October 10, 2010
Solomon Burke...
"Solomon Burke, the larger-than-life "King of Rock and Soul," whose songs blended soul, gospel, country and R&B, died early Sunday at Amsterdam's Schiphol Airport at age 70."
ADDED: Another great gospel singer — Albertina Walker — died on Friday. She was 81. "I wanted to stand up before audiences and deliver the message, win souls for Christ. I wanted to touch dying men and slipping women."
And when I reach the pearly gates, He will remember me.
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13 comments:
If I had to die in an airport, Amsterdam's would be as good as any.
Phillipa Foot is standing on one trolley track and Solomon Burke is on the other.
The trolley is out of control and I am forced to save one or the other based on who has contributed the most to society.
I am not given the choice to yell at the stupid f*cks to get off of the trolley tracks or to derail the trolley.
Sorry Ms. Foot.
"It can hardly be a coincidence that no language on Earth has ever produced the phrase, 'as pretty as an airport.' Airports are ugly. Some are very ugly. Some attain a degree of ugliness that can only be the result of a special effort."
~ Douglas Adams, The Long Dark Tea-Time of the Soul
Christopher Hitchens gets all pissy about those selfish embryoes not saving him from years of smoking.
I want Hitchens to recover. I want life saving treatments through science. But there is a legitimate ethical argument against using embryoes for experimentation. There is an argument for it too, as Foot makes.
Inspired by Bob Dylan's "Blowin' in the Wind," Sam Cooke wrote "A Change Is Gonna Come," the definitive most soulful version performed by Solomon Burke.
"None of us are Free".
Well that's true.
Did the crazy stupid left-winger Crooks and Liars collective just explode?
Solomon Burke, one of the greats. In a song like "Cry To Me" for example he combines a really smooth delivery in the verses to heartbreaking effect Iespecially the line "in the night but there's no one" of the last verse) then moves to the grit, and in both cases his smooth delivery and grit would outclass most singers separately.
I've heard him described as a baritone, but on his smoother sounds he could easily be a tenor. Versatile and elastic voices like his are very hard to come by.
On the personal front, I love his lfe. He had twenty plus kids, was grossly overweight wore furs and was a bible thumping preacher. Compare someone like Burke to people talking about overpopulation and how we need to remove some excess, or people who get up in arms about someone wearing fur coats, or who keep talking about peoples carbon footprint (with the size of his family I can't imagine his footprint being small) and you realize what a bunch of life hating pussies a lot of modern society has become.
Solomon Burke was a seminal influence on one of my favorite artists Van Morrison. He mentions him by name in a few of his songs.
A great talent who is on Ipod along with AL Green, Bill Withers and the Stylistics when the wife lets me play my old man music.
Cry To Me
My Solomon Burke favorite, too, jr565. I was playing it the other day off my old "Dirty Dancing" album for my kids to hear. I re-attached my turntable to my stereo for the first time in over 10 years.
This just in: The Lord remembered Albertina Walker this morning, and requested to hear her sing some more.
I love black gospel music. Love that YT vid.
In happiness studies, guess who the happiest people in the country are?
Old black women. :-D
I have so much Gospel music on my iPod it's embarrassing. First because, as an atheist, it means I always have to explain why it's there - "it's brilliant music!" - when others (believers and non-believers) hear it, and then because I always have to explain why it's there - "it's brilliant music!" - when serious heads (modern music critics) are around and something classic, like Soloman Burke, comes on.
One way or another, Gospel always stops the show.
It's brilliant music!
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