Macca At The Mecca

Fifty-three years after his boyhood idol Buddy Holly played the Apollo Theater in Harlem, Paul McCartney finally took the stage last night at one of the most famous music venues in the world.
In its review of the show, The New York Times reported that Macca told the audience, "It's the holy grail. I dreamed of playing here many a year."

McCartney follows in the footsteps of a pantheon of stars who have graced the venerable space that first came to prominence in the Harlem Renaissance of the pre-World War Two years: Ella Fitzgerald. Sarah Vaughan. Billie Holliday. Chuck Berry. Sam Cooke. James Brown. The Supremes. Marvin Gaye. Stevie Wonder. Aretha Franklin.

The concert on Monday night was heavy on the hits - both The Beatles and Wings - as expected. But The Cute One bowed in reverence to the occasion by pulling out Marvin Gaye's "Hitch Hike," a Motown tune that The Fabs took a swing at in their "back to basics" Let It Be sessions. With six women behind him on a platform dancing go-go style, "it was going pretty well . . . then the house speakers turned off, only the stage monitors were audible, and a screech of feedback made Mr. McCartney recoil."

Perhaps recognizing the ghosts of the Apollo's luminous past at work, the band leader rebooted and ordered his mates to take it from the top. After all, McCartney has been playing American rhythm and blues since he was 15, when he first appeared on stage singing Little Richard's "Long Tall Sally." Even at the ripe age of 68, another take was natural for the eternal Beatle boy from Liverpool who still loves the beat.

Marvin Gaye, 2 April 1939 - 1 April 1984

"I hope to refine music, study it, try to find some area that I can unlock. I don't quite know how to explain it but it's there. These can't be the only notes in the world, there's got to be other notes some place, in some dimension, between the cracks on the piano keys."

Marvin Pentz Gay, Jr

Aretha Franklin Film To Be Released - 38 Years Later

On January 12 & 13, 1972, Aretha Franklin entered the New Temple Missionary Baptist Church in Los Angeles and sang spirituals, just as the "Queen of Soul" had done since she was a youngster growing up in Detroit. The result was the double album Amazing Grace, which is still the biggest selling gospel record of all-time (it went double platinum and won a Grammy in 1972).

Given the box office success of Woodstock and Gimme Shelter, Warner Brothers (owners of Aretha's label, Atlantic Records) was keen on producing a documentary of the performances. The studio hired a young director named Sydney Pollack for the job. Pollack was an up-and-comer in the film game, with They Shoot Horses, Don't They? to his credit.

Footage was captured by Pollack and three other cameramen and the job of editing was set to begin when Warners pulled the plug on the project, claiming audiences would not turn out for such secular subject matter.

More than 20 hours of film was vaulted away for 38 years. Only snippets have been seen by the public at large (in an "American Masters" episode on PBS in 1988). Pollack tried to have the project resurrected a number of times, as did famed Atlantic producer Jerry Wexler. Both passed away over the last two years.

Fortunately, Pollack - who would go on to be an Academy Award winning director - left copious notes with regard to the 16mm footage, and the end result will be soon released on DVD, labeled "a film by Sydney Pollack." Noted author David Ritz (who co-wrote Aretha's autobiography and also authored the definitive biography of Marvin Gaye) has apparently seen most of the canisters of film. "It's the perfect music, an artist at her height, everybody there to make her feel confident and loved, the music of her childhood and the encouragement of the African-American church," says Ritz. He reports that Rev. Alexander Hamilton is seen conducting the gospel choir and is accompanied on the piano by his boss, the gospel giant Rev. James Cleveland. In the audience is Aretha's father, Rev. C. L. Franklin and her mentor, Clara Ward. And Mick Jagger is in one of the pews clapping along.

The song selections are mainly spiritual standards, with a couple of modern compositions (Gaye's "Wholy Holy" and Carole King's "You've Got A Friend").

Hamilton says he's happy the film may finally be released: "Maybe because it's history now. Here is one of the most famous artists in the world, as she was then, doing something that nobody had ever done, or has really done since. So I think the film is going to find a wider audience, not just because of its gospel roots, but because of its historical value."

No release date as of yet, but here is the trailer to Amazing Grace. We dare you to sit still.

The Dictionary of Soul: James Jamerson

James Jamerson, pictured above, using "the hook" on his 1962 Fender electric bass, which he famously nicknamed "The Funk Machine."


He has been called the most influential electric bass player in the history of rock and roll by his peers. The most noted comments came in a 1995 interview, when Paul McCartney recalled his training on the instrument, saying "I started listening to other bass players, mainly Motown. As time went on, James Jamerson became my hero . . . because he was so good and melodic." Motown founder Barry Gordy described him as "a genius on the bass . . . an incredible improviser in the studio and somebody I always wanted on my sessions."

James "Igor" Jamerson was the undisputed anchor of the Motown house band known as "The Funk Brothers." With the drummers Benny Benjamin and Uriel Jones, the famously unknown rhythm section played on more number one hits than the Beatles. The Sound of Young America pumped out successful 45s throughout the 1960s with nary a session credit mentioned anywhere on record sleeves or newspaper stories. It took he 1988 book by Alan Slutsky on Jamerson and the subsequent excellent documentary Standing In The Shadows of Motown to bring Jamerson and other Funk Brothers to the forefront. [The story of Jamerson's recording of the bass lines on Marvin Gaye's What's Goin' On is worth a view of the movie alone.]


Jamerson died tragically at the young age of 45 in 1983. He was posthumously elected to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2000. It would have been his birthday today, so let's celebrate his genius by spinning a few of his most endearing performances:


Taken from the rarely seen documentary Save The Children, Marvin Gaye sings 'What's Goin' On" and "What's Happening Brother" in concert from 1973. About 2:30 into the clip, watch for Jamerson and observe his unique index finger bass playing style (known as "the hook").

Now isolate the bass on your stereo and marvel at the bass line Jamerson delivers on Stevie Wonder's smash "I Was Made To Love Her."




And one of the crowning achievements of the Motown catalog: The Four Tops sing "Bernadette" in 1967. Written by Holland-Dozier-Holland. Levi Stubbs on lead vocal. Jamerson scales the heights of the bass matching the driving beat of Benny Benjamin.