BELL BOTTOMS!
no more of this addressing brooklyn & p-fork drivel - WHAT THE HELL WAS JON SPENCER GOING ON ABOUT? Why was the first track on Orange (I think it was jsbx's 'commercial' breakthrough) an ode to Bell-bottoms? Except for the brief pop-disco revival that happened in the mid-90's (though maybe it was limited to Phx or even just Royal Palm Jr. High), have Bell-bottom pants ever been revived as cool?
Well regardless, more interesting to me is the not the Blues Explosion, but the Blues Brothers. The Akroyd/Belushi SNL duo backed by SNL band & soul luminaries such as Steve Cropper & Duck Dunn that spawned a movie, a couple of albums, a tour and a revival of interest in 50's & 60's R&B & Soul. Can you imagine such a (maybe shallow but) reverent movie about early Rock'n'Roll & Soul being made today? The movie featured James Brown, Aretha Franklin, Ray Charles, John Lee Hooker as well as other Major Major Soul/Blues artists. Apparently Peter Guralnick (in Sweet Soul Music - his book about Memphis Soul) disses the movie, and there is some stink of exploitation, but it honestly seems like Belushi/Akroyd started the Blues Brothers out of love for the music, and as SNL comedic performers it probably seemed like a reasonable way to do it. (Akroyd later went on to start the House of Blues) It's not reverent or deferential or stale, instead it's living, blasphemous, funny and a damn good time. And this seems totally in the spirit of the music itself, which was irrevent, salacious, slapstick, silly, serious, vulgar, sanctimonious, and wierd all at the same time. Why shouldn't a second order appreciation be any different?
Obviously they are two white (insider) guys copping the moves and sounds of (mostly) black musicians. Obviously they tread a dangerous line of co-opting, or attempting to bask in, the "authenticity" of soul music, or soul musicians, or the down-trodden lives of soul musicians. The whole thing of beauty created in the shadow of oppression. Importantly though I don't think 1) this is the story soul musicians tell of themselves, 2) this is not the story the music tells and 3) that's an even reasonable story to tell. Yes, the conditions of blacks in America (then and now) are lamentable and need to be addressed, but this doesn't make them victims. The dialog of authenticity says more about guilt and the position of the privileged than it does about soul musicians themselves.
What the Blues Brothers do is more sincere, and true to the form (in a limited way), than what any Blues or Soul archivist can do. And more to the point, Don't you think Aretha Franklin, James Brown and Ray Charles wanted to be in a Hollywood picture?
And damn it, the movie is a FUN TIME, that lets the music BE, but also has the great mainstream 80's comedy (Landis, Ramis, et al) feeling of fun & silliness & irreverence.
(The unspoken thing here being trying to understand, position my own tastes in 60's soul and funk. I'd think it fair to be on the same side as Elwood and Jake.)
Well regardless, more interesting to me is the not the Blues Explosion, but the Blues Brothers. The Akroyd/Belushi SNL duo backed by SNL band & soul luminaries such as Steve Cropper & Duck Dunn that spawned a movie, a couple of albums, a tour and a revival of interest in 50's & 60's R&B & Soul. Can you imagine such a (maybe shallow but) reverent movie about early Rock'n'Roll & Soul being made today? The movie featured James Brown, Aretha Franklin, Ray Charles, John Lee Hooker as well as other Major Major Soul/Blues artists. Apparently Peter Guralnick (in Sweet Soul Music - his book about Memphis Soul) disses the movie, and there is some stink of exploitation, but it honestly seems like Belushi/Akroyd started the Blues Brothers out of love for the music, and as SNL comedic performers it probably seemed like a reasonable way to do it. (Akroyd later went on to start the House of Blues) It's not reverent or deferential or stale, instead it's living, blasphemous, funny and a damn good time. And this seems totally in the spirit of the music itself, which was irrevent, salacious, slapstick, silly, serious, vulgar, sanctimonious, and wierd all at the same time. Why shouldn't a second order appreciation be any different?
Obviously they are two white (insider) guys copping the moves and sounds of (mostly) black musicians. Obviously they tread a dangerous line of co-opting, or attempting to bask in, the "authenticity" of soul music, or soul musicians, or the down-trodden lives of soul musicians. The whole thing of beauty created in the shadow of oppression. Importantly though I don't think 1) this is the story soul musicians tell of themselves, 2) this is not the story the music tells and 3) that's an even reasonable story to tell. Yes, the conditions of blacks in America (then and now) are lamentable and need to be addressed, but this doesn't make them victims. The dialog of authenticity says more about guilt and the position of the privileged than it does about soul musicians themselves.
What the Blues Brothers do is more sincere, and true to the form (in a limited way), than what any Blues or Soul archivist can do. And more to the point, Don't you think Aretha Franklin, James Brown and Ray Charles wanted to be in a Hollywood picture?
And damn it, the movie is a FUN TIME, that lets the music BE, but also has the great mainstream 80's comedy (Landis, Ramis, et al) feeling of fun & silliness & irreverence.
(The unspoken thing here being trying to understand, position my own tastes in 60's soul and funk. I'd think it fair to be on the same side as Elwood and Jake.)
posted by furtanic at 1:17 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home