I am in the middle of a real good novel called "The Magician King" about a modern day Harry Potter and when it's over I will delve into RJ Smith's "The One: The Life And Music Of James Brown".
I've loved RJ since his New Musical Express days and I am trying to find the time to rush thru the Lew Grossman novel so I can start it. I'm guessing it will be as close to the last word on the great man and I am banning Brown from my Spotify account till I start because it is going to be a steady diet of the Godfather of Funk for a coupla months or at least as much as I can manage). I am sweriously waiting for his mid-70s peal, when he rewrote disco in his own image.
This comes to mind because Al Sharpton, the Black leader with a show on MSNBC reviewed the RJ bio for the new York Times and really really loved it. Saturday night, the Re was on NY1 discussing his own review.
Sharpton considered Brown a mentor and was very, very close friends with him, and RJ interviewed the Reverand for the bio. Sharpton said he thought nthing much of the interview at the time because he was often asked about Brown but he was very impressed with RJ's work.
Phew… hang about I'm getting to the point…. Three actually, all of them claimed by Sharpton in the interview
1. Sharpton was the James Brown of Black politics, Jesse Jackson the Motown.
2. Brown changed music because before Brown, in order for blacks to attract the white audience, the Black musicians had to change their music but Brown never changed his sound and the white audience was forced to go to him.
3. And this is kinda self-evident though it bears repeating: Brown was not a pacifist, he believed in an eye for an eye. And, Brown was very right wing and disagreed entirely with Sharpton.
Which makes it all the odder that I once saw brown play Bb King's where he introduced Al on stage and said Al would make a great Mayor.