jump-jive sort of pre-rock'n'roll sound.

-That Chuck Berry thing...

-Of course.

-We'll get into our various stories about it, like old fishermen, later on,

about albums and stuff.

I'm changing my first selection as you spoke there,

because one of the albums I brought shows it ain't all about funky horns

and it's not even about what you consider to be groove music,

but it's one of the great soul albums which has an explanation of church roots...

-Bill Withers Live At Carnegie Hall.

-I nearly brought that!

He explains about grandma's hands and does a bit of gospel singing,

then switches to an acoustic guitar, as James Taylor would, but there's something else there.

-I'm going to bung that up there - a live soul album.

-Excellent choice.

Bill Withers Live At Carnegie Hall.

-I get to choose first, now you're all choked!

-It's brilliant!

There are many questions posed in song -

Anthony Newley "What Kind of Fool Am I?,

-Tom Jones

-"What's Thing Called, Love?"

but it was Ben E King who asked the big one in 1967 when he said, "What Is Soul?"

It's a question still worth pondering.

If the Devil really does have all the best tunes,

then the Lord undoubtedly has the most soulful singers.

-# I say a little prayer...

-# For you #

The church was at the root of Sam Cooke, Marvin Gaye and Aretha Franklin's singing careers,

not least because their fathers were all preachers.

-# This is my prayer, yeah #

-# Answer my prayer #

GOSPEL SINGING

When Ray Charles took the passion of the church and used it to praise a woman

on his album Hallelujah I Love Her So,

it was considered sacrilegious.

# That's because

# I've got a woman

# Way over town... #

This song, I Got A Woman, based on the hymn It Must Be Jesus,

would kick-start modern soul as we know it.

-# Respect yourself

-# Da-da, da-da-da

-# Respect yourself #

-# Hee-hee-hee-hee #

Although deep-rooted in gospel, The Staple Singers helped modernise the form

with their irresistible hymns of self-empowerment...

..their finest collection being the 1972 album Be Altitude.

# All I'm asking

# Is for A little respect When I come home #

"Respect" was a message which chimed with the times,

and not only with black audiences.

Otis Redding's classic 1965 album, Otis Blue,

showed that sometimes, soul music could cross the colour line.

# I let you do these things... #

When Aretha joined Atlantic Records in 1967,

she also knew that her soulful, richly emotional voice

could reach a mass audience.

With her record I Never Loved a Man (The Way I Love You)

she truly delivered.

# ..the way that I...

# ..I loved... #

But I remember my sister, who wasn't a big R&B fan,

she was a pop fan - and there's a fine line in that -

she bought Age of Atlantic, a sampler on Atlantic Records,

which had everybody on it - they were just names to me then -

but the first time I heard When A Man Loves A Woman,

I just thought, "That voice don't sound like

the fella's going on cabaret circuit any time soon."

-It turned out he did!

-Yes!

But there is something in that groove.

We can get into the question of

"Is it race? Is it authentic? "Can blue men sing the whites?" all of that later on,

-but I remember hearing that and thinking, "He sounds like he means it."

-Yes.

-This is what I'm trying to tell you about the gospel thing.

-You've summed it up.

You can't sing the song without affecting the people.

All the emotion comes out because it's all about inspiration.

And they took that and brought it into popular culture, which was great!

That's why it sounded different. It wasn't just a hook.

It wasn't just, "Let's all sing along." It was like...

-Wow.

-You can hear Mica Paris at 16 singing that in a church!

-Bootlegs are available!

-You could!

You can hear that music everywhere, but you couldn't give it away

-because of the gospel tag, unfortunately.

-It's funny.

-The greatest singers on this planet are all gospel singers.

-That's the root.

Like, Aretha did secular music, so the moment they went against the grain with their parents,

that's the moment the world got really exposed.

If you think about Otis Redding and all those cats,

they were really upsetting their community by doing that.

When they decided to put these secular lyrics onto these church tunes,

-they were getting...

-They were selling out.

Also, from the other end of the spectrum,

some of the saltier versions of the songs they used to do late at night,

they didn't belong in the church!

Mica, let me come to you with the idea of,

we've decided from whence it came, the roots and all that,

but what makes an album?

It's a hard thing, and there aren't that many, in any genre, perfect albums.

Do you have any where you say, "That's a quintessential R&B album?"

There was a moment in music, or a time,

where every album was a full album,

where it was a journey that you started

and you went through a whole journey on the album to the end.

Convinced yourself the lousy tracks were good!

It wasn't even like that. Literally, it was a journey.

Most of the artists when they made their albums,

they had nothing.

Most of them were really broke. That's all they had. So the stories were really rich.

There wasn't that pressure to, "You must record at a certain time."

-This was their life.

-You couldn't have known that at the time.

You knew that you didn't want to take it off. It was a journey.

You couldn't let it go. You played an album from start to finish.

That's what was different, because it was a journey.

Whereas now, it's all about...

If someone gets in a car and they're playing their own mix tape,

when I hear things out of sequence I think, "That doesn't go there!"

-Exactly!

-It hits at my DNA!

-They were very conscious of that.

If you listen to Stevie, you knew it was a storyboard.

It was starting from somewhere and evolving somewhere else.

I remember reading about Michael Jackson, as well, when he made Off The Wall,

his first thing that he said to Rod Temperton and Quincy was,

he wants every single song to be incredible.

This is the level that most artists were at,

-R&B artists.

-Trying to be at.

-They were back then.

But back then, they were achieving that,

whether it was Earth, Wind & Fire, Isley Brothers,

-every single album, you didn't take it off.

-No, you didn't.

It's sometimes more about you than it is the artist.

I think that's right,

and I think there was a period that I would argue,

tentatively, because I'm 41 and a 16 year old could show me a load of music I don't know,

but I think you could argue that there was something in the water between '64 and '75.

There was something special going on.

But at the same time, when you're young,

the fewer records you have, you've got less choice.

Sorry to cut in, but something you just said was interesting,

that the period, '60...?

-Four to '75.

-What was happening in the world?

-Indeed.

That said, and it's not something particularly R&B, it's true of all of that,

that era in recorded music when the album was there,

and we mustn't shy away from this

because the default position is to say, "The kids today, it's just as good"

it might not have been... Nobody would argue when Charlie Parker was blowing, that's happening now.

There were times when stuff was rubbish!

There can be a magical time and all of these things being pulled from the air,

because pop culture didn't exist before and then it did.

But there was a political thing happening at that time.

There was loads going on.

Artists, you know, from Gil Scott-Heron to whoever,

they were vocal about what was going on.

We had two massive things going on. We had the Vietnamese War

and we had Civil Rights in America. We're talking about America, obviously.

When you look back and you look for politics and political viewpoints -

How would you have filtered that?

OK, so I can honestly say when I bought an album,

you know what was going on in my mind? Economics.

If you buy one single, two singles, three singles... Hang on, you can afford an album!

So I'd buy albums based purely on, "There are at least three good songs. I'll have that."

That's how I started. I'm not going to be pretentious

and say, "I bought albums because they were themed."

And then I caught onto the fact that "This has got a theme."

I want to say something else. It was funny, because when I was younger,

and these same albums, I was hearing through my dad's records,

when I used to hear them, my thing was

"I really want to be there".

I was so obsessed with American black music

that I was like, "How do they do it?"

You were reading the back of the linear notes. You were like, "Who played the triangle?"

You know what I'm saying? It was more than just saying every album was fantastic.

There was a kind of looking up to these amazing artists.

"How do they do this?" coming from the UK as a black person.

Then as saying we know what a great album is,

I want to think about the opposite kind.

Can you detect the BS when someone tries it on? We'll get round to that in a second.

Since the beginning of recorded time, R&B performers have been making the albums that move us,

and I mean move us out of our chairs and onto the dance floor.

The old "getting up just to get down..."

By the early '60s, the balance between the rhythm and the blues

swung increasingly towards the former,

as certain R&B acts decided to get "uptight" and indeed "out of sight".

Ike and Tina Turner made some of the most wildly energetic records of the period.

This rendition of It's All Gonna Work Out Fine

gives just a hint of why she could knock your socks off.

MUSIC: "It's All Gonna Work Out Fine" by Tina Turner

FUNK MUSIC

James Brown...

The 1963 album Live at the Apollo

showed Brown as the unstoppable showman.

The following year, a new number - Out of Sight -

revealed Brown the musical revolutionary.

With its syncopated upbeat, James Brown revealed a brand-new groove

which would take funk to the next level.

It was called The One.

-One, two, three, four.

-STEADY FUNK BEAT

One, two, three... And you hit on the one. One!

You know? One! You know?

# We want the funk

-# Give up the funk #

-Bootsy Collins, of Parliament Funkadelic,

was one of the greatest funk players to develop Brown's sound

and explode the dance floors.

# ...give up the funk #

By the late 1970s, Earth, Wind & Fire raised the game again, and their bank balance,

with their brilliant million-selling album "I Am"...

# Boogie wonderland... #

..which mixed funk, disco and those jumpsuits.

MUSIC: Stayin' Alive by Bee Gees

But the commercial high-water mark of dance music came in 1977

when three brothers, born in Britain,

wrote a film score in pretty much one weekend.

# ..I'm a woman's man No time to talk

# Music loud and women warm... #

With Saturday Night Fever,

the Bee Gees inspired the world to dance,

sometimes unconvincingly.

And there you have it.

You see, I really don't dance.

-Come on.

-No, it's sinful. It is the way I do it, anyway.

-You don't dance well, Danny?

-I don't. I never dance.

That's because your brain is getting in the way!

-Exactly!

-I think I dance really, really good

-but everyone else doesn't.

-You do!

-Nobody else thinks so.

By the end of the show, I may give us a snatch of it.

But you look like a fella who never lets his left hip know what his right's doing.

-Are you a dancer?

-I used to be. I used to love clubbing and dancing.

-I really used to love it.

-I love it. Oh, gosh...

-But I think partly age, partly being a dad...

-Dignity.

..partly fame. Genuinely.

-Really?

-If people are already looking at you in a club,

your paranoia kicks in and you think,

"If I throw some shapes, they'll think I'm showing off."

And people have said that. "He's got to draw more attention to himself by getting down."

All right, you're indoors, you're safe, the windows and doors are locked...

-You're talking my language.

-..what particular dance album would you reach for,

dance R&B album,

that actually kicks in the groove from the beginning?

Listen to the Music by Isley Brothers.

-Their version of Listen to the Music, erm...

-Yes.

-What's their names?

-The Doobie Brothers.

-Their version is disgusting! It's amazing.

-It's just foul.

-Filthy, dirty, junkyard beast.

It's wonderful.

I feel it but I'd be lying if I said I swing a nonstop shoe. I don't.

And yet, that is almost the raison d'etre of so much R&B.

How do you stand, and what are the classic R&B great dance acts and albums?

First of all, you have to go with Earth, Wind & Fire

because they just...

You cannot put that on without moving.

Everything just starts to... without you even trying.

And then Rock With You, Michael Jackson, ridiculous!

You put that on and it's over!

Superstition, Stevie Wonder... They're so infectious

that you just can't stop yourself from moving.

It's funny how many of the people are drummers. That explains a lot.

Marvin Gaye drums on his albums.

-Barry White drummed on his album.

-Stevie's a brilliant drummer.

Earth, Wind & Fire, Maurice White was the drummer. Stevie Wonder...

I would say, talking about dance, R&B acts,

-I'd say Chic, without a doubt.

-For sure!

-Chic, without a doubt.

-Tommy Thompson, the drummer...

They gave that to Diana Ross, they gave it to other people.

Even a terrible turn like Sheila And B Devotion,

when they wrote Spacer for her, those fellas were too profligate!

-Did they ever make a great album, though?

-Chic did, I think. I think they made a decent second.

-What's the black and white one where they're all '20s?

-Risque.

Let's go back to the VT, James Brown.

-When the doors are locked in my flat...

-Come on! Insane!

..and I agree with Martin, being a DJ it's very difficult to dance.

You go to a club and see hundreds of people dancing,

but the DJ looks like a bit of a prat if he's going...

Trevor, I've got to say something! When I see you up there DJing,

I just don't understand how he keeps so still!

Me, I'm just like...

-I'm going for it!

-It's restrictive! It's like torture.

The last thing you want to do is move because people are looking at you.

I know.

But there is a release, without examining too closely the effect of -

I suppose it's legitimate - the effect these albums and sounds can have on people

because, in my limited experience when I was a DJ in the '80s in pubs,

something like Boogie Wonderland, if you will,

that drumroll as it begins, it goes "Brr-ram-dam-dam-da-da!"

-and just watching the room lift up, that's enough.

-It's over!

It's interesting what you were saying about being paranoid -

and don't get me wrong, it might be going on in my head when I'm in public - I can't though.

Music is so powerful to me that I don't even care!

-I've got a drink in my hand and I'm going for it!

-It's so much easier for girls!

Do you think an R&B album can sustain being relentlessly dance-driven?

-Chic pretty much went for that.

-No, I don't think a really good R&B album

can be relentlessly dance-driven nowadays.

In the past, certainly. I think Chic were great, but even they had mellow moments.

They had subtle moments.

I think it's kind of boring if it's all dance.

It's a dance record then, isn't it? It's not an R&B record!

The reason I like talking about James Brown, James just never finished a record.

-James is in there and he's making it up as he goes along.

-I love it.

You think, "What a groove he's got! But what crap lyrics he's put on there."

Or "What great lyrics, but..." THEY ALL TALK AT ONCE

That's it, and I believe it's core to what we're saying.

When you've got an album like that, without bringing the dreary student to it,

you would look and think, "Oh, Fred Wesley..."

-"Oh, that's who they are!"

-Right.

All right, he copyrighted all of it, but you suddenly started looking and thinking

"These aren't just slung together."

-Literally the craft in them...

-The layering and everything...

Seeing Bootsy actually rehearsing, something like Earth, Wind & Fire,

you can't imagine they're in their street clothes making this record

as much as The Beatles putting Sgt Pepper together.

You think it's a jam. You're thinking, "They've just thrown that together."

-That was rehearsed. It's crazy.

-I'd say polished.

Can I just say something? And you were there, being the elder statesman...

-It's like we're going round in ages!

-Stay over there!

Disco did kind of kill the R&B album, that disco era,

because if you look back and you look at some of the great artists,

not so much Stevie because he was a genius

and he managed to still do Hotter than July

when everyone else around him - Curtis and those guys, Marvin was struggling a bit -

-all of them were struggling a bit.

-Fallen off.

-Yes, because of disco.

And it kind of killed the R&B album for a little while.

Donna Summer took it to... Bless her heart.

Curtis Mayfield did a disastrous kind of disco-y album and made Sweet Exorcist.

It's enough to be an R&B artist. You don't have to bandwagon-jump.

And James Brown did a couple of real stinkers!

A lot did go wrong in the '80s, to be fair.

-Man alive, absolutely.

-In every kind of conceivable way.

I'm all for expunging it from the record book!

For R&B, definitely!

That's what happens when a new style comes in.

-When a new style is coming in -

-I don't like new styles.

When a new genre's coming in and you have that little overlap, there's always a weird period.

But the authenticity and roots should always be rediscovered.

Somebody who did lose their way, and never found their way back, is my second selection.

Somebody whose albums were crafted, she used to listen to producers,

and they're virtually concept albums - Millie Jackson.

Made two albums in the early '70s -

Caught Up and Still Caught Up.

Unfortunately, her reputation after that, when she was on album covers on the toilet... Sorry, folks!

But nothing can take away from these albums. I'll choose the second one.

Millie Jackson's Still Caught Up is a vocal performance par excellence.

She interprets on this and it's a wonderful story.

-It's a concept album. That's my second.

-Can I have a look?

-Sadly, disco came along and...

-Ruined her.

-Well, she went after the fast buck.

The greatest R&B is often lyrically very expressive,

eternally truthful, agonisingly personal,

generic and yet profound.

It is called soul for a reason.

# Mother, mother... Thank you!

# There's too many of you crying #

Black musicians have often used their music to comment on the times.

But the greatest of them took the particular and made it universal.

# There's far too many

-# Of you dying... #

-# Brother, brother... #

In the early 1970s, Marvin Gaye was moved by his brother Frankie's experiences in Vietnam,

along with wider ecological concerns,

to produce his passionate masterpiece What's Going On.

# Father, father... #

"If you want to send a message, call Western Union."

That's a cynical adage that, thankfully, countless R&B artists have ignored.

# A change is gonna come

# Oh, yes it will #

Even with an unpromising vehicle, the musical results could be spectacular.

"This dude is bad!

"And he ain't just fly,

"he's super fly! Yeah!"

# ..bad machine, super cool Super mean... #

Curtis Mayfield's score for Blaxploitation move Super Fly

definitely explored the moral pitfalls of inner-city life.

# I'm your pusherman

# I'm your pusherman #

Poet Gil Scott-Heron

already knew how to harness the power of the spoken word.

His first studio album, Pieces of a Man,

not only announced the arrival of an authoritative performer,

but also offered an early blueprint for rap.

# You will not be able to lose yourself on skag

# And skip out for beer during commercials

# Because the revolution Will not be televised #

Black performers from successive generations

have used the mental and physical space an album affords to push the music on.

MUSIC: "Fight The Power" by Public Enemy

-# Fight the power #

-# Let me hear you say... #

Public Enemy's third album, Fear of a Black Planet,

took the force of James Brown's "Say It Loud I'm Black and I'm Proud"

and retooled it as a comment on racism in the '90s.

# Fight the power

# Fight the power #

Trevor, you touched on it earlier on,

when did you actually realise,

"I'm not just going to wear this as a mask of, er,

"politics and comment",

but this stuff has suddenly switched from

"everything's uptight and out of sight" to, you know...?

For me, my first school disco, I was DJing - that was my first gig ever -

and the last song I played was Let's Get It On.

To me, that was R&B. Let's Get It On. Love song.

-You know...

-I'm aware of the secret language there!

I jumped down, had my first dance, singing it into the girl's ear! Didn't work.

I thought it was love songs and a bit of dancing.

And then I started really listening to, like, Gil Scott-Heron.

"Who is this man?" The Revolution Will Not Be Televised, B-Movie...

He was talking stuff that was very American

and I couldn't relate to as a teenager, but I knew the politics.

-James Brown's Say It Loud I'm Black and I'm Proud...

-Yes!

Massive tune at the time.

-But again, America.

-Yes.

So as a black kid growing up in Hackney -

it was a lovely place -

"What's the problem over there?!"

Marvin's What's Going On,

which I never thought of as such a political song,

I thought, "Lovely song." But you start listening...

Stevie Wonder then started politicising, as well.

The best artists have a knack of lulling you in and not being political to your ears.

-You just listen to it and go, "That's a beautiful song."

-Yes.

Then, like a girl, you start listening to the lyrics!

Because I was a beat man!

I started thinking, "This is so powerful."

So it was probably around the age of about 19, 20,

just coming out of adolescence, I really started listening to the politics of R&B

and realising that there were moments in time that were captured on vinyl

that were absolutely priceless and historical.

And they are now. We're still talking about them.

As a black bloke yourself, did you feel possessive about that?

You hear a bloke like me saying, "Oh, yeah, Back to the World, Curtis Mayfield..."

"There is, without prejudice, a connection that I have that you wouldn't have."

Oh, just as a black man.

And I think the South African situation...

-Yes.

-..which was put to music most powerfully...

-Johannesburg.

-Johannesburg!

And Marley did, as well. Zimbabwe and things like that...

It was different for me. The only reason I was conscious about it was because of my parents.

My father, especially, because he was a proper music collector.

So he got me into...

-..the whole political thing with Gil Scott-Heron.

-Right.

When he put that on, I couldn't have been more than 12,

I remember hearing it, going

"Wow! This guy's really angry!" I remember saying that!

And then my dad went through the whole thing and explained.

But it can go the other way, you see.

-An outfit like The Last Poets, which I used to sell a lot of...

-Yes!

-..the Last Poets didn't have

-that

-going on under them.

I know it's shallow, but I could never really empathise with them

-because that was hard-line.

-Yes.

But Gil Scott-Heron might've had just as much of a hard-line lyric

-but the melodies are better.

-Yes.

-That's exactly what I'm saying.

It's like Lennon said about Imagine, "You need to give people sugar."

You can't just beat people over the head with it.

There's nothing wrong with a bit of sugar.

But when you think, you know, as historians now,

you think that came in, because it seemed just after the hippies and everything else...

-Early '70s.

-The very early '70s. Probably What's Going On...

The Stax period, there was this, erm,

you know, when Martin Luther King was assassinated,

I took a trip to Memphis and the old Stax Museum and stuff,

I heard the story of Steve Cropper and got to meet David Porter and Isaac Hayes, rest in peace,

and they were telling me about the day they found out

and what it meant to Memphis and...

-It's different for us because we've always imported our soul music.

-That's right.

It's difficult for a kid to really connect.

You can talk about it. And some of the biggest soul fans were white in this country.

The people who owned all the fanzines were white. They were writing about -

I think most people are staggered to find out

-a good deal of the Stax musicians were white.

-Of course they were.

I tell you what, Danny,

the first time I truly could say I lived through a connection was hip-hop.

-That happened in the '80s.

-Really?

What do you mean when you say connection?

There was a birth of a movement while I was,

you know, 15, 16.

-Young enough to get it.

-Young enough to be right there.

I think it makes a big difference if you're there.

-Really?

-I really do.

-I disagree with that,

only from the standpoint that it's all about where you were brought up.

With me, because my father was so conscious,

my dad was really on-point with that,

-so we got the drilling from when we were 12.

-Mm.

As I said, it was Gil, then it was Curtis, then Marvin.

He would go through each album and say, "This is what's happening in America."

-He was hard-core.

-Like a professor!

-He was.

He was my introduction to music. He's the reason I began to sing.

Nobody could be overwhelming in that because you cannot stop your toes tapping

and feeling, "I know I should be more dedicated to this" rather like in punk rock,

some of the best songs had love lyrics,

do you then go through that phase and come out the other side - the politicising - thinking,

-"That was a stage of my life but I find that hard to listen to?"

-Yes!

Can you listen now and think, "Sounds a bit..."

I've got an album in my box right now we're going to probably talk about at some point,

that I say I can only listen to on certain days,

when I'm in a certain mood.

That's what makes me wonder, "Is it one of my classic albums?"

-I think a classic album should be listened to at any time of the day.

-At any time.

We'll refer to the Wall of Sound. You've all got three with you.

-But also... Sorry.

-Go on.

The classic album thing,

half your brain goes, "What's an important album? but half goes, "What do I like?"

If you're being really honest, it's only personal,

-all art is only personal.

-Absolutely.

That's what this programme is about.

-Even if it's not a cool album...

-"What did it do to you?"

-Just be honest.

-It's a lot more scary to be honest

because you'll have uncool things in there.

I could sing in the bath, if you can get that vision out of your mind,

I have no connection to it, but I can sit in the bath going

# A boy is born In hard-time Mississippi... #

completely divorced from what he's saying.

The problem is, when you see another artist sing those songs now,

it's like he's divorced from it, as well!

When you hear McCartney doing Blackbird you think, "You know you wrote this?"

Sometimes it becomes cabaret. It becomes showbiz. It's scary when that happens.

And all of this is part of the trudge towards the grave...

Oh, don't...!

Just as rock musicians in the late '60s looked at the album to stretch themselves

and say plenty of things, no matter how banal,

so too did African-American musicians

begin to explore the conceptual possibilities of the long-player as never before.

MUSIC: "Tracks of my Tears" by Smokey Robinson and the Miracles"

In the mid-'60s, the main focus for the great R&B labels,

such as Atlantic, Chess, Stax and Motown,

was the single.

# It's easy to trace

# The tracks of my tears #

With smooth love ballads such as Tracks of my Tears,

Motown's The Miracles showed how adept they were

at turning out radio-friendly hits.

But as the '60s progressed, some acts began to see albums

as more than just a compilation of singles and filler tracks.

One of the most significant game-changers was Isaac Hayes.

When Stax Records lost their back catalogue to distributors Atlantic,

they rallied by releasing 27 LPs simultaneously. Hooray!

# ..you put the hurt on me

# You socked it to me, Momma #

The most successful of these was Hot Buttered Soul

which featured only four tracks, including Walk On By,

none of which were intended as singles.

The album was a hit on the R&B, pop, jazz and easy-listening charts.

"New York! Just like I pictured it."

# ..just enough

# For the city #

It was also an object lesson for Motown,

who had embraced the new decade with a slew of classic albums,

not least Stevie Wonder,

who had an unbeatable run of classics in the early '70s...

# To find a job

# Is like a haystack needle #

..recording at the Electric Lady Studios in New York,

where the enormous TONTO synthesiser gave songs like Living for the City an edge,

which supported the serious concept behind the music.

Missed out Fulfillingness' First Finale from the Stevie run there.

-Did they put in Music of My Mind?

-It was right there.

Something happened between that period,

in rock terms, between Woodstock and the Sex Pistols,

when all these new genres were suddenly pulled out of the air,

whether it was heavy rock, hard rock, folk rock, glam rock,

-all of these. And in R&B...

-Brighton Rock.

..suddenly, this second rise of Motown,

from being this finger-popping single station, started putting out albums.

It's a wonderful thing. Of course, the two cornerstones being Marvin and Stevie.

-How did affect you?

-Well, I mean, not at the time it didn't,

but retrospectively, when I was a teenager, it blew my mind.

-That's an odd thing -

-I love the Motown scene.

The Motown sound from '63 to '67,

the production line, just faultless.

As pop music, as chart music, just beautiful and hard to beat.

But once those people started to use Motown

basically as a distributor, once they came of age artistically,

I don't think there's been anything like it.

What really annoys me, when people try to sum up a decade

they always go with the lowest common denominator, like, "The '70s, wasn't it awful?"

-I know!

-No, it wasn't. No-one mentions Stevie Wonder, Gil Scott-Heron, Marvin Gaye!

Ridiculous records being made by great artists, and they never got better than that.

It's almost like there was a maturity

when they decided to come out of Motown and do their own thing.

There was a maturity, almost like, "We can finally write the songs

"without it having to be the chorus every time so that the radio can hear it."

I think, Mica, particularly in R&B where there had been a pressure and tradition

of all wearing the same-coloured suits,

I think they thought, "These rock guys don't have to do that. They just go out there."

-And they all did it.

-Everyone!

If you think, Marvin, Michael Jackson, Stevie Wonder...

-The Temptations.

-..when they came out, they just went nuts.

They may've been geniuses, but they were boy bands.

Do you know what this is all about? Clout.

-Yes.

-It's like, "You've sold so many records,

"we're renegotiating your deal..."

If you look back in history, most of these guys made their conceptual albums

at the point that Berry Gordy had to say,

"OK, we're going to renew your contract now."

They could say, "If you want me, I've got to do what I've got to do."

If you notice, all the conceptual albums are made by incredibly established musicians.

No-one was signed based on a conceptual album.

-No way!

-"Excuse me. I've got this great idea, Berry. Can you sign me?" No way!

-They've had a string of 50 hits.

-You could even go to George Michael.

When he left Wham! he suddenly became this amazing talent.

Do you think, Trevor, that is,

let's knock the old term around again, genius?

Because What's Going On seems to come out of nowhere,

as does Music of My Mind.

Nobody saw that coming. It doesn't seem to have any antecedents,

it doesn't seem to be anything that anyone else is going to do.

The sound, the very sound of those records, is so complete and finished.

The scariest thing is, they are genius, but they may not have happened.

Berry tried to stop What's Going On.

-He tried to stop bloody Songs in the Key of Life!

-He did.

I don't blame him, as a record company boss, to be scared.

They cost a lot of money to make, they spent a load of studio time messing about,

having the best musicians hanging around.

They're very expensive masturbation projects, in a sense. Dare I use that term?

If you know what I mean.

It's almost like they were... You're right when you say that they peaked.

But all of that time at Motown was necessary for honing their skills.

If you think about it, it really was a time of learning the craft.

As much as it was very manufactured, it was honing their skills.

You're a fan of The Funk Brothers, right? I loved your doc on The Funk Brothers.

It's a production line, Motown.

-Unfortunately, whether you're Gladys Knight, whoever you are, you're in a pecking order.

-Yes.

Someone writes a song and it goes down the pecking order.

-Gladys Knight should get it, but Diana Ross gets it.

-Yes.

So you want freedom! You want to stand away from the pack.

-Isaac Hayes wrote loads of hits for other people.

-He did.

When Isaac was at Stax, he was like, "I want to make a conceptual album."

-No-one's going to say no because he's so important.

-Right.

I was listening to Jerry Wexler talking, as he was discussing before,

and Jerry Wexler said, "Motown make singles for white teenagers."

Atlantic were struggling. There weren't a lot of albums shifting.

Aretha's albums were respected, but they weren't shifting a lot.

We needed white rock groups, we needed Yes and Led Zeppelin,

Crosby, Stills & Nash and The Stones to come in on Atlantic

so we could have these vanity projects and say, "They've got their own credibility,

"but if you want to keep making these albums, we have to get some do-re-mi."

Such an important point

that people never, ever imagine was the reason for the funding of half of these albums.

No boss would say, "I'm going to make an album with no hits on it.

"It'll be my artistic statement." Swallows something jagged...

Berry Gordy was freaking out. He really lost it.

When he first heard What's Going On, he was like, "This is undanceable. This is meandering rubbish."

Did you "get" What's Going On as soon as you heard it?

I bought it when I was 16 from Kingston, probably Beggars Banquet or maybe Our Price,

and, er, before then,

because it's one of the pillars of modern music,

I thought, "I'd really better like this."

And I didn't realise it was all kind of one song-suite.

I didn't realise it was going to be a segue-way, each song into the other.

And I felt really bad, I felt real Catholic guilt for not loving it immediately.

I thought, "I love that song and I love that song, but I'm not sure if I do love it yet."

You think, "I better train myself to love this or I won't be a good person."

And I do love it

-but it took me a few listens.

-It's a complete change!

Sometimes the reputation of an album is assured.

-Again...

-This is the hardest thing -

-..I love "I Want You".

-I think it's a lovely album.

-But isn't it hard? Think about it like this.

It's almost like when you see a child actor.

You've always seen as a child actor and then you see them as a grown up. It's very hard to adjust.

You've been used to Marvin Gaye singing "It Takes Two"

and then suddenly...

You're like, "Hang on a minute!" It's crazy!

We're at a disadvantage, knowing the sociological and Vietnam War made him do it.

This is what I'm saying! I keep harking on about this!

You asked Martin how he felt when he got it.

I felt exactly... Let's Get It On, for me, was my Marvin Gaye tune and album.

-It's a great album.

-Shocking.

-As far as I was concerned, that there was me.

What's Going On - nice tune. Inner City - nice tune.

-It took me a couple of years to marry the whole thing together.

-Really?!

My third selection is going to be the handmaiden to it,

an album that I fell in love with immediately

and, let's face it, was made with the help of two odd-looking German Moog players.

But the extraordinary word and, no pun intended,

the vision that Stevie Wonder had to start this extraordinary thing where he sent this message out,

you know what - you can make any damn record you want!

-But there was that period there, wasn't there?

-This period.

Music of My Mind is every bit the album that What's Going On is.

You don't have to play them off against each other.

It never ceases to amaze me that Quincy Jones,

that hepcat jazzer, palling around with Ray Charles in the 1940s,

was also the sonic scientist smoothly producing Michael Jackson's Thriller in 1982.

How can that be?

But then it seems that R&B just doesn't quite work like other forms of popular music.

Scratch the vinyl on an R&B album

and you'll discover a kind of collective musical DNA,

a strand which includes blues, soul and funk.

As influential performers like Sly and the Family Stone,

seen here performing "I Wanna Take You Higher" in 1969 demonstrates,

R&B seems able to hold onto its past while redefining its future.

A young British band, named after a Muddy Waters song,

had their first big hit with "It's All Over Now", a song by R&B great Bobby Womack.

# But it's all over now #

Rock'n'roll is a white version of rhythm and blues, OK?

This is not no prejudice thing, so don't go there.

The Stones' first album took the blues to a new white audience

and then reignited interest in the original rhythm and bluesmen they were imitating.

# I used to love her But it's all over now #

Shuggie Otis was the son of legendary bandleader Johnny Otis

and had played guitar as a teen with all the R&B greats.

He would turn down a place in The Rolling Stones to develop his own sound.

MUSIC: "Aht Uh Mi Hed" by Shuggie Otis

His brilliant trippy third album

not only updated his musical lineage,

but his "I can pretty much do everything myself" approach

was also an obvious inspiration to a youthful Prince.

# I never meant to cause you Any pain... #

The R&B continuum is most obvious in Prince himself.

Artist and producer, he performs it, records his favourite R&B stars

and updates it with his own style.

# ..a skinny man

# Died of a big disease With a little name #

With his album Sign 'O' The Times, he paid homage to his influences

while moving the music on.

MUSIC: "Me, Myself and I" by De La Soul

# It's just me, myself and I #

And of course, hip-hop acts like De La Soul,

knee-deep in an old funkadelic groove,

have plundered the R&B back catalogue to give new life -

and royalty cheques - to ageing performers.

# You say plug one and two Are hippies

# No, we're not That's pure plug bull... #

Trevor, do you think it will always reinvigorate itself?

Do you think R&B... Let me put it this way, do you fear for it

or do you think it's in good health, as you know it?

OK, seeing as I'm active, playing everything that's come out,

-I'd say it's not in good health.

-Why is that?

Because the term has been used and abused in a way that it's uncontrollable.

I mean, David Guetta does a tune with an R&B singer,

is that R&B, you know?

Calvin Harris, I like his stuff, does a tune with an R&B vocalist. Is that R&B?

And then kids are going, "I've got the latest R&B tune!" and it's 130bpm.

Whereas Frank Ocean comes along and Miguel and these guys, and they're bringing it back to...

Frank Ocean is a guy I really like.

He's done what someone like D'Angelo did 15 years ago.

-Absolutely.

-So it's soul, I'd call it, rather than R&B at this point.

It just always comes back.

If ever you're in doubt, whenever X Factor do their R&B night, that'll be it!

You get me!

You know what you said earlier about that lapse,

that point where disco came in and it all went pear-shaped...?

-I love disco.

-You know what I mean.

-It's a bit like that at the moment.

-It's a little bit like that.

That's where we're at.

But I've made a similar point in the other shows we've done like this,

that it was never for everyone. Yes, it's a mass music,

but the people who talk about it, like us, either you do that or you don't.

Some people can breeze through life, "Oh, I think I know that" in a way that we couldn't...

I know certainly, Martin, if someone said, "I think I know that album!"

What do you mean, you 'think'?" So it is about us, as well, rather than the bigger picture.

You're steeped in it in a way that perhaps eight-out-of-ten people aren't.

They're definitely not. And that's no accusation on them.

-But it's still a specialist music somehow.

-Yes.

We're talking about some of the biggest names in recorded music,

but when you're talking about albums and other artists slightly off-tangent,

people don't know!

Earlier, when I brought out the Bill Withers, there was a frisson around here of,

"Oh, we're playing deep, are we? We're serious about this!"

That's nice. It's a wonderful thing to talk about.

But now the proof of the pudding, the fun part of the evening, the Wall of Sound behind me...

I've suggested some up the top. Pretty good fellas to me.

-Trevor, what have you brought?

-Stevie Wonder is a genius. He deserves two up there.

That may've been the beginning, Music of my Mind. But this...

-Yes.

-Is zenith the right word?

-Zenith - the culmination.

It makes me laugh, smile, cry.

I said great albums should be able to be played at any time of day.

There's never a time I don't want to hear that.

We haven't talked about soundtracks.

There was a great era in the '70s for Blaxploitation films where the soundtrack was better than the movie.

-We haven't mentioned Curtis Mayfield.

-No!

-Not enough, anyway.

-Criminal! Super Fly, surely the best film score ever in soul music?!

-You bet.

I think so. I love it. Super Fly, Curtis Mayfield.

And political, as well. Hip-hop... You know.

A lot of people say it has no place here, but I believe it has when it's made like this.

Probably the second greatest hip-hop album ever made, or third, after Public Enemy and Nas.

But for the sake of this show and people watching this show,

I think they'll appreciate this because it's a combination of jazz, poetic lyrics.

There are a few messages, but I never get tired of listening to this.

-A Tribe Called Quest - The Low End Theory.

-Cool.

I'll fight you over ODB later, but there you go!

-Mica, what have you got?

-Basically, for me,

when I became quite conscious about what was happening in America,

my father gave me the whole rundown and this was what he really played and told me about.

That was a powerful point in my life, coming out of church and hearing it.

This was my first secular album that I'd ever listened to.

-The rest of the world fell in step there.

-Absolutely.

And then when I got into Barry White,

why I got into that was the production. I'd never heard strings like that.

I was blown away by hearing R&B sounding so epic.

-It is.

-It was a fantastic sound.

-Cinematic dance floor.

This is when I started to dream about doing this.

So he was an important part of my life.

Didn't mind the videos, as well. The videos were fantastic.

-Very funny.

-White suits and fluffy curls!

And then, obviously,

-Prince, for me...

-Yes.

-Phenomenal.

Basically, he completely changed the style of R&B

in terms of taking it away from being massively produced and sounding really big and epic,

he made it all simple but still effective and powerful.

Also, speaking about things at that time that most people were speaking about,

about Aids being the new disease and all of these other things that were happening...

Everyone was talking about these things and he put that all in song.

He made extraordinary, fascinating music. Fantastic.

-He's fascinating himself.

-That's my favourite. Still got it.

-Martin, what are you left with?

-I'm left with...

What these two have left me with...

-Plenty!

-They've all been stolen.

-I'm sorry.

-That's all right.

-Now we're agreeing.

-There's not enough women.

Aretha - Lady Soul from 1968. Just beautiful.

Her voice has never sounded better. The band are brilliant.

-There's Bobby Womack, Clapton... Phenomenal record!

-Cornerstone.

I nearly swore then, Danny, that's how good it is!

This one, 1970, '71...

Oh, Donny Hathaway! Well done!

Part of the thing about a great record or a great artist,

part of it is the songs. He's got really good songs that he's written.

But it's the sound. He's got a monstrous sound on this record.

-It's deep.

-The live albums... Oh!

-That Fender-Rhodes business... It is a ridiculous record.

Beautiful. And he's a beautiful singer.

I'll choose this one - Make It Happen by Smokey Robinson and the Miracles.

It was reissued three years later as Tears of a Clown

when Tamla Motown released it in 1970.

This is '67. It was about the third Motown record I ever bought, when I was 15.

And it's Smokey Robinson at his best.

Beautiful voice. Beautiful writer. Love this record.

Do you know what? Very good! You just stole the show with your selections there!

I'm allowed one, because it seems to be a rib-tickling concept that it'll be a Baker's Dozen up there.

I'm going to go for what I consider my favourite and one of the best ever R&B albums,

Al Green's Call Me.

And I'll tell you why. Because I don't know.

I think a lot of R&B particularly, if someone says,

"Why do you love it?" you go, "I don't know."

And that, my friends, is music.

So there it is, a thing of wonder.

Tremble under their R&B might, everybody!

13 "12-by-12" pieces of cardboard that are anything but square.

I think it was Russell Thompson of The Stylistics who put it best when he said,

# Thank you, baby! #

-Thank you very much indeed, Trevor.

-Thank you.

-Thank you, Mica.

-And thank you, Martin.

-Thank you.

There you go, Marvin Gaye.

After decades of asking "What's going on?" we just told you.

I hope it's been of some help. Thank you for watching. Good night.

MUSIC: "One Nation under a Groove" by Parliament Funkadelic

Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd