Date: October 15, 2002 (release)
Release: Specialty #4437
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For nearly six years, Sam Cooke and the Soul Stirrers put religion in the hearts of all within earshot of their sanctified sounds. Theirs was a music that lightened your load and lifted your soul to heaven, spiriting away all the everyday hurts and hatreds long enough to make you honestly feel that God is love. Under the influence of Sam Cooke and the Soul Stirrers, even an agnostic sinner like me is able to see the light.

Formed in 1935, the Soul Stirrers played a big part in reshaping gospel music and taking it mainstream. They were among the first gospel groups to employ a rhythmic and bluesy sound—a sound that would not only come to define gospel, but also help lay the foundation for doo-wop, R&B, rock and soul. Had the legendary Sam Cooke never joined the quintet, the Soul Stirrers would still rightfully deserve their place of honor in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

But it was clearly with Cooke that the Soul Stirrers were able to reach their most powerful emotional heights. When they brought in the 19-year old Cooke to replace venerable singer R.H. Harris in 1950, they were taking a gamble on a relative unknown. One of eight sons of a Baptist preacher, the highly qualified Cooke soon put to rest any doubts about the decision. Cooke was not only blessed with the miracle of religious faith, but also with one of the greatest soul voices in history. The Soul Stirrers scored a major hit with their first record featuring Cooke on lead vocals, “Jesus Gave Me Water.” With his irresistible blend of movie-star looks and preacher’s son intensity, Cooke developed a massive following as the gospel circuit’s first golden-voiced sex symbol. From 1951 – 1957, Cooke led the group to national stardom with hit after hit, inspiring a generation of singers in the process.

The Complete Specialty Recordings of Sam Cooke collects all of the sides Sam Cooke recorded during his tenure with the Soul Stirrers, including numerous alternate takes, live songs, and a handful of solo cuts documenting his first foray into pop. A far cry from Cooke’s secular bubble-gum hits, this 3-CD, 84-song collection bursts with all the raw passion of a divinely inspired singer finding his own voice.

Disc 1 finds Cooke at his unpolished best, energetically belting out the gospel with surprising grit and fire. By Disc 2, Cooke is clearly on his way towards developing his trademark style, singing on such songs as “All Right Now” in his uniquely throbbing and sensual voice. By Disc 3, Cooke has fully come into his own—both as an ambitious songwriter (“Touch The Hem of His Garmet”) and as an incomparably versatile singer.

By the end of his run with the Soul Stirrers, it was clear that Cooke had huge crossover potential. Tempted to try his luck, Cooke left the group in 1957, finding enormous success in the profane world of pop music. But while he may have turned his back on a career in gospel, he always stayed true to his musical roots. From the sweet innocence of his first pop hit, “You Send Me,” to the courageous politics of his last, “A Change Is Gonna Come” Cooke never lost the gospel spirit embodied in his recordings with the Soul Stirrers. Among Cooke’s best, these sides capture the pure heart of soul music.

Date: August 19, 1969 – February 6, 1970
Release: COLUMBIA #65570
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I am here to report on a completely undocumented supernatural tragedy. At some unknown moment in the last thirty years, a violent rip in the Soul-Funk Continuum allowed The Best of Earth, Wind & Fire, Volume One to take root in everyone’s CD collection and sucked every other Earth, Wind & Fire recording into oblivion. Musicologists are already reacting with horror at the discovery, fully aware that a single-disc best-of package, no matter how jammed with huge pop-funk grooves, is a scientifically inadequate representation of a superfunk supernova like Earth, Wind & Fire. How will they account for the deep, delicious album tracks on hit-spawning discs like Spirit and I Am? Who will answer for the solid, sprawling jazz/funk excursions of Open Our Eyes or Last Days and Time?

None of the music on these two classics is found on Best of, Vol. 1. The big picture begins to emerge: This group was not a chart- busting flash-in-the-pan to be taken for granted as their greatest hits are thrown on at frat parties – Earth, Wind & Fire was the tremendously visionary and prolific disco-funk leviathan of the Seventies funk explosion, whose spiritual messages, monstrous grooves and spectacular stage shows led millions to Boogie Wonderland.

With this glorious, funkified chapter of music history secure, we turn in our books to page one: Earth, Wind & Fire’s self-titled debut is released, 1971. Long before the primetime dazzle of “Shining Star” or “Fantasy,” composer and percussionist Maurice White channeled smooth Motown R&B, James Brown chunk-a-funk, squealing guitars, gospel harmonies and his own afrocentric vibe into thirty minutes of absolutely exquisite soul-funk – groundbreaking, earthshaking and full of heart.

Long underappreciated, Earth, Wind & Fire is a breezy, humble, little masterpiece. Maurice, brother Verdine and eight other musicians crafted seven beautiful pieces of music as catchy and compelling as anything Earth, Wind & Fire has done since. If that sounds unlikely, click over to track two, turn the stereo up to eleven, grab hold of something and witness commanding horns, a hyper-elastic groove and subtly scorching vocals gel into a luminous cascade of organic funk.

The band got something huge out of “Moment of Truth,” something sweet and graceful and bright. “Fan the Fire” reaches equal levels of groove magic, again soaring on Sherry Scott’s penetrating vocal work. “Love is Life” and “This World Today” are enchanting soul ballads while “C’mon Children” builds towards a galloping, growling gospel-funk assault. The final track, a thoughtful funkstrumental that features their distinctive African hand drum the kalimba, functions as a “buckle-your-seatbelts” prologue for all that was coming. It works perfectly within the context of the group’s debut, as the other songs’ genuinely inspiring, hippie-vision lyrics evoke earth (“plant your pretty flowers, children”), wind (“somebody fan the fire”), and fire (“flame of love”). So let’s allow the pleasing, easy groovadelic vibe of Earth, Wind & Fire to begin repairing the broken link in the continuum, and try to forget this “Best of” thing ever happened.

Date: 1958
Release: Columbia #53629
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The 1958 Newport Jazz Festival has taken on mythic status. Over those four days in July Thelonius Monk, Miles Davis, Chuck Berry, Dinah Washington, Gerry Mulligan, Louis Armstrong, Duke Ellington, Anita O’Day, George Shearing, Sonny Stitt, Chico Hamilton, and others played. That’s quite extraordinary, as is the fact that the event was so well documented. There were hundreds of feet of film shot, and filmmaker Bert Stern edited all of that down to 84 minutes of performances punctuated by the America’s Cup yacht race, which took place off the coast of Rhode Island at that same time. Plus, we have great CDs from the festival, especially Miles Davis‘s Live at Newport 1958.

On Sunday, the last day of the festival, Mahalia Jackson, the greatest gospel singer ever, took the stage, and luckily her performance, too, was recorded and released later that year as Live at Newport 1958. The original performance was just over 45 minutes long, but the LP release was much shorter. With the CD release we get more, nine other songs (including a marvelous "Keep Your Hand on the Plow" with the Duke Ellington Orchestra), restoring the entire set. And thank the Lord, as Mahalia might say. From the moment Willis Condover introduces her, she sings as a woman convinced of her place in heaven, if not of her place in history.

It was a career come from heaven. Until 1948, she was singing in churches, but then she recorded a huge hit, "Movin’ on Up," for the Apollo label, and she was suddenly a star. She started appearing on Studs Terkel’s TV show in 1950, went on a European tour, and in 1954 started hosting her own CBS radio show. Then she caught the attention of legendary Columbia producer John Hammond, who signed her up and got her on Ed Sullivan.

Moving past 1958, she sang at the Kennedy inaugural, for the civil rights March on Washington, for Indira Gandhi, and at her friend Martin Luther King’s funeral. She died a few years later at the age of 61.

The best moment in this set, besides raucous renditions of "He’s Got the Whole World in His Hands," "When the Saints Go Marching In," and "Joshua Fit the Battle of Jericho," is when Jackson speaks to the audience just after her regular set ends and she is ready to launch into her encores. She leaves it up to the audience. "Now I don’t know if you want to hear me and want to stay in the rain," she says, "I’m just getting warmed up." The crowd (we now know a wet crowd) screams for more. "All right, you make me feel like a star."

This woman wasn’t just simply singing, as she proclaims in "I"m Goin’ to Live the Life I Sing About in My Song," one of the previously unissued tracks. She was truly humble, even as the most famous gospel singers of all time. This CD is one you’ll pull out of your collection as a surprise every time. Mahalia Jackson‘s talent is one that you can’t resist, no matter how many times you’ve heard her preach the gospel.

Date: 1973
Release: SONY #65431 (1997)
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“One of the best live releases from the ’70s” — All Music Guide

With the exception of jazz trios, I’m not a big fan of live albums. Nothing is more painful than hearing your favorite singer straining to bring a song to life that once seemed so effortless on the original record. Concerts are meant to be seen (and heard) once, then confined to the warm, hazy depths of concertgoing memory.

Leave it to Bill Withers to turn my world upside down with Bill Withers Live at Carnegie Hall. This 1972 concert captures Withers at the top of his game, before “Just the Two of Us” become overly covered pop cheese and the inspiration for a lame Will Smith song. From the opening number (his hit “Use Me”) Mr. Withers is warm, relaxed and loving every minute of the performance—the same goes for the enthusiastic audience. His hilarious banter between songs (check out the riff before “Grandma’s Hands,” where he does a spontaneous impression of the “fat sisters in church” or before “Let Me In Your Life” where he gives some of the best relationship advice ever) reveals the charm and wit that make Withers such a talented lyricist: he is a constant observer of the human condition.

To that end, the standout track is “I Can’t Write Left-Handed”. As Withers explains the inspiration for the song, meeting a Vietnam veteran not much younger than he who lost his right arm in the war, the chorus begins to hum softly in the background. The song is part spoken-word, part protest and all soul. It is quite possibly the best anti-war song ever written and still heartbreakingly relevant. “I don’t believe I’m gonna live to get much older/ Strange little man over here in Vietnam / I ain’t never seen / Bless his heart I ain’t never done nothin’ to/ He done shot me in my shoulder!” Withers is not interested in pointing fingers, he believes that if you capture the individual experience—a bewildered teenager fighting in the jungles of Vietnam in exchange for a few bucks from Uncle Sam—the rest is clear.

Maybe it’s because Withers has a large view of history and the way it continues to affect generations (his grandfather was born a slave) that his songwriting is instantly human and powerful. All of his songs, even the romantic ones, come from a life lived in empathy. He tells us, “I think about young guys who are like I was when I was young. I had no more idea about government or political things or anything.” Withers knows that he could have just as easily been the one trying to write left-handed. He ends the show with an epic, funky version of “Harlem” that morphs into a sing-along about eating cold baloney sandwiches while dreaming of filet mignon. The entire audience participating, the band in high gear, the song captures the reason we go to concerts—to participate in the music we love with a bunch of strangers who have great taste. This album is the next best thing.

** For more essential Bill Withers, check out the two SACD releases of Just As I Am and Still Bill. Just As I Am has an excellent documentary featuring Elvis Mitchell interviewing Withers, who is just as passionate about his music in 2006 as he was in Carnegie Hall in 1972.