Tracks: Introduction to James Brown//I'll Go Crazy//Try Me//Think//I Don't Mind//Lost Someone//Medley: Please, Please, Please, etc. //Night Train
So now ladies and gentlemen it is Star Time. Are you ready for Star Time? Thank you and thank you very kindly. It is indeed a great pleasure to present to you at this particular time national and international know as the hardest working man in show business...
A little soul, a little jazz, and now we are back round again to soul. Today we are getting down like James Brown. Or with James Brown. James Brown is the man making the music, and we are getting down alongside him in his particular manner. A manner which apparently involves lots of young women shrieking and making lewd, if the audience reaction captured on this recording is anything to go by (and we can only hope). Well can I believe it, too, as this may be the sexiest album ever recorded. And to think that the whole thing almost never came to be! Even though, at the time, everyone knew Brown’s real strength lay in his live act, the man himself was the only guy who thought it might be a good idea to actually record it. In the end, he told his label boss “To hell with you, Syd Nathan; I shall do it myself” and then he went off and recorded the album at his own expense, across three nights at the Apollo Theatre in New York. From that day forth, all sets on amateur night would be limited to no longer than ten minutes each.
Which is to say that this is a pretty great album. A lot of people argue (and their opinions are of course quite valid, though in fact they may be wrong) that this is the very best live album ever put to tape. I don’t know if that’s true, but then again it’s probably irrelevant anyway. If we compare with Sam Cooke (most obvious point of comparison) then we have a less ferocious, and considerably less raw, album here. However, James Brown’s album is by far the better recorded, and this is an important (and good thing) for one very big reason. In a word, James Brown’s band is tight. “Tight” tight. Imagine the tightest band you’ve ever heard, and then imagine it tighter. Do this even if you have heard James Brown’s backing band. His band is actually tighter than his own band. I don’t know how he managed it, but there you are. Possibly he had a gun under his cape. Then again, it’s more probably got something to do all the practice from his insane touring schedule, and the fact that Brown used to fine his musicians fifty dollars for every note they missed. I wonder what effect this approach would have had on a band like say... the Raincoats, perhaps?
The neat thing about the tightness of Brown is that it’s integral to his music. His twelve-piece band is very rhythmic in focus, and every single instrument is coming in right on time, playing a neat little phrase or soloing along perfectly against the beat. At this point James Brown was still the Godfather of Soul, not yet having been appointed Minister of The New New Super Heavy Funk (I believe George Clinton was prime-minister of that particular Parliament); as a consequence, the beats are more of the soul stomp or boogie-woogie variety, and we get a lot more throat-tearing ballads and plaintive crooning than one might expect from the singer of “Hot Pants”. Still, everything is just so damned well-executed. Things start-out slow, with a few nice ballads, then build-up to the insane jazzy groove of “Think” – which is one hell of a song, and makes me think I should be in a car chase in The Blues Brothers. The real strength of Brown as a singer was of course in his sense of rhythm, and he chants and claps hands like a loon across all two minutes of the song. Then we lull again, and the songs start stretching out, and we get a suit of beautiful ballads, the best of which is a full ten minutes long. “Lost Someone” is one of those wonderful songs that is filled with a massive amount of momentum, but which never actually goes anywhere. This may actually be my favourite sort of song, I should note – and in any case, it’s an obvious antecedent to Brown’s later, full-fledged funk (I also suspect Isaac Hayes may have taken a few pointers from this song). The band starts by running through the song as it was released as a single – a beautiful bit of gospel – and then extends the closing refrain seemingly indefinitely, riding on nothing but two gorgeous horn riffs and a six-note bass riff. And then Brown brings the audience in, basically making love to them through his song, asking them to cry “Yeah!” and having the hordes of young girls in attendance scream “YEAH!!!!” back, and every time right on the beat. And even if you are the straightest of men, you will cry "OWE!" and swoon for him when he calls for you to say "Owe". And you will envy the girls he starts singing to specifically. The way these guys – Cooke and Brown – bring the audience in as another instrument is just marvellous. I’ve never heard the studio version of the song but I can’t imagine it coming within a thousand miles of this. Brown almost breaking down into tears, croaking-out his pleas of “I’ll love you tomorrow!” Grunts and screams and the whole thing recycling itself over and again... It’s just such a wonderful song. I could listen to it all day. And then it ends, and out of nowhere it launches into the "Please, Please, Please" medley, a thunderstorm of hot and sweaty R&B. A+, James Brown and the Famous Flames. A+ indeed.
The sense of springing forward while standing still that I mentioned earlier is actually a part of what makes this album so great. Knowing what we know about Brown, the expectation is that things will get funky at some time or another. And, in fact, the whole rhythmic foundation of the band sounds like it’s on the verge of making the jump into on-the-one and break beats. But it never comes. And by the end of the album, which is only thirty-five minutes long, you’re left dazzled and energised with nowhere to go but back into the album again.
This is a truly wonderful record. In fact, I might even say that it’s better than Sam Cooke’s. I didn’t think that at first – in fact, on the first listen I considered it kind of so-so. Now, however, I’d regard it as a masterpiece of passionate concision. James Brown was a master showman, and this album is a collection of perfect songs, performed faultlessly and in exactly the right sequence. This isn’t a showy album – it doesn’t slap you in the face with its brilliance. It just quietly sidles in behind you when you’re not looking and then proceeds to kick your arse.
If you are reading this and you haven't heard this album, then drop what you are doing and acquire it at once.
9.5/10.
Download: James Brown - Lost Someone (Live at the Apollo) mp3
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