I was recently at a friend’s house for game night, and upon finally finding the lost remote and taking over music (as I regularly do), I found an excuse to descend down a YouTube rabbit hole purely focused on performances from VH1’s Divas concerts. They’re my favorite series of concerts and are responsible for the most formative moments in my music taste.

At the beginning of 1998, a few months shy of my 8th birthday, I discovered Aretha Franklin. My entire world shifted the moment that I consciously heard her voice. As my interest grew, my parents took a blank VHS, labeled the spine with “Aretha Franklin” and began taping Aretha anytime she was on TV. The second entry on the tape took place on April 14, 1998. VH1 staged a benefit concert for their non-profit organization, Save The Music. The organization was formed in 1997 to combat the widespread removal of music programs happening across schools in America.

The benefit they produced was called VH1 Divas Live. It assembled an array of women from different corners of music, uniting all for a common cause: music. What transpired on that stage, and in the six years of shows that followed represents the most formative moments in my love and interest in music. I even half-jokingly refer to it as my “musical fertile crescent.”

For a decent chunk of time, I had just a fraction of that first VH1 Divas Live show. My parents taped Aretha’s parts only. Months later though, when the show was officially released, my dad got me the CD and I got my ears on the rest of the show. In between, I also caught reruns of the program, and eventually the whole show in the ramp up to VH1 Divas Live ‘99 the following April.

What happened on that stage still feels a little bit like magic, in part because programs like that just don’t take place in this day and age. Even when VH1 resurrected the Divas brand in the late 2000’s and 2010’s, none of their revivals ever matched the immensity of the initial run.

The magic was also in what happened at the show’s conclusion. Yes, there’s much to say about that finale, but for this moment, focus on the presence. All five of the show’s headliners stood shoulder-to-shoulder and sang together for the first (and only) time. Only one other time, at the 2000 show, did every performer from the show unite together on the stage. At every other show, it was fractions and fragments of those who took the stage that night. And at no show aside from 1998’s original did every woman get a moment to shine during the finale.

I had never heard the word ‘diva’ prior to the show, but I became obsessed with it thereafter. I have a few compilation cds from other corners of the world that bear the name. Aretha Franklin’s final studio album, released in 2014, even includes the word in its name.After the show I remember my mom printing out an article that created an acronym for “diva.” It’s been a quarter of a century so the “i” is lost to time, but I do remember “divine” and “virtuoso,” and the reason my mom printed it out for me was what they had for a: Aretha. From then on, when the word “diva” was mentioned, I perked up and paid attention.

What made the first Divas so special is that it sequenced all these formidable performers from different edges of pop and other genres, and then converged them all together for one culminating moment of female unity.

Revisiting the show a quarter of a century later, all of these women were in the midst of a high in their respective careers. Franklin was in a renaissance. Dion and her Titanic theme were ubiquitous. Carey was in a state of liberation. Twain was transcending the barriers between country and pop. And Estefan, perhaps experiencing the least remarkable moment of the group, was still in her own high, dancing her way into her next chapter.

I have a love for Mariah Carey that some believe is first and foremost in my musical palette (it’s the merch. I can go a solid 40 days in nothing but Mariah attire and never repeat a top). But like Mariah, Aretha is “my North star and high bar.” I am only a Mariah fan because I saw her sing with Aretha on Divas Live. And because of what I heard when I got the CD. With that said, when I think of Mariah, I first see her with the big hair and black dress she donned during the show’s closing number.

Mariah opened ‘Divas’ in true diva fashion: with a ballad. “My All” was her current single, slated to be physically released on April 21, the week after ‘Divas’ took place. The Puerto Rico-inspired production was rearranged to include an orchestra, adding a lushness to the dramatic record of longing.

At the end of the record though, instead of simply fading out, a pounding dance beat emerged. Mariah delivered what should have been the final “tonight” as the beat took hold, and tilted her head down and a smirk grew on her face. She couldn’t contain her own excitement as she launched a dance mix of the record, produced by David Morales. The audience loved it. As the dance beat took hold, audience members could be heard screaming in excitement for what was about to unfold. And Mariah delivered some powerhouse vocals over that dance beat, as any good diva should be able to do. Hey, divas gotta dance too!

A few years later when I finally heard the studio version of “My All,” I was dismayed when the ballad simply faded out at the end, no pulsing dance beat to be found. I searched high and low for that dance version. Not long after securing the audio file of one of the dance mixes (thanks Morpheus!), began acquiring the CD singles that held all the mixes. My voracious appetite for CD singles, and undying love for dance remixes can be credited largely to Mariah incorporating that “My All” remix into her performance.

Mariah also served up Diva in her ensemble, which she playfully joked about between songs. “Do you like the ensemble?” To which you can hear an audience member respond with “you’re werkin it!” And she continues with “cause it’s all about the ensemble when you’re a diva.”

Her second song of the evening was a gospel-inspired cut from her 1991 album Emotions. The song, in which Mariah details some of the many perils she endured on her road to stardom, was co-written and produced with C&C Music Factory’s David Cole and Robert Clivilles. It’s a beautiful intersection between gospel and house music, and came accompanied by a gospel choir for this performance. “I know you’re all music industry people, but you can get up,” Mariah playfully shaded to the audience, who willingly obliged. Mariah got so into it that one point she started running back and forth on the stage, a moment that has been endlessly gif’ed in years that followed.

Up next was the incredible Gloria Estefan. It’s unclear how the sets were doled out, but Gloria was the only artist to receive a 3-song slot and not include any guests during her performance. She did however, give a solid history of her catalog, from old, to new.

Gloria was the only artist who’s promoted release wasn’t already in stores. Gloria! wouldn’t arrive until June of 1998, but Gloria still made sure to promote. She opened her set with her hit cover of Vicki Sue Robinson’s disco classic “Turn The Beat Around.” This live performance gives it a heavier emphasis on the Miami Sound Machine percussion. It’s also hysterical to watch Gloria fight with her wrap, which got caught in her heel as she attempted to shed it. Aside from a little laugh as it happened, she didn’t miss a note.

She gave the Divas audience the premiere of gloria!’s lead single. Funny enough, “Heaven’s What I Feel” was originally pitched to another diva on the roster that night: Celine Dion, who passed on it. The song made for a perfect fit for Gloria, with highs and lows.

Finally, Gloria gave the audience some “oldies” as she called them, a 5-song 80’s medley that began with her earliest hit with Miami Sound Machine, “Dr. Beat,” and spanned all the way to 1989’s “Get On Your Feet.” These selections further emphasized Gloria’s dominance over a dance beat, making her announcement of a “dance album, top to bottom” feel formidable for the audience.

Up next was one of country music’s brightest stars, Shania Twain. Shania was riding high by 1998. Her second album, 1995’s The Woman In Me, had recently been certified 11x Platinum (that’s a Diamond certification plus one). Her third album, 1997’s Come On Over was already 3x platinum by the time Divas took place. She opened her set with the now-classic “Man! I Feel Like A Woman.” It’s always been a Shania staple for me because of this show. However, it wasn’t a single when Divas occurred, and the iconic music video was likely not even conceptualized, let alone shot. In fact, it wasn’t even released as a single until almost a year later. It’s one of, if not the, earliest live performance of “Man! I Feel Like A Woman.”

Shania was the only performer who paused in the middle of her set to discuss the subject at hand and emphasized the importance of music education in schools. “If it wasn’t for music class in school, I think I would’ve been a dropout,” she told the audience.

She wasn’t the only one who shared remarks though. Just before Shania’s set, Mariah took to the podium to not only crack a few diva jokes but also emphasize the importance of music education. She then looked to the monitors, where a video package provided more information. It also included a special message from President and First Lady Clinton, who helped kick off the initiative, which included President Clinton presenting his famed saxophone to a budding school-age musician, underscoring just how significant Save The Music was.

After her first song, Shania grabbed her guitar, sat down, and delivered a stellar rendition of her then-current single “You’re Still The One.” It remains one of my favorite tracks on the album. It’s country enough to twang through, but pop enough to satisfy my pop-leaning palette. And Shania’s vocal that night is flawless. Then it was time for the big moment.

The center spot on the show was given to Aretha, who damn near skipped the whole thing. As has been heavily documented, an air conditioning snafu caused Aretha to walk out of rehearsal and leave the entire crew unsure as to whether or not she would actually return for the show. There’s actually rehearsal footage that’s been broadcast where Aretha can be heard recognizing the issue. “The air is on,” she can be heard saying to producer Ken Ehrlich, prior to her departure.

I most enjoy Mariah’s recollection of the situation. Mariah was simply in awe of the fact that she was going to sing with Aretha. It also didn’t help that Aretha initially suggested the two sing a Mariah song that she loved, “Dreamlover,” which Mariah said her heart wouldn’t have been able to take. At Mariah’s suggestion and relief, Aretha “mercifully” agreed to do “Chain of Fools.”. Until she arrived, giddy as a schoolgirl to rehearsal, to find Aretha on her way out. She greeted her with, “Mariah, they’re playing games, and I’m not having the games. So we won’t be rehearsing this evening.” Though she didn’t say it out loud, Mariah’s reaction was “Wait. Who the fuck is playing games?!”

Aretha did return, and the twelve dozen roses the producers sent her ahead of the show as an apology for the air conditioning probably didn’t hurt the situation. Aretha was on fire in 1998. Aretha’s first studio album in 7 years, A Rose Is Still A Rose, had been released just weeks earlier. The lead single, produced by an on-the-cusp-of-superstardom Lauryn Hill was proving to be a surprise hit. And less than 2 months before Divas, Aretha had made her monumental last-minute opera debut stepping in for Pavarotti at the Grammys.

Her set opened and closed with cuts from A Rose Is Still A Rose. She performed the title track and the second single, “Here We Go Again.” The latter was coincidentally produced by Mariah’s friend Jermaine Dupri and co-written by Mariah’s friend/background singer Trey Lorenz. Both performances were curiously left off the official releases of the show. They were the only performances from the broadcast omitted from the releases.

Despite the omissions, Aretha’s label didn’t waste her appearance. The single cover for “Here We Go Again” used a photo taken at Divas. And the song’s music video was built around Aretha’s performance of the song on the show.

That didn’t mean it wasn’t available through other methods. My interest in Aretha prompted my dad to start taking me to then then-abundant record stores in the West Village. The first stop was a spot called Revolver Records on 45 W. 8th St. As I’ve learned in my adult years, they specialized in bootlegs. One such bootleg was of VH1 Divas Live. With a blue cover instead of the standard red, along with some photo editing worse than the actual design, it stood out. What also stood out was that it had both of Aretha’s tracks that were cut from the official release. It took a few trips but I finally convinced my dad to shell out the $24.98 for it (the very faded price sticker is still on it, along with the very faded 10-98, indicating the month it hit the shelves). And I’m glad he did.

The crowning moment of Aretha’s mid-show set came mid-set. After receiving an overwhelming response from the audience (hey, this was the Queen of Soul after all), she launched into a not-untrue story about not being able to rehearse, and how her “newest girlfriend” came and hung out with her in her trailer. That new, unnamed girlfriend would be joining her on stage. As Aretha launched into “Chain Of Fools,” out came Mariah Carey, donning not just a new dress, but also new nail polish. She had three dresses and three polish changes throughout the show “just for laughs.”

The performance garnered a lot of attention for how Aretha performed around Mariah. Whenever Mariah hit a note, Aretha hit a note beyond that, higher or lower. To some, it seemed as though Aretha was asserting dominance or trying to upstage Mariah. Producer Ken Ehrlich didn’t see it as a conscious effort. “I think Aretha just falls in love with those lights, and falls in love with crowd.” Mariah didn’t see it that way, either. Moments after leaving the stage with Aretha, she told VH1 cameras the moment was “an incredible honor.”

Later, she expanded further. “I was there in reverence of the Queen of Soul,” Mariah said in 2001. “I was inconsequential in that moment, That was Aretha’s moment, cause she’s her.” “She’s just a really cool person as well as an amazing idol. But the moment doing “Chain of Fools,” I didn’t know what was gonna happen.” And one of the most amazing things that occurs during this performance neither could have predicted. Mariah begins to follow Aretha’s runs. They hit first notes, second notes, and then on the third and final, they hit the same note. On the right footage, you see a look of satisfaction exchanged between the two.

The final performer of the night was Celine Dion. Forget winning album of the year at the 1997 Grammys, Celine was on fire thanks to a famous shipwreck. “My Heart Will Go On” was absolutely inescapable, to the point where Saturday Night Live even had to get in on the fun, and their parodies of the Divas even made it into 1999’s show.

Celine was the first confirmed booking for the show. While it’s never been suggested, it’s something of a coincidence that the date of the show was the “exact date, 86 years ago, that the mighty Titanic struck that iceberg,” as Celine told the audience. Funny enough, it was the one moment during the show that relied on a backing track. Not a vocal backing track, but the music itself. The band did play along, but the application of the track had something to do with the complexity of the music. Either way, Celine delivered a stellar performance and no one was the wiser.

My sister latched onto Celine, which I’ve always thought was because Celine’s jacket had a pink lining and she loved pink. I’m not entirely sure though. But either way Celine became hers and I became a closet Celine fan as a result. It was something about us both not being able to like her. God knows. I was young. Celine opened her set with another diva’s classic: Tina Turner’s “River Deep, Mountain High.” It had been included on her 1996 album Falling Into You, even after the song’s original producer, the now-disgraced (and dead) Phil Spector, refused to produce Celine singing the song. It was a dynamite performance.

One of the other high points of the show, was Celine’s duet with Carole King. Carole had just contributed a song to Celine’s 1997 LP Let’s Talk About Love, and this marked their first live performance of the song together. She was also a late addition to the show, and confirmed her appearance 9 days prior to the show date.

Despite being labeled a “special guest,” Carole King proved to be a crucial element in the show. As the Aretha drama unfolded, it provided an opportunity to add another performance. They came up with an acoustic piano-bar style performance of “You’ve Got A Friend.” Carole took the lead and accompanied on the piano, with Celine, Gloria, and Shania sitting shoulder to shoulder. They rehearsed it for the first time just hours before the show.

And then, it was time for the grand finale. As the audience cheered the immensity of the acoustic performance, Carole King emphatically told them, “this is why we write songs, so you get people like this to sing them… and this!” Aretha took the stage mid-sentence for the grand finale.

It wasn’t a guarantee that it was going to happen though. Wayne Isaak, VH1 Divas co-producer and EVP of Music & Talent Relations at VH1 (and the author of the album’s liner notes) said on a 2001 VH1 All Access episode about the Divas shows that there was no plan set in stone for the finale to actually happen with all six women. They had asked everyone to participate, but there were no guarantees, especially concerning Aretha.

A Page Six item the day of the show also helped compel participation. It implied that Mariah didn’t want to be on the same stage as Celine Dion. As the producers recalled though, Mariah saw the article and effectively said, “to hell with that, I’m going to blow that whole notion out of the water.” Shania Twain even recalled everyone doing a run-through of the finale in her bus before the show.

The Divas all lined up, and after Aretha not only credited Clive Davis and VH1 for her appearance at the show, she acknowledged that she’d never performed “ (You Make Me Feel Like) A Natural Woman” with Carole King, and that the song had been associated with her for “almost *ahem* 20 years,” a little time joke that didn’t seem to land. And away they went.

As it began, Aretha sang “would you forgive me? If I didn’t sing this song tonight? I don’t think so,” naturally nodding to her near-absence after the air-conditioning fiasco. The plan was for Carole to start it off, and in the live audio you can hear Carole begin, but Aretha took the reins instead. Aretha thanked her and continued on, and after Carole made one more failed attempt to get a verse in (Celine took over instead), she stuck to the chorus. Each Diva got their line in, with Aretha adding some authoritative melisma after, and they delivered a once-in-a-lifetime rendition of the classic.

At the end of the song, Aretha took charge, acknowledged her background singers, and delivered a stunning finish that reaffirmed her title of Queen of Soul. Celine inserted a few runs that have been deemed “competitive,” but Aretha maintained her dominance over the moment, which only extended as she immediately cut into Rev. Clay Evans’ “I’ve Got A Testimony,” which was retitled “Testimony.”

For nearly 10 minutes, Aretha took the Divas and the audience to church. Though the full footage has either never been released or is sitting in a vault somewhere, watching the other women attempt to keep up is amazing. They truly had no idea what to do, short of Mariah Carey, who has endlessly recalled slipping back towards the background singers and giving Aretha room to run the show.

This of course, is that big “diva moment” that is seen as a competition. Out came Celine, seemingly attempting to compete with Aretha again. And yet, it was a simple cultural gap. Celine didn’t understand gospel and what was happening, she saw it as an opportunity to have her moment with Aretha, and has said as much in years that have followed. Aretha on the other hand, was, as Mariah put it, the equivalent of a jazz bandleader. She ran the show, and was going to make sure you knew it.

Eventually, Aretha had delivered an adequate testimony, and the surprise gospel performance wound down as the women said their goodnights. They posed for a group photo backstage, and VH1’s first installment of Divas came to a close. At the time, it became VH1’s highest rated program in the network’s 13-year history, with over 20 million tuning into the initial broadcasts. It also helped raise significant awareness for Save The Music, which has done tremendous work in its 25+ year history.

I have worn out the audio of that show. The CD and booklet are a little beat-up, and I love that it shows the life it’s lived since I got it nearly a quarter century ago. The performances I staged in front of my tv and in my bedroom as a child, pretending to be each of these incredible women, have long informed the person I am today. And I can go riff-for-riff lip-syncing nearly every performance of this show. Try me sometime.

With the exception of Aretha, my first exposure to so many of these great women began on that stage, and the stages the show occupied in the years that followed: Mariah Carey. Gloria Estefan. Shania Twain. Celine Dion. Carole King. Tina Turner. Mary J. Blige. Whitney Houston. Brandy. Faith Hill. Diana Ross. Destiny’s Child. RuPaul. Jill Scott. Celia Cruz. I learned all of their names and became fans of many of them because of VH1’s Divas series. That’s the power of music, and of a solid concept.

25 years later, I’m still waiting for a lot on the Divas front. Right now, only Mariah’s solo performances, and her duet with Aretha have made it into the streaming age. The show is in desperate need of a reissue on vinyl. It’s also long been time that not only Aretha’s solo tracks, but also Carole King’s performance of “It’s Too Late” (which happened before “You’ve Got A Friend”), all see the light of day. Plus all the years that followed. These shows were formative to so many, not just me. It’s long been time that they be made available for the world to enjoy and marvel over. The network had no problem officially uploading “Chain Of Fools” to YouTube in the wake of Aretha’s 2018 passing. Now it’s time to do the rest. And that’s my testimony.

The post VH1 Divas Live: A Life-Changing Show appeared first on THE 97.

“As America moved deeper into its love affair with disco, my sales stayed slightly off,” Aretha Franklin said of her mid-late 70’s slump. By 1977, the fusion of pop, gospel, and blues known as R&B that Aretha Franklin forged and drove to the top of the charts a decade earlier no longer had the chart dominance it did in the early 1970’s. In its place was a mix of genres and subgenres that were thrusted ahead by the beat. Funk and disco were dominating, and Aretha was struggling to find her place in the mix. 

With Jerry Wexler, Arif Mardin, and Tom Dowd at the boards, Aretha forged a winning musical partnership that lasted from 1967 through 1972. In 1973 she branched out and worked with the brilliant Quincy Jones. The resulting work was a pretty, albeit lopsided and strangely presented album, Hey Now Hey (The Other Side Of The Sky) (seriously, have you ever seen the album cover?). Her return to Wexler and co. that year only resulted in one more timeless record, 1974’s “Until You Come Back To Me (That’s What I’m Gonna Do),” penned by Stevie Wonder. The old team made three albums together in 1974 and 1975 that failed to recapture the magic of years passed, so Aretha moved on. 

In 1976 Aretha partnered with Curtis Mayfield for the incredible Sparkle, which momentarily restored her to the summit she once occupied. Aretha hadn’t seen that level of success since nearly a half decade earlier, and was determined to sustain her resurgence. She kicked off 1977 on a high note, performing as part of President Jimmy Carter’s inauguration celebration. Her performance culminated in a chill-inducing acapella rendition of “God Bless America.” In an attempt to keep the momentum going, she shifted producers once again and enlisted Motown legend Lamont Dozier to produce her next LP. 

Dozier’s credits as part of songwriting and production trio Holland-Dozier-Holland speak for themselves: “Heat Wave.” “Where Did Our Love Go?” “Baby Love.” “Come See About Me.” “Stop! In The Name Of Love.” “Nowhere To Run.” “I Hear A Symphony.” “This Old Heart Of Mine.” “My World Is Empty Without You.” “You Can’t Hurry Love.” “You Keep Me Hangin’ On.” “Reflections.” “Give Me Just A Little More Time.” “Band Of Gold.” By 1976, Dozier was in a similar position to Aretha; His relationships with the Hollands and Motown were fractured, and he was in need of his own resurgence.

Slump aside, with a resume like that, who could resist such an opportunity? Not the Queen of Soul. Plus, the two had history dating back to their youth. “Aretha and I went to school together in Detroit, Hutchins Junior High.” Dozier revealed to Billboard in 2018. When Aretha reached out to Dozier, he quickly agreed to produce her next LP and the duo got to work. They brought their own compositions to the table, along with a cover or two, as well as one record that didn’t involve Dozier at all. The resulting album was 1977’s Sweet Passion. There’s some fine material that was received variably by critics, but it failed to continue the fire ignited with Curtis Mayfield the previous year. 

Unlike the sibling rivalry that prefaced the Sparkle sessions (another story for another day), or tension that existed during the Almighty Fire sessions, the album’s recording sessions reportedly went over without conflict. “She was probably the easiest act I ever had in the studio as far as directing… She made my job easy.” Dozier said.  “She just had a natural talent, and you didn’t have to direct her; She directed herself, mostly, and if there was something you wanted to hear she’d do it automatically and then had her own interpretation or her riff on whatever you wanted her to do, as far as the feeling was concerned.” 

Interestingly, the album’s lead single was outsourced. “Break It To Me Gently” was written and produced by Marvin Hamlisch and Carole Bayer Sager and co-produced by Marty Paich and his son David, who formed a little band called Toto that same year. The structure of the song is interesting, with a psychedelic introduction, sweet strings, and randomly emphasized chords throughout. “Why’d you give me what you knew I would miss?” Aretha laments as she pleads to be let down gently. She suggests tomorrow instead of now, in hopes that in time, he’ll change his mind. Though it didn’t have any staying power, “Break It To My Gently” did top the R&B charts in 1977. 

Despite her aversion to disco, she takes another stab at it on “Touch Me Up” (there was another earlier attempt on 1974’s “Don’t Go Breaking My Heart”) It’s a lively blend of brass and piano on top of a driving beat, and probably could have done some damage on the charts had it been released. She finds beauty and love on her own composition, the effervescent “Meadows of Springtime,” and proclaims superior devotion on Dozier’s “No One Could Ever Love You More.”  

Her cover of “What I Did For Love” from ‘A Chorus Line’ is another strong entry. Though in context of the show the ‘love’ sung about is dance, Aretha takes that and turns it into romantic love for another. She sprinkles in a “you” or two as she stakes her claim for all she’s done in the name of l-o-v-e. It’s a gorgeous reading of this Broadway classic. 

The 7-minute title track features nearly two minutes of an introduction. It defies the standard structure of a pop-oriented record, as does “Meadows of Springtime.” Aretha had previously experimented with song structures on the still-unreleased “Springtime In New York,” from the mid-70’s. That record is a complete rollercoaster ride of tempos, instrumentations, and moments in general. “Sweet Passion” isn’t that scattered, once the introduction cedes to the first verse, it maintains a largely standard, albeit extended structure. 

“There comes a time in every woman’s life… when she meets… that special someone,” Aretha says during “Sweet Passion”’s opening stanzas. “And he makes her feel, like a woman… ow!” Who knew she was telling her own future? In the months leading up to the album’s release, Aretha connected with Glynn Turman, who would soon become her second husband in 1978. “Sweet Passion” isn’t about Glynn, but Aretha was certainly looking for her man. She had recently ended a long-term relationship with Ken Cunningham that dated back to the late 60’s. 

“Sweet Passion” was inspired by a different man, one whose identity remains unknown. Aretha referred to him as ‘Mr. Mystique’ in her 1999 autobiography, Aretha: From These Roots. She said she was moved to write the song after their first ‘real’ encounter. The man had missed his plane in New York and what followed was Aretha being “kissed, touched (and) loved” in a way that she’d never experienced before. They met at a hotel and got a room, something she’d never done either. 

The true gem of Sweet Passion is one of the compositions Aretha brought to the table. “When I Think About You” is a mid-tempo that hits all the right notes. It’s 70’s R&B at its finest, with an infectious blend of strings and brass that compliment Aretha’s earthy and intense ooo-ooo-ooo’s. Aretha does some real good singing throughout, making it all around one of her strongest songs on her final trio of albums for Atlantic. 

You won’t find Sweet Passion on Spotify… or Apple Music, or Tidal, or Amazon Music. Nor will you find it in CD bins anywhere. You might encounter it on vinyl though, because that’s the only format (aside from 8-track and cassette) that housed the album in significant quantities. It is one of five Aretha Franklin albums from the 70’s that has never been fully issued on CD or digital. 

The story goes that, when Aretha departed Atlantic Records in 1979, she left with the master recordings to these five LPs (With Everything I Feel In Me, You, Sweet Passion, Almighty Fire, and La Diva). That meant that it was challenging to acquire and reissue the albums, unlike her other Atlantic albums which were all issued on CD in the early 1990’s and digitally over the last two decades. 

Eight songs from these five albums have been remastered and pressed on CD. Sweet Passion is one of the lucky ones. Two songs from the album have been reissued. Lead single “Break It To Me Gently” was even reissued both on 1992’s out of print 4-CD box set Queen Of Soul: The Atlantic Recordings, and 2021’s 4-CD ARETHA box set, which brought both “Break It To Me Gently” and “When I Think About You” into the digital age.

It’s unfair that Sweet Passion gets the strictly negative rap that it does. In part, this dismissal is due to lack of awareness and accessibility. If the album was more accessible, more people would be listening to and analyzing it, creating more conversation and perhaps in turn shifting the conversation. The album’s reviews are impossible to find (unless, like me, you know someone with a stunning archive, thank you James!). Yes, there are biting, negative reviews, but there are also glowing, positive, and optimistic ones too. 

Reflecting on the slumps of both artist and producer, Paul McCrea offered, “So what odds on Sweet Passion reinstating them in the winners circle? Pretty good me-thinks.” Mike Duffy of the Detroit Free Press went a step further and called the album, “brilliant.” Granted, he spent half his review writing “I love you” over and over again, but he made it clear that Aretha, “puts every other female voice to shame.” “Note for note, Aretha is still unbeatable,” said another review. People Magazine went a step further, declaring that “Natalie Cole’s interregnum as Queen Pretender of Soul ends roughly midway through the first side of this LP.” 

New Musical Express’s Paul Rambali wrote one of the dissenting reviews. He observed that though “Aretha never really makes a bad album,” the arrangements and song selections, save for “No One Could Ever Love You More,” didn’t hold up.  Another review identified “three real duds,” going as far as to say that on “Sunshine Will Never Be The Same,” “Aretha sings it as if it matters, but it doesn’t.” Ariel Swartley offered one of the most critical reviews, calling the album largely “uninspired” (with “When I Think About You” as the sole exception), while noting that “her voice remains a presence, but that Midas touch that transformed lyrics… has disappeared.” A dozen years later in 1989, biographer Mark Bego dealt one of the harshest blows, calling the album a “disaster” and identifying “Mumbles/I’ve Got The Music In Me” as “one of her all-time worst recordings.” 

The shame of it all is that the critics aren’t wrong (although on that last note, there is a moment about two minutes into “Mumbles/I’ve Got The Music In Me” where Aretha, with two lead vocal tracks harmonizes with herself that’s chilling in the best way possible, and a 2001 performance of “Mumbles” at ‘VH1 Divas 2001: The One and Only Aretha Franklin’ more than redeems this 1977 version). There is something great here on Sweet Passion, but something is also missing, and it might just be the passion. No reviewer, nor this writer, is going to try to diminish Aretha’s voice, especially during this era. The late 70’s were some of Aretha’s best years vocally. But this material just doesn’t stack up, especially compared to what Aretha was able to achieve with Curtis Mayfield just one year earlier (although it’s worth noting that the next year, 1978’s reunion with Mayfield on Almighty Fire was “a rare Curtis miscue,” that “lacks fire” as David Ritz put it in 2014’s Respect: The Life of Aretha Franklin). Was it the producer? The material? Or both? It’s hard to say. What’s easy to say is that as a whole Sweet Passion doesn’t come close to the best of Aretha’s material.

Sweet Passion may not be well-known or remembered, but visually, everyone knows it. The album’s cover was shot by photographer David Alexander, who’s best known for shooting The Eagles’ Hotel California. It is one of the most iconic photos of Aretha, featuring her against a black background with her hair in a tight, high bun. She’s wearing a string of pearls and a black strapless dress (which isn’t visible on the album’s cover). It’s an understated glamor headshot that captures Aretha at her finest, a morsel of redemption for the muted flavor of the record it houses. 

Listen to a full vinyl rip of Sweet Passion:

The post Aretha Franklin’s ‘Sweet Passion’ Yielded Mixed Results appeared first on THE 97.

Electrifying expanded Aretha’s sound, serving up big band arrangements and a few R&B arrangements, in hopes of expanding her reach while further solidifying her as a force to be reckoned with in jazz. That slight directional shift wasn’t a decision that everyone agreed on though, and it can’t be called a turning point because it didn’t lead to longstanding beneficial results. However, the album does mark a few noted changes in Aretha’s life, professionally and personally. 

First of all, the album marked the end of her work with John Hammond as her producer. Hammond is the person who signed her to Columbia Records. Second, it marks the first album with her first husband Ted White in the picture. The two dated and married in the time between the release of her debut and the commencement of work on Electrifying. Ted wasn’t just her husband, he also assumed the role of her manager, a position he’d remain in until they separated in 1968. 

The story goes that Aretha and Ted dated for around 6 months and were married during the second half of 1961 in Ohio. The exact date and location that they were married remains unknown. She was 19, he was 30. Those two events are significant because they explain what happened after The Electrifying Aretha Franklin was released. Different factions with varied degrees of clarity struggled to define who Aretha Franklin was, resulting in the patchwork of material that makes her Columbia material hard to confine to one musical direction or genre. That’s a story for another day. Back to album number two.

Recorded under the working title ‘The Incomparable Aretha Franklin,’ John Hammond is listed as the album’s sole producer. He disputed that credit, alleging that it was a credit in name only. He was told he could only produce her album cuts, and that their work together concluded in winter 1961. He remembered producing two cuts from the sessions: “Hard Times” and “That Lucky Old Sun.” 

Hammond’s recollection was half right. He did only produce the album cuts. However, he produced all but four of the fifteen songs recorded for the album. Columbia quietly revealed this when they released the Take A Look box set, attributing the production of those four tracks to Al Kasha in the box set’s liner notes (“Rock-A-Bye Your Baby With A Dixie Melody,” “Ac-Cent-Tu-Ate The Positive,” “Operation Heartbreak,” and “When They Ask About You”). Kasha is best known for becoming a two-time Academy Award winner for Best Original Song in 1973 and 1975. 

Hammond’s goal was to frame Aretha as the next big jazz star, so he was focused on producing formidable jazz records for her. As Mark Bego observed in The Queen Of Soul, Hammond wasn’t concerned with creating ‘Aretha the pop star.’ Aretha made a similar observation in Aretha: From These Roots, writing “Hammond saw me as a blues-jazz artist… (he didn’t seem interested in pop hits (Franklin, 87).” This was, after all, the man who discovered Billie Holiday. Holiday died in 1959, less than a year before Hammond signed Aretha to Columbia Records. John Hammond was out to create the next Billie. 

Aretha’s debut on Columbia Aretha with the Ray Bryant Combo contained her first twelve professional recordings. She was accompanied by a combo led by Ray Bryant (and, fun fact, film legend Spike Lee’s father on the bass). It made for an intimate and jazzy body of work, accentuated with flourishes of blues and pop. Hammond was certainly off to a good start considering DownBeat magazine named her New Female Vocal Star of the Year in 1961. 

Electrifying expands Aretha’s jazz profile and overall sonic profile. Hammond mixed in more sounds and styles, most notably big band. Aretha is heard in front of both an orchestra and a full horn section for the first time. The songs Hammond didn’t produce aimed to bring Aretha into the pop world, and burgeoning R&B realm as well.

None of the players from her first album reappear here except for Spike Lee’s father Bill Lee, who plays bass on four cuts. Writer/arranger John Leslie McFarland was also a returning contributor from Aretha’s debut. He’d written half of the songs on her debut, and this time around contributed four compositions. 

McFarland was the only composer to bring multiple new songs to the album’s final tracklist (“I Told You So,” ”It’s So Heartbreakin,’” “Rough Lover,” and “Just For You”). The rest of the material was all interpretations of material claimed by other artists, largely part of the Great American Songbook. For those unaware, that encompasses a host of standards that exist in the jazz and pop canon, written in the teens, thirties, and forties. The one other new record was “Nobody Like You.” It was a unique pick. It was one of her mentors in gospel, Rev. James Cleveland. 

From the album’s opening notes courtesy of a string section, the sonic profile of this record expands beyond her debut. The strings create a lush, plush landscape that yields as Aretha glides over her opening notes of “You Made Me Love You,” made popular by Judy Garland (it was the b-side to “Over The Rainbow”). She unapologetically bends the notes to fit where her impeccable ear sees fit, delivering a remarkably smooth and controlled performance; at first, that is. She gradually crescendos as the song meanders along, until she reaches her climax, cracking her voice as she surpasses the peak of her vocal register. She tackled the song a different way in 1966 when she recorded a second arrangement.

She’s unrelenting in her vocal expressiveness throughout the album, and unafraid to test the limits of her vocal range. There’s more electricity in Aretha’s performance here than on her debut, to give credence to the album’s title. She displays room to improve control as she goes for those runs and embellishments that approach the limits of her range, but she’s got the rest down pat. 

The influence of Dinah Washington shines clearly through on McFarland’s “I Told You So,” one of the highlights of the album. It swings like a brassy big band record, but it also has a jazzy undertone in the groove, with a touch of blues in the percussion and piano. Aretha enjoys some sassy gloating after her man comes crawling back to her. She was stuck crying when he left her for someone new, but she told him he’d beg her to take him back. And there he is. She kisses him off brilliantly as the song crescendos, “When you were leaving I told you then, You needn’t ever come back again, So let me tell you with a last goodbye, I told you so, I told you so.”

Another of McFarland’s originals, “It’s So Heartbreakin’” might sound familiar at first. It confounded me when I heard it for the first time, because the piano introduction is nearly identical to that of Aretha’s smash 1970 cover of “Don’t Play That Song (You Lied).” Aretha might be the pianist on the song (the credits confirm that it’s either her or another musician), so it’s fair to assume that she’s behind those notes. The way that piano part comes off, especially during the brief piano solo, seems akin to Aretha’s unique style of playing. Vocally she’s unhinged, especially when she screams “the man really turns his back on ya!” right before the song fades out. 

“It’s So Heartbreakin’” is one of the Hammond productions that leans more into the R&B realm than most of the album’s other jazzier cuts. She sings about two-timing lovers, specifically Janie, who had John enraptured but ran off Bill instead. It’s fodder that could play well with the teenage audience both musically and topically. 

It’s always amused me that two songs with seemingly contrary titles appear one after the other on the LP’s first side. “Nobody Like You” and “Exactly Like You” may appear to be contradictory, but they’re actually complimentary messages. “Nobody Like You,” is one of the Rev. James Cleveland’s few decidedly secular compositions.  Aretha looks everywhere but “can’t find nobody like you” on this bluesy ballad. It could almost pass for a gospel lyric, since the essence of the record revolves around the protagonist unable to find anyone like “you.” The idea of searching for someone and not finding anyone comparable could certainly be an allusion to God. But the lyrics “now it’s all so lonely, since you went away,” dispel that possibility because it would be unlikely for someone to sing about God abandoning them and them missing God. Complimentarily, the subject of “Exactly Like You” checks all the boxes of what the protagonist is looking for. Their waiting paid off, because they’ve found exactly what they’re looking for in this “you.” 

On her debut, Aretha reflected on finding herself a “Sweet Lover.” Here, she was looking for a “Rough Lover,” which might have been seen as risky territory without giving the song a listen. “Rough” in this case meant a gruff, tough, “sweet and gentle day and night, but mean enough to make me want to treat him right” type of man. She “don’t want no cream puff, baby,” she ad-libs near the song’s conclusion. Speaking as what would have been considered a cream puff, that one didn’t exactly age well. 

Aretha also waded into festive territory on the album. “Blue Holiday” is melancholic and jazzy, with holiday lyrics, produced by Hammond. Inversely, “Kissin’ By The Mistletoe” was recorded during the sessions but relegated to a compilation album and single, and produced by Kasha. It’s got a traditional pop holiday sound to it. They perhaps represent the best contrast between the directional differences intended for Aretha by Hammond and the brass at Columbia Records. 

Al Kasha’s pop contributions were put front and center despite representing a minor portion of the album. They were also the label’s priority. Kasha’s sessions with Aretha took place before she even returned to the studio with Hammond. The recordings with Kasha took place in July and August of 1961, while Hammond’s took place from November 1961 through January 1962. 

Two of the songs Kasha produced were well-known covers. “Ac-Cent-Tu-Ate The Positive” was a hit in 1945. Within two days of Bing Crosby’s version of the song hitting the Billboard charts (where it would peak at #2), it received an Academy Award nomination for Best Original Song.  

Like the album’s opening cut, “Rock-A-Bye Your Baby With A Dixie Melody” was another record associated with Judy Garland. Aretha takes it and bends and twists her delivery, respectfully blowing Judy out of the water with her incredible vocal performance. She also gave some staggering performances of it on the piano. They’re some of her earliest live performances that can be found online. The song was also The Electrifying Aretha Franklin’s lead single, though in a unique twist the b-side out-performed it on the charts, along with everything else Aretha did on Columbia Records.

That b-side was a song Kasha co-wrote called “Operation Heartbreak.” It was excluded from the album but released as “Rock-A-Bye”’s b-side. “Operation Heartbreak” managed to become Aretha’s highest charting recording on Columbia, peaking at number 6 on the R&B chart. 

One of the strongest moments they recorded didn’t even make the final cut. A cover of Ray Charles’ instrumental “Hard Times,” is a glaring omission. The instrumental recording offers one of the earliest opportunities to hear Aretha’s brilliance as a pianist. And she doesn’t let the song go by without saying something. She issues a few runs in the last 30 seconds, most notably wailing “Ray Charles said it was hard times but I feel alright!” Alright! It’s the perfect garnish on this beautiful display of Aretha’s exceptional skills at the piano. It was finally unearthed and released on 2002’s The Queen In Waiting compilation. It’s fair to assume that the label heads didn’t want a mostly instrumental jazz number on an album for an artist they were trying to move into the pop world.

While Aretha drew from Ray on “Hard Times,” Ray returned the favor with “That Lucky Old Sun.” He heard Aretha’s melancholic version of the standard and was inspired to record his own grand, orchestral version, with an expansive chous behind him. Aretha’s version is intimate, accentuated by a smaller string section which sweetens the warmth of the bass and chords of the electric guitar. It wouldn’t be the first time she inspired one of her peers to take on a song, either. On her next album, released in the second half of 1962, Aretha covered “Try A Little Tenderness.” Her version would inspire Otis Redding to deliver the definitive version four years later in 1966. 

That next album, The Tender, The Moving, The Swinging Aretha Franklin, marked a clear directional shift in Aretha’s music, moving further away from jazz and more into pop. What Electrifying represents, is the last clear-cut attempt at framing Aretha Franklin as the next big jazz star. Hammond never worked with Aretha again, though he praised the work Jerry Wexler did with her when she moved to Atlantic. Aretha left most of the album behind her in her Columbia days, though she did mention enjoying a number of the cuts on the album. She did mix “Rock-A-Bye Your Baby With A Dixie Melody” into her live set a few times in later years, notably as part of an oldies medley she performed a number of times in the 1980’s. 

Listen to The Electrifying Aretha Franklin:

The post The Electrifying Aretha Franklin: Aretha’s Sophomore Album appeared first on THE 97.

The album artwork depicts Aretha quadrupled and fragmented like the glass on a church window mosaic. It feels holy, though the lyrics are far from the holy homecoming Aretha staged 10 days before the album’s January 24, 1972 release. In my single digits I knew little of that (although I received my copy of Amazing Grace: The Complete Recordings for my 9th birthday). With all that said, Aretha infuses her gospel intensity into every lyric she delivers across the album. 

In an effort to further support my burgeoning musical interests, my parents bought me a Sony boombox for my bedroom. Very excitingly, it also included a remote control and had a ‘sleep’ function, which began my years-long routine of falling asleep to music. I have vivid memories of throwing Young, Gifted and Black into that CD tray and hopping into bed as Aretha opened the album playing the piano on “Oh Me Oh My (I’m A Fool For You Baby).” Over the years I was fortunate enough to see Aretha perform live a dozen times, and amidst those performances I saw her run through a quarter of the album (and one b-side) live in concert. 

Aretha Franklin hit her true artistic peak in the early 70’s. She soared to the top of the charts in the late 1960’s incorporating rhythm and gospel into the blues to help create the sounds of R&B and soul music. Her soulful voice was so immense it turned every head it reached. She demanded equality at the height of the Civil Rights movement. In the midst of a tumultuous marriage, Aretha put her pain and trauma into her music, creating some of the most crucial recordings of the 20th century. Then she rose up, divorced herself from her marriage, and trudged onward. 

1971 marked the only year in Aretha’s 12-year tenure at Atlantic Records when she didn’t release a studio album. She wrote and recorded though, and released a crucial piece of her musical tapestry: Aretha Live at Fillmore West. As she began work on her next LP, she was in a position she hadn’t been before: Aretha was truly happy. She was in a relationship with Ken Cunningham, who would be her partner for years, and had given birth to her fourth child, Kecalf. The joy she felt poured out of her musically throughout Young, Gifted and Black. The album was released on January 24, 1972, 5 years to the day that she cut “I Never Loved A Man (The Way I Love You)” in Muscle Shoals, Alabama and found the sound she’d been in search of since signing her first record deal in 1960. 

Sessions for Young, Gifted and Black commenced in the summer of 1970 and wrapped up five months later in February 1971. The album was recorded at Criteria Studios in Miami and both Atlantic Recording Studios and The Record Plant in New York City. The album’s production was led by Jerry Wexler, who exclusively produced Aretha’s Atlantic recordings until 1973. Arif Mardin, who handled arrangements and Tom Dowd, who led the engineering were both also receiving production credits by this time. Aretha also deserved a production credit, though she didn’t receive one until later that year on 1972’s Amazing Grace. She was backed by some of the strongest band members that ever played with her. Much of the album is credited to Cornell Dupree on the guitar (he’d also worked on Spirit In The Dark, along with Bernard “Pretty” Purdie on the drums and Chuck Rainey on the bass. 

Two other giants of music also participated in the sessions. Billy Preston and Donny Hathaway traded off duties on the Hammond organ, and Hathaway also played the Fender Rhodes into the clouds on “Day Dreaming.” Dr. John even pops up to contribute additional percussion to the ever-funky “Rock Steady.” Background vocals largely alternate between two of Aretha’s greatest backup groups: The Sweet Inspirations, and Aretha’s sisters Erma and Carolyn. 

More than twenty songs were recorded during the sessions, which were tailored down to a twelve-track album. Three cuts went into the vault until 2007. Three were released as singles unaffiliated with the album, and one was one of their b-sides. Those singles are among her best covers: “Bridge Over Troubled Water,” “You’re All I Need To Get By,” and “Spanish Harlem.” 

Aretha wrote four of the album’s twelve records, tying it with both its studio predecessor and successor as the most Aretha-penned songs on an LP. She also wrote one of the album’s four b-sides. But unlike the last LP, these songs have a brightness to them, even in their darkest moments. Over the five months the album was worked on, Aretha wrote some of her finest material, and delivered some of her finest readings of others’. 

From the album’s opening cut, the tone deviates from her previous Atlantic albums. It’s the first Aretha album in her Atlantic years (and Columbia years too), to open with back-to-back love songs. This Girl’s In Love With You comes close, but “Son Of A Preacher Man” isn’t really about love. Like “Preacher Man,” though “Oh Me Oh My (I’m A Fool For You Baby)” was both originally recorded by a British singer, and produced by Aretha’s production team of Jerry Wexler, Arif Mardin, and Tom Dowd. This time though, the singer in question was Lulu, who cut the record for her 1970 LP New Routes. The arrangement is very much pop, merging acoustic guitar with the dreamy strokes of the orchestra. It’s a typical pop arrangement of the era that could have easily suited Dionne Warwick or The Supremes. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pUuV3ybvkpc 

Naturally, Aretha resets the arrangement and reverses the tempo downwards with her masterful piano playing. Her meandering keystrokes create a deceptively timid introduction to what becomes a magnanimous declaration of love. It sounds at first like the soundtrack to the shy, bashful girl with her head down and her hand covering her blushing smile of adoration. As she steers the expanding arrangement towards the chorus, it’s like watching that girl straighten out as she finds her confidence, loosens her shoulders, raises her head, drops her hand, and unabashedly declares her foolish adoration, as she pleads that he let his love light shine on her. Aretha sounds more impassioned with adoration than she ever has before, and the only true sin of this album is that this record fades out right when Aretha hits a vocal stride. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=amhofKBvuyU 

It constantly feels like Aretha has stumbled on clarity in her life throughout the album, even as she’s singing about being a fool and getting lost in daydreams, uplifting Black people and trudging forward, and the desire for peace and harmony in the world. No record better encapsulates this newfound clarity than her cover of Kenny Gamble and Leon Huff’s Dusty Springfield record, “A Brand New Me.” It could have been the album’s opener to tell the listener, “guess what? Aretha’s not down and out anymore.” She’s standing on her two feet, carrying a smile that could eclipse the sun. This is some footage I took one of the final times I saw Aretha. She breaks into a mean, minute-long piano solo just when the song would otherwise be winding down. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nMlilbU-HtI 

The quad of Aretha-penned songs on this covers album are undoubtedly her best compositions to appear on a single body of work. “Day Dreaming” and “Rock Steady” were both top ten top records and top two R&B records. “All The King’s Horses” is a powerful portrait of a deteriorating relationship. “First Snow In Kokomo” is an Aretha gem that still hasn’t gotten it’s due. 

“Kokomo” marked the first time Aretha cut a record with no rhythm. Though Aretha and her piano drove many of her Atlantic hits, this time there’s no percussion to draw attention away from that crucial fact. It’s also a rare occasion when Aretha acts as a narrator instead of a main character. The song was originally a poem that Aretha put to music. It’s inspired by the happenings Aretha observed during a visit to Kokomo, Indiana, where Ken Cunningham’s mother lived. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hKgTD1zpZy8 

On the contrary, “Rock Steady” is all about the music. That groove is infectious, and it is, “what it is, what it is, what it is” as the background vocals echo. It’s one of the funkiest records Aretha ever cut, and lives up to every bit of the “funky and low down feeling” she describes in the lyrics. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EiB8_PpWedk 

Though her relationship with Ken Cunningham and the birth of Kecalf informed this body of work, a chunk of this album have hinged on another man. Aretha’s affair with the Temptations’ Dennis Edwards began sometime around when her marriage to Ted White began to dissolve. Their short, torrid affair inspired the other two Aretha compositions on Young, Gifted and Black: the classic “Day Dreaming” and the underrated “All The King’s Horses.” This pair of songs bookends their affair, and it’s not unlikely that the affair informed some of the other material and the emotion Aretha put behind it. 

She literally ascends into her dreamy musings on Edwards in “Day Dreaming,” one of the most beautiful love songs she wrote and recorded. It epitomizes romance budding on a breezy spring day. She takes a classic nursery rhyme and applies it to the end of she and Edwards on “All The Kings Horse.” It swaps out Humpty Dumpty for their hearts, as the object beyond repair. The verses are just as dreamy as “Day Dreaming,” but as the “walls started shaking” the dream screeches to a stop and the music starts to tremble. The song only has one short verse, and it’s filled out by Aretha lingering on the finality of their breakup.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8GFDUWzWP9A 

If “Day Dreaming” and “All The King’s Horses” bookended Aretha’s affair with Dennis Edwards, Dionne Warwick’s “April Fools” and the Delfonics’ “Didn’t I (Blow Your Mind This Time)” are their connectors. On “April Fools,” the dream is over and she ponders the vitality of their relationship. The song alternates between zipping, fast-paced verses and sweeping, pensive choruses. It sounds as though she lets the thoughts run through her head and then pauses to marinate on them. 

On “Didn’t I,” she strips away the soulful Philly pop of the original and funks it up. Elements of background arrangement maintain the essence of the Delfonics, but echo Aretha’s lead vocal instead of accompanying it. On top of that, she injects “yes you did”’s that transform the titular statement into a question “didn’t I blow your mind this time?” with a resounding answer. It’s straight up empowerment. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ueTpSEAfWbM 

As the Civil Rights movement wound down, Aretha also seized this moment and got more overtly political in her music. Prior to the album’s release, she made headlines for offering to pay Angela Davis’ bail, and doubled down by seizing Nina Simone’s “To Be Young, Gifted, and Black” The title was shortened, the song was lengthened, and it became the album’s very fitting title. With a gorgeous introduction that plays like a gospel testimonial, she infuses a touch of funk and a gospel influenced rhythm into Nina’s prideful declaration and call to action. Aretha also makes the decision to cut lyrics that are specific to Nina’s experience and removes all the “I”’s except one: She changes the final line of the opening from “open your heart to what I mean” to “open your heart is all I need.” In that minor lyrical change, she transforms the song from an explanation to an opportunity to shift perspective. This is Aretha, ministering. It’s genius, complimenting genius. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-LrGW6cmSIc 

A sentiment of “press on” permeates from Aretha’s piano accompaniment on her fourth Beatles cover, the originally melancholic “The Long and Winding Road.” She might as well just be singing “persevere” over and over again. Even though that’s not the subject of the song, every note she sings seems to imply it. There’s an unsaid sense that the road may be long, but it’s worth traveling. It could even be said that she’s singing to God. 

Elton John’s “Border Song (Holy Moses)” closes the album in fantastic fashion. It feels like a call to action when Aretha delivers it with gospel fervor. Interestingly, the single version uses dual lead vocal tracks for the majority of the record. One Aretha is enough, but two?! It’s a powerful force. There’s only one known performance of the song, and it’s every bit as good as the record. In 1993, Aretha sat down across from Elton and the two played and sang their way through the song together for the first and only time. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pHhW-lWWxbo 

Four additional cuts from the album’s sessions were also released. A heartfelt cover of Vivian Green’s “Lean On Me” was crucial enough to be issued as the b-side to non-album cut “Spanish Harlem” in 1971. It sounds right at home alongside the other material from the album, sonically and topically and could have easily been worked in. Aretha poured her everything and pushed her voice to it’s on  this declaration of unwavering support. It came into the digital age along with three other b-sides on 2007’s Rare and Unreleased Recordings from the Golden Age of the Queen of Soul. In addition to the four b-sides, 2021 saw the release of a few alternate takes from Young, Gifted and Black on the ARETHA box set. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bSV3ZTJqjrI 

She also covered Edna McGriff’s “Heavenly Father,” at Jerry Wexler’s suggestion. It didn’t make the album because as Jerry told David Ritz in 2014’s Respect: The Life of Aretha Franklin, Aretha felt it “didn’t belong on a pop album,” which he didn’t argue with at the time. One Aretha original also fell in with these covers, “I Need A Strong Man (The To-To Song).” It sounds like it may just be a demo. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wg0VXK_RNf8 

“My Cup Runneth Over” was another cover recorded during these sessions. Originally written for the 1966 Broadway musical I Do, I Do!, it was a hit on the pop charts for Ed Ames in 1967. Though it wasn’t released until 2007, it was one of the only b-sides Aretha ever sang live. One of the many times I saw Aretha live was at New Jersey Performing Arts Center in March 2015. It was one of the best Aretha shows I saw. It was also a heavy Young, Gifted and Black evening, which saw her performing “Day Dreaming” and “Oh Me Oh My (I’m A Fool For You Baby)” (which may have been the final live performance of the latter). When she reached the point of the show where she sat at the piano to obliterate the audience on an even higher level, something came over her and she began to sing “My Cup Runneth Over.” The band hadn’t even rehearsed on it. Whatever came over her stuck though, and the song became a mainstay in her live show from there on out; she performed it at most of her final concerts. It’s possible that this was the very first time she performed it live. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jj9QedT305o  

The legacy of Young, Gifted and Black demands that it be taken as one of the best Aretha albums. Rolling Stone named it among their 500 Greatest Albums of All Time. It also won the Grammy Award for Best Female R&B Vocal Performance in 1973, becoming the first album to win in the category. It also marked Aretha’s sixth consecutive win in the category, which she was sole winner of from its inception in 1968 until another artist finally won in 1976. 

I’ve been calling Young, Gifted and Black my favorite Aretha album for a good few years now. It’s always easy for me to put it on and just let it play through. The optimism Aretha projects even in the face of heartbreak always seems to be a bright spot for me. She sang her full and bursting heart out on every record she cut during these sessions. It is a crucial piece of Aretha’s discography, and an essential listen for anyone who wants to understand her music.

Listen to all the released recordings from the Young, Gifted and Black sessions: 

The post Aretha Franklin’s Young, Gifted and Black Turns 50 appeared first on THE 97.

VOLUME 5, CURATED BY ANDREW

How do you boil Christmas down to just 97 minutes? Maybe I’m not the best person to ask. I make the annual Christmas day playlist since my family hosts Christmas. That playlist clocks in around 8 hours and I struggle to get everything into that playlist. That aside, there are a few Christmas cuts that are crucial to my annual Christmas listening. My playlist mixes nostalgia-fueled cuts together with the songs I’ve found on my own over the years that resonate with me. It’s largely a mix of gospel and pop with a few touches of jazz and R&B.

Things open with the underrated pop perfection that is Kylie Minogue’s “Christmas Isn’t Christmas ‘Til You Get Here” (if you’ve never heard her Christmas album, don’t hesitate on working it into your rotation). From there the playlist cruises through the necessary Mariah, Aretha, and Nat King Cole which marries my own finds (the former) with classics I’ve been listening to since before I can remember (the latter). Mary J. Blige jumps in to do her best Ella Fitzgerald on “Rudolph The Red Nosed Reindeer.” Otis Redding follows with his holiest moans for a “White Christmas.” Vanessa Williams croons over a spirited contemporary jazz rendition of “Hark The Herald Angels Sing,” which leads the way for Celine Dion to deliver her brilliant original, “The Magic Of Christmas Day (God Bless Us Everyone).”

The fare is largely similar from there on out, but a few other cuts are worth noting. Aretha Franklin’s take on “Silent Night” originally appeared on her 2008 Christmas LP, but a decade later marked her first posthumous release just two months after her death as stripped back with just Aretha’s vocal and piano accompaniment. It’s haunting. My favorite contemporary song, “Where Are You Christmas” by Faith Hill also surges through, as does Donna Summer’s understated “White Christmas,” one of the only cuts to appear on the playlist twice. Things close with Aretha delivering the most hysterical take on “‘Twas The Night Before Christmas” that you’ve ever heard. Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good soundtrack!

LISTEN TO ANDREW’S 97 MINUTES OF CHRISTMAS

Also available on: Apple Music – Tidal

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1980’s Aretha put significant distance between 1979’s lackluster, disco-influenced La Diva, but Love All The Hurt Away made a more conscious effort to contemporize Aretha’s sound. That was the goal of signing with Clive Davis after all: Continuing to find hits. He’d already had success revitalizing Dionne Warwick’s career. Aretha hoped she could achieve a similar, or even bigger resurgence. And while it didn’t arrive entirely with Love All The Hurt Away, she began moving the needle back towards prominence. 

Love All The Hurt Away wasn’t a chart smash (it peaked at number 36 on the Billboard 200 and number 4 on the R&B chart), but it got Aretha back to the winner’s circle. Her explosive cover of Sam & Dave’s “Hold On I’m Comin’” earned a Grammy Award in 1982, her first win since 1975. It also served as momentum for what was to come.

After Chuck Jackson (of Natalie Cole fame) and her old collaborator Arif Mardin split production duties on 1980’s Aretha, Arif was reenlisted and dubbed Love All The Hurt Away’s sole producer. Aretha also co-produced three of the album’s ten cuts. The album forged together soul, pop, funk, and jazz fusion on an array of original compositions and covers that focus thematically on shades of love, perseverance, and empowerment. 

Aretha continued her work here with a number of session musicians who came into the mix during 1980’s Aretha sessions. Among them, a budding David Foster once again contributed keyboards to a few tracks, and Toto members David Paich, Steve Lukather, and Jeff Porcaro all returned and made larger contributions. Bassist Marcus Miller can also be heard on a few tracks, a precursor to the extensive work he was about to do with Aretha on her following two albums with Luther Vandross. On the background vocals, Aretha continued her reunion with Cissy Houston and The Sweet Inspirations on about half the album. The legendary Darlene Love also joined the Sweet Inspirations on those tracks. 

Love All The Hurt Away was named after it’s opening cut, which was also Aretha’s first major duet. She paired up with George Benson for a smooth and sensuous record which was recorded “round about midnight… (full of) atmosphere. The lights were down low, and we just kind of got into a groove and had a good time,” Aretha described to Mark Bego. It’s a grown-and-sexy record describing a union that comes with baggage, and a heavy dose of love and cognizance to heal past traumas. Aretha always kept it fun when she performed the song. Since George was rarely with her for live performances, she playfully flexed her range and imitation skills by doing George’s part. 

Aretha was still in fantastic voice on Love All The Hurt Away, and two of the album’s covers highlight her vocal strength. Her emphatic and spastic cover of Sam and Dave’s “Hold On I’m Comin” is a supercharged vocal tour de force. It surges to life with a brash brass section, which yields to the plucking of Marcus Miller on the bass. After almost a minute-long introduction, the piano kicks in and Aretha lets out an extended run on a “yeah.” 

The arrangement crafted by Arif breaks this classic record even further open time-wise to allow Aretha room to lay down the verses as she pleases, with minimal restriction. It gives Aretha freedom like a gospel record does, where a phrase can be extended into as many bars as the Lord sees fit. Everything tightens up for the chorus, where Aretha issues jaw-dropping wailing orders to “hold on!” She’s exuberant, full of grit and soul. She sounds hungry for that next hit. But she’s playful too, laying down a bewildering spoken word part that may even classify as early rap. In a cool voice recites pieces of Mother Goose rhymes Little Jack Horner and The Queen of Hearts, and then jumps right back into wailing away.  

She also seizes Diana Ross’ 1980 hit “It’s My Turn.” According to David Ritz’s Respect: The Life of Aretha Franklin, when her collaborators resisted her desire to cover Diana’s recent hit, she brushed off their concerns and said “I don’t care… it’s my turn.” It wasn’t an exaggeration. In her autobiography Aretha: From These Roots she echoed that same sentiment and frankly, she was right. Her cover of “It’s My Turn” is among the best things Aretha did in the 80’s. Anchored by Aretha at the piano, it elicits one of the most emotive performances from Aretha during this period. She dials back the tempo and draws out the intro while at the piano, flourishing her vocal with her own background arrangement performed by the best of the best: Cissy Houston’s Sweet Inspirations, Darlene Love, and Margaret Branch, who’d been backing Aretha up since 1970.

A spirited cover of The Rolling Stones’ “You Can’t Always Get What You Want” boasts a staggering six background singers, it also features a choir directed by Aretha’s old friend and mentor the Reverend James Cleveland. In fact, three members of the Southern California Community Choir who backed Aretha up on 1972’s magnanimous Amazing Grace are part of this choir: Alonzo Athens/Atkins, Betty Hollins, and Esther McIssac. 

“Truth And Honesty,” which would classify as yacht-rock by today’s standards, is another standout cut. It’s warm and embracing, with vibrant bouncing guitar from Toto’s Steve Lukather and bass from Marcus Miller. Once again, Aretha drives the show from the acoustic piano. It follows a similar theme to the album’s title track: the song calls for open and honest communication in a relationship, optimistic that truth and honesty can repair a fracturing relationship. 

She serves up some electric funk on “Living In The Streets”, which sounds like zipping through the nighttime neon streets of 1980’s New York City and reassesses herself and relationship on “There’s A Star For Everyone.” Aretha is modestly boastful on “Whole Lot Of Me” and adoring on “Kind Of Man,” the two songs she wrote. 

On the album’s big ballad “Search On,” Aretha plays the encouraging and reassuring friend. Written by Rod Temperton, it feels like an arm extending outwards towards the horizon of possibility for the heartbroken and love-jaded. “You’ve been hurt by love, and it’s changed the way you feel,” she observes, before motivationally urging “search on for love, and try not to let the search get you down, someday you’ll find it.” 

It’s impossible to shine a light on this album without acknowledging the album cover. Conceptualized by Aretha, the photo serves up a heavy dose of old Hollywood glamour and elegance, with Aretha perched atop a caravan of luggage. One bag even reads “The Blues Brothers Chicago-LA, 1979-80” in a nod to her recent Hollywood debut in 1980’s The Blues Brothers. Legendary photographer George Hurrell shot “many of the legendary ladies of the screen, in what was called ‘Hollywood’s Golden Era,’ Aretha explained to biographer Mark Bego in Aretha Franklin: The Queen Of Soul, “and naturally he had to photograph moi!” she laughed. Indeed, Hurrell is credited with setting the standard for the Hollywood glamour portrait. It stands as one of her most gorgeous album covers ever. 

In 2012, Big Break Records reissued Love All The Hurt Away on CD with 3 bonus mixes that were previously unavailable on CD.  

Listen to Love All The Hurt Away:

Sources

“Back On Track.” Respect: The Life of Aretha Franklin, by David Ritz, Little, Brown, 2014, pp. 331–333. 

“Aretha Jumps To It.” Aretha Franklin: The Queen of Soul, by Mark Bego, Gale, Cengage Learning, 2012, pp. 197–199. 

“‘You’ve Got To Hold On.’” Aretha: From These Roots, by Aretha Franklin and David Ritz, Villard, 1999, pp. 191–191.

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After a notable resurgence in the 80’s at the hands of Narada Michael Walden, it was time for a change. A slew of new producers assembled to lace Aretha with a fresh sound, along with a few veterans like Walden and Luther Vandross. The resulting What You See Is What You Sweat is one of the most diversely produced LPs of her career. Of the album’s 9 songs, 11 producers contribute. 

For it’s faults, What You See Is What You Sweat is undeniably and ironically cohesive. It largely shifts between new jack swing and adult contemporary R&B ballads of the time. While the new jack sound isn’t necessarily for Aretha, she could sing the phone book and be convincing. The ballads are mostly well-suited for her voice at the time. She’s reflective on these records, not outright heartbroken and down like her early Atlantic hits. There’s a sense of greater wisdom and experience in these songs. 

Aretha opened the album, and the era with a new jack swing take on Sly & The Family Stone’s “Everyday People.” It’s zesty, spirited, and fits the moment. The track was also fueled by a colorful, star-studded video with appearances from Naomi Campbell, Flavor Flav, Bryant Gumbel, Beverly Johnson, Donnie Simpson, and more.

A bigger draw for the album was Aretha’s collaboration with Michael McDonald. Though the two never collaborated before, Aretha cut an immensely underrated cover of “What A Fool Believes” on 1980’s Aretha. They may be together, but McDonald plays second fiddle to Aretha on this Siedah Garrett cover from 1987’s soundtrack to Baby Boom. It has all the hallmarks of an early 90’s R&B ballad. A video accompanied the song, as did a performance at the Grammy Awards.

Aretha keeps the new jack energy going on the album’s title track and “Mary Goes Round.” “What You See Is What You Sweat” is all about a man who’s never satisfied with what he has. The grass is always greener for him. Then there’s “Mary Goes Round,” which sounds like a musical cousin to Aretha’s take on A Different World’s theme song, recorded in 1988. Mary, the song’s focus, likes her men attached. She claws her way in, chews them up and spits them out, all for sport. They’re both solid tracks with strong replay value.  

The cover of “I Dreamed A Dream” from Les Misérables is a tragic misstep, despite all the incredible things she does to transform it. This gut-wrenching song that emphasizes a moment of mournful inflection almost becomes an anthem for perseverance. She purposely changes the lyric to “I had a dream,” clearly referencing Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Instead of following the idea that the dream is dead, she declares that “life will not kill the dreams that I dream.” 

For all the good of the lyrical changes, the arrangement of “I Dreamed A Dream” is overwrought with effects and production. Not to mention that Aretha’s voice was hitting rock bottom after decades of smoking. She delivers far from a definitive vocal on this immense song. Instead, it crumbles at the hands of producers and Aretha’s deteriorating voice. However, her 1993 performance of the song at Bill Clinton’s Inaugural Gala is one of Aretha’s definitive live performances. What a difference a year (or two) makes. 

“Someone Else’s Eyes,” is a much stronger ballad. Written by Burt Bacharach, Carole Bayer Sager, and Bruce Roberts, it’s a record about coming to terms with losing yourself in a relationship and recognizing the importance of self-love. This is Aretha with experience. She sings about taking control of what is inside of her, finding who she wants to be, and acknowledging the value of seeing herself as whole, even without a man. This is no “you’re a no-good heartbreaker.” Instead, it’s “I never realized, I can’t love you, I can’t love me, through someone else’s eyes.” It’s a palatable demonstration of growth. 

Her reunion with Luther Vandross is another misfire. “Doctor’s Orders” is just annoying. There’s even a mid-song rap, for no apparent reason aside from to elicit the question “is that Luther rapping?.” It’s disappointing that this is the only formal duet between these two musical titans and neither one is at their best. For all it lacks, it did earn the pair a Grammy nomination for Best R&B Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocal. 

Aretha sneaks in two of her own compositions at the end of the album, which had become something of a tradition by that time. The album closes with two songs written by Aretha, both refreshing in their own right. Aretha recruited Academy Award winner Michel Legrand to produce the closer, “What Did You Give.” She self-produced “You Can’t Take Me For Granted,” with a glittery harp-driven intro, and punctuating staccato-piano pre-chorus. The ballad directed towards the man she calls “the great love of my life” has a strong, catchy hook and makes a notable nod to her early Columbia recording “Sweet Bitter Love.” 

The album ends with an edited version of Shep Pettibone’s “Everyday Remix” of “Everyday People.” It’s an underwhelming inclusion because this edit is so close to the album version. Except for some slight percussion changes and one or two new lines from Aretha near the song’s conclusion, it’s basically the same, instrumentation and all. Also, be mindful that this is even more glaring because these versions open and close the album, playing back to back when the CD or stream is left on repeat.  Pettibone’s other mix, the “People Remix,” or it’s edit the “Hot Radio Remix” would have been a better selection because  they shed all the original instrumentation to incorporate new percussion and piano parts that give it a fresh house-driven sound to distinguish it from the album version.  

Despite the cohesive nature of the album, it didn’t connect with listeners. Aretha’s first album in the SoundScan era performed underwhelmingly, peaking at 153 on the Billboard 200. Though she appeared on a slew of soundtracks and other albums, Aretha wouldn’t release another album of her own until 1998’s A Rose Is Still A Rose. 

Listen to Aretha Franklin’s What You See Is What You Sweat:

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Fillmore West’s promoter Bill Graham badly wanted to book Aretha, but she wasn’t in his reach. Her ascension to success drove her booking fee up, and she was far beyond what he could afford for the 3,000 capacity venue. Jerry Wexler wanted her to play the venue too, and hatched a plan to make it happen. To offset Aretha’s booking fee, Atlantic Records would record the shows and release a live album. Though hesitant about the audience, Aretha agreed and the shows were on.

In order to properly engage this seemingly new audience, Aretha crafted a setlist that was true to her soul essence but mindful of the crowd she was venturing into. She brought some of her biggest hits, and some of the songs she anticipated to be their favorites. The show opened with an accelerated version of her hit “Respect,” easily the best way to engage a potentially foreign crowd. The tempo prepared the audience for the roller coaster ride she was about to take them on. Then she diverted into a series of covers that were tailor made to show her audience just what made her the Queen of Soul.

“Love The One You’re With” by Stephen Stills cracked the Billboard Hot 100’s top 15 less than two months before Aretha touched down in San Francisco. Aretha found herself “experimenting” with this folk record for the Fillmore crowd. It turned out to be the perfect song for Aretha to commandeer. With the backing of the King Curtis’ Kingpins brass section and emphasis on Billy Preston at the organ (coincidentally Preston inspired Stills to compose the song), Aretha demonstrates how she can take a song from another genre and infuse it with soul or “Aretha-ize” it, as she often called it. The audience’s emphatic whistles clearly indicate that her “experiment” was a success.

She applied similar rearrangements to The Beatles’ “Eleanor Rigby” and Bread’s “Make It With You.” “Eleanor Rigby” was one of two Beatles records Aretha covered on 1970’s This Girl’s In Love With You (“Let It Be,” which was written for her, was the other). In the same vein as her studio recording, Aretha turns the Fab Four’s experimental sound into an upbeat and driving lament. She stays a little closer to the original tempo on “Make It With You,” but brings Bread’s starry-eyed arrangement back to earth. The Rhodes keyboard, Preston’s keyboards, brass section, and background vocals give Aretha’s soulful voice room to make the record a more emphatic interpretation of the lyrics. It’s still dreamy, but it feels urgent. And as Aretha directed the audience before launching into “Eleanor Rigby,” “don’t fight the feeling.”

Throughout the performances, Aretha rotates on and off of the Fender Rhodes electric piano (she played piano the first night, but those performances weren’t included on Aretha Live At Fillmore West). During a few key moments she cements her importance not just a vocalist, but also as a pianist. When Aretha plays and sings at the same time, she rockets to a height beyond the dizzying altitude where she already exists purely as a singer. When she’s playing, the connection she creates with the music is transcendent, and her style is unmistakable. Aretha’s keyboard is part Art Tatum, part Rev. James Cleveland, and all self-taught genius.

One of these key moments comes when Aretha debuts her towering cover of Simon and Garfunkel’s “Bridge Over Troubled Water.” Though she recorded it in August of 1970, the Fillmore West marked her debut performance of the duo’s hit. Two weeks after Fillmore West she’d ignite the Grammy Awards and debut her version to the world. Aretha’s “Bridge” would go on to top the R&B charts 3 days after Aretha Live At Fillmore West was released in May 1971 and win its own Grammy Award in 1972 for Best Female R&B Vocal Performance.

The Fillmore West audience didn’t know what hit them. Aretha’s version of “Bridge Over Troubled Water” floats in on a sweeping and definitive rearrangement. Her new and extended introduction is complete with background vocal parts and a mesmerizing piano solo by Aretha. She infuses the song with the true gospel essence that inspired Paul Simon to write the song in the first place. This is a pivotal moment, as Aretha’s voice fervently ascends amidst her affirmation that she will be right there, through whatever.

This was only Aretha’s second live album, but it still demonstrates the immensity of experiencing Aretha in a live setting. Nothing better reinforces this than the transformation “Dr. Feelgood” undergoes before the audience’s eyes and ears. Written by Aretha and driven by a bluesy rhythm, “Dr. Feelgood (Love Is A Serious Business)” clocks in at a modest 3:23 on her 1967 Atlantic debut album I Never Loved A Man The Way I Love You. On Aretha Live At Fillmore West though, it’s a 7-minute experience. This live arrangement dials back the tempo, giving Aretha room to simmer into a rolling boil. As she prepares to deliver the song’s sixth and seventh words “sittin’ around,” she stays on the “s” of “sittin'” and elongates it into a slithering hiss. By the time she gets the “ittin’” out, she sounds like a teapot that’s just reached its boiling point. It’s bone-chilling. Then, her syncopated delivery of the second “ev-er-y-on-ce-in-a-great-while” is so intense it drives the audience into a frenzy, only to be heightened by the moans that follow. By the time Aretha reaches the chorus’ “don’t send me no doctor,” the audience is singing and screaming along with every word.

Any fear Aretha had about not belonging in front of this crowd was gone by the end of this 7-minute revival. Clearly she had no reason to fear this crowd. She gets so comfortable at this point in the show that she begins to testify and minister, just like her father Rev. C.L. Franklin. She unleashes runs and worried notes with a ferocity only matched on 1972’s Amazing Grace. Aretha may not have performed any gospel records during this show, but moments like this cement the constant presence of gospel within her and her music.

The final night’s show ended with a surprise to the entire venue, Aretha included. Ray Charles was in town and decided to catch the show, with the intention of remaining an audience member only. Once Aretha caught wind of Ray’s presence, that went right out the window. After closing with a rousing version of “Spirit In The Dark,” Aretha ventured into the audience and brought Ray on stage.

“I’ve discovered Ray Charles!” Aretha proclaimed in a nod to a recent Flip Wilson bit. The two jammed together on an extended reprise of “Spirit In The Dark.” When Aretha sits Ray at the piano and elicits a keyboard solo out of him, which the audience goes wild for. Despite the magnitude of the moment, it almost didn’t make the album. Ray initially resisted the release of the recording because it was so off the cuff. He didn’t know the lyrics and wasn’t crazy about his freestyled contributions. Thankfully Jerry Wexler managed to sway Ray by highlighting the gravity of him and Aretha performing together.

After Ray departed the stage, Aretha momentarily acknowledged her fear of the crowd by saying “I would like to say before we leave that, you have been much more than I could have ever expected.” Though “Spirit In The Dark” was her encore on the first two nights, Aretha decided to close her final performance with an additional song. She took Diana Ross’ debut solo single from 1970, “Reach Out And Touch (Somebody’s Hand)” to reach her audience one last time. Aretha preached a call to action that her audience could undoubtedly identify with: “Reach out and touch someone’s hand. Make this world a better place if you can.”

For further listening, the complete performances from all 3 nights at the Fillmore West were released in 2005. Don’t Fight The Feeling: The Complete Aretha Franklin & King Curtis at Fillmore West was a limited 5,000 4-CD run, but has since been added to streaming services. It highlights the first-night set where Aretha plays piano instead of the Rhodes, as well as a 1-time cover of “Mixed Up Girl.” Stellar renditions of “Call Me,” “You’re All I Need To Get By,” and “Share Your Love With Me” from each night are so good they’re a further testament to the immensity of these shows. Because any other circumstance, you’d be a fool to leave such strong performances in the vault for 30 years.

Listen to Aretha Live at Fillmore West:

Source

Respect: The Life of Aretha Franklin, by David Ritz, Little, Brown & Company, 2014, pp. 234–238.

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After a few listens, the album didn’t exactly stick. It was all over the place. On top of that, a production issue caused a glitch on the cd with one song, making that track unlistenable. Wal Mart had to release the song as a free download in an attempt to remedy the problem. The reviews ran the gamut. One reviewer expressed gratitude just to hear Aretha’s voice on record again after her recent and mysterious surgery/illness. Another was less kind, saying the album “(appeared) to indulge every wrong musical instinct Franklin has ever had” and was “a muddy-sounding hot mess of an album.” The album barely charted and yielded no hits. After nearly 6 years, Aretha delivered a dud.

Aretha: A Woman Falling Out Of Love is one of the most difficult Aretha albums for me to put words together about. It became her penultimate release, and final Aretha Franklin album containing original material. The album was delayed for years, and ranks among her weakest bodies of work. As with all her albums though, it does contain a few strong tracks that hint at what could have been. 

Aretha first teased this project in the spring of 2005. At a show in Tennessee she announced that her new LP Aretha: A Woman In Love, would arrive in June. “Let me tell you, when it’s good, it’s good,” Aretha mused to the audience, referring to the title. After announcing the album she performed a new song she’d written for the album called “I Adore You and I Abhor You.” 

“I Adore You and I Abhor You” became a mainstay in her setlist until 2011, but was abruptly excluded from the album. At some point along the line she began introducing the song with an updated album title: Aretha: A Woman Falling Out Of Love. She would emphasize the “out” when she said the title. Here’s audio I recorded of the song at a 2010 show in Philadelphia: 

For all the waiting and teasing, the album’s final content and sequencing don’t reflect either title. There are love songs and there are heartbreak records but they’re thrown together haphazardly, muddying the good and emphasizing the bad. 

On the good side, Aretha delivers some stellar scatting as she glides over the dismissive smooth jazz of “U Can’t See Me.” She details the ebbs and flows of an on-again-off-again relationship on the reflective and melodically captivating “Put It Back Together Again.” And she’s brightly optimistic on “New Day,” which would have made a fantastic opening cut. 

But Aretha’s really at her best when she goes to church. Alongside the divine Karen Clark-Sheard, Aretha takes “Faithful” to astronomical heights. It’s easily the best cut on the album. Anyone who knows anything about Aretha’s gospel performances won’t be surprised by that. It’s more than just the fact that this is a gospel track, though. Kudos are more than due to Richard Smallwood for crafting the perfect gospel record for Aretha in this era. After a life lived and many storms weathered, what could better encapsulate Aretha other than “faithful”? It’s the one thing Aretha carried with her to her final days: her faith. 

She also digs her heels into a sizzling cover of BB King’s “Sweet Sixteen.” It’s the first blues song Aretha’s recorded in decades, and it’s long overdue. Some of her best records are blues records (“I Never Loved A Man (The Way I Loved You)” and “Dr. Feelgood”). She freestyles some of the lyrics to truly make it her own, dedicating a verse to her brother Vaughn who served in Korea and Vietnam. As the song builds she vocally delivers some of her best runs and leaves nothing in her wake. 

For the good though, there’s also the terrible. Her covers on “A Summer Place” and “The Way We Were” are a sequenced one-two punch of bad and worse. “A Summer Place” maintains the styling of Percy Faith’s original and classic instrumental, but it’s out of place amidst this mix of adult contemporary R&B and jazz and the melisma is a bit dizzying. Kudos to Billy Dee Williams for his spoken-word contribution, though. 

Nothing is worse than the reading of “The Way We Were” featuring Ron Isley. The reverb is at its max, the melisma is at a point of no return, and to call it overly-schmaltzy would be disrespectful to overly-schmaltzy records. Nobody wants or needs to hear these two sing this song with this arrangement. It’s hard to listen to a decade later, even for this die-hard Aretha appreciator. It’s the antithesis of the pair’s brilliant and sentimental 2010 cover of Carole King’s “You’ve Got A Friend.” 

Then there’s the perplexing inclusion of her son Eddie singing a 6-minute rendition of “His Eye Is On The Sparrow.” Aretha accompanies him on the piano (and can be heard responding in a few spots if you listen closely). He has a great voice. But I found myself wondering why I was hearing him for 6 minutes in the middle of an album I’ve been waiting 6 years to hear? There’s no reason for this to be here.  

The album closes with a bonus: Aretha’s “preferred” version of her show-stopping “My Country ‘Tis Of Thee” from the 2009 inauguration ceremony of President Barack Obama. It’s a fitting close to this perplexing and oft-disappointing body of work from The Queen of Soul. (This version is not currently streaming, but can be previewed and purchased digitally on Amazon) 

There’s also a treasure trove of unreleased material that never made the album and has never been released. There’s the title track “A Woman Falling Out Of Love,” which Aretha said is a duet with Faith Hill. Shirley Caesar appeared on a radio program not long after Aretha’s passing and debuted a record that the two of them recorded entitled “Friends.” There is no recording of the broadcast so the song has never been replayed. But according to Pastor Caesar, the song was written by Ray Charles and originally intended as a duet between Aretha and Ray. Yolanda Adams’ “Open Your Heart,” and “Better Than Gold” were both performed live under the banner of being part of the LP but excluded from the final product. Aretha also name-dropped a song titled “Tell Me You Love Me Again” And of course there was the oft-performed “I Adore You And I Abhor You.”

Aretha: A Woman Falling Out Of Love remains understandably overlooked in the Aretha Franklin canon. It was only physically available at WalMart and while it’s currently available to purchase through their website, it’s likely just remaining stock from a decade ago. It was digitally available to purchase for a period of time, but has since been removed and has never been licensed for streaming services. Seek it out at your own convenience. One final note: while working on this retrospective, I edited and resequenced the LP. What I found was that by editing the tracklist it created a more cohesive and digestible listening experience. The re-organized track list is below, for those interested. It’s an easier, softer way to take in this LP. 

1. New Day
2. Sweet Sixteen
3. How Long I’ve Waited
4. When 2 Become One
5. U Can’t See Me
6. This You Should Know
7. Faithful (with Karen Clark Sheard)
8. Put It Back Together Again
9. My Country ‘Tis Of Thee (Bonus Track)

Aretha: A Woman Falling Out Of Love is available for purchase though WalMart.

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“You Light Up My Life” 

This only reached the masses via YouTube in 2019, and has never been officially released. Recorded in 1977, this cover was a contender for inclusion on 1977’s Sweet Passion LP, and Aretha even performed it live during that time period a few times. Unfortunately, it never made the album. But her transformation of the song is jarring. The delayed phrasing and the strength of her voice turn this coy caucasian moment into a full blown, life-or-death testimonial of illumination. And for all the squalling and wailing Aretha does, what brings chills to my body with each listen is the little “la-da-da-da” she coyly emotes at the end of the song. 

“Pledging My Love/ The Clock” 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1WTfbfi9tps

Aretha was known for her love of Johnny Ace, and covered his “Never Let Me Go” on 1967’s Aretha Arrives. This amalgam of two of his other hits was recorded in 1969/70, and relegated to the b-side of “Share Your Love With Me”. She manages to take the adamance “Pledging My Love” and seamlessly transition into the agonizing yearning of “The Clock”, at a moment’s notice. The songs sound as though they were meant to be together, even though Aretha was the first, and only one to ever marry them. 

“Without Love”  

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DSUTLDofTcw

In the late 70’s, the hits stopped coming for Aretha, but Aretha never stopped trying for them. The lead cut from 1974’s With Everything I Feel In Me was written by Aretha’s prolific sister Carolyn (“Angel”, “Ain’t No Way”). There’s something in the melody: it’s infectious without sacrificing any of it’s melancholy and yearning. It’s undoubtedly one of the best cuts from Aretha’s later years at Atlantic Records.

“Faithful”  

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_S9utf35tSE

On Aretha’s final album containing original material, she joined forces with gospel powerhouse Karen Clark-Sheard of The Clark Sisters. “Faithful” would turn out to be the last gospel song Aretha released. Written by Richard Smallwood especially for Aretha, it was featured on 2011’s Aretha: A Woman Falling Out Of Love. Pairing these two is sacred, and their voices together are heavenly. It’s hard to not feel a little faith and resilience after hearing Aretha and Karen on this one. 

“Springtime In New York” 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IYBQCq-cQnM 

This long-storied still-officially-unreleased cut from the 70’s hit the internet in 2019. Known only by name up to that point, it was recorded in June of 1974 during the sessions for With Everything I Feel In Me. Over nearly 8-minutes, Aretha bobs and weaves, meandering through the song’s movements. Most of the song is driven by Aretha’s hands at the piano, and she follows vocally, delivering an ode to springtime in a manner that musically is not unlike the way a testimonial might be given at her church. It’s very gospel, except for one moment where it picks up, and then about 3/4 of the way through where it turns into a jazzy, funky instrumental session.

“I Wanna Make It Up To You”  

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bRkReuJjX28

This duet between Aretha Franklin and Levi Stubbs from the Four Tops (with the rest of the Tops providing backing support) is tremendous. Written by Aretha and helmed by Luther Vandross, the chemistry between Aretha and Levi is powerful. The song has everything, vocal compatibility, that 80’s electric bass, powerhouse belting, and perhaps most iconic of all: a fake fade-out around the 6-minute mark. As the song fades, Aretha starts rallying “one more, one more, one more” and the fade reverses. Because, why not? And what Aretha says, goes.

“You Can’t Take Me For Granted” 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bPnjG-g0_xQ

Aretha’s 1991 LP What You See Is What You Sweat was something of a dud, but this Aretha-penned composition is one of the album’s bright spots. Aretha’s not at the piano this time, but the staccato chords in the pre-chorus accentuate the catchiness of the song. And though Aretha’s voice is at its most weathered from years of smoking, she’s still soulful as ever. Plus, the lyrical reference to one of Aretha’s most enduring cuts, “Sweet Bitter Love”, seals the deal. 

“I’m Your Speed” 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4CeihaaQjDo

The closing cut from 1978’s Almighty Fire is one of two Aretha songs that has no rhythm part to it. This one is just Aretha Franklin and the piano. It’s impossible not to hang on her every word she sings, taking her time and driving the song exactly as she chooses.

“Never Leave You Again” 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wkz89-52qHo

Aretha teamed up with Diddy (still Puff Daddy at the time) for a little extra flavor on her 1998 hip hop-tinged A Rose Is Still A Rose. Not only is she in a stellar voice, but she launches the ballad into another stratosphere as she starts scatting at the end of the track. 

“If I Lose” 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7u2ql-sT6QU

Aretha’s sporadic soundtrack contributions of the 90’s don’t get their rightful consideration. And this one is too good to miss. Aretha revisits the jazzy roots she planted pre-fame at Columbia Records in the early 1960’s for this cut from 1992’s White Men Can’t Jump. The song was written just for her by the film’s director and musical director. They were hellbent on Aretha participating in the soundtrack, and lending her voice to a pivotal moment in the film. She glides over this like a breath of fresh air, fresh off an album that was very trendy and not very successful.

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