quote:sirmoonie wrote:
He had thats schtick where he would collapse in exhaustion from performing, and would be propped to his feet by aides. Anyone finds that vid, you get my sincerest thanks.
They'd put his cape over him and pretend to lift him to his feet and he'd jump up and start singing again. When I saw him in '85 he did that and I didn't realize it was a schtick. I came home and told my Mom about it and she laughed and said he's been doing that for years.
25th December 2006 05:18 PM
Factory Girl
What a HUGE loss. I think JB was just GREAT!
What a crappy thing to hear on Xmas morning. I regret never seeing Mr. Brown live.
RIP Godfather of Soul. Thank you for the great music and the influence.
25th December 2006 06:43 PM
ComeAsYouAre
Shit.... big loss. RIP.
25th December 2006 07:15 PM
GotToRollMe
Here's a little of the "cape bit" that he used to do. This one got a little rowdy - it was the day after Martin Luther King's assassination.
25th December 2006 07:15 PM
nappyrags
quote:sirmoonie wrote:
He had thats schtick where he would collapse in exhaustion from performing, and would be propped to his feet by aides. Anyone finds that vid, you get my sincerest thanks.
hope i'm not being redundant here...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EqAFKAX6esM
25th December 2006 07:16 PM
GotToRollMe
A couple more good ones.
Mick grabbed more than a few moves off of ole JB.
[Edited by GotToRollMe]
25th December 2006 08:10 PM
sirmoonie
Nice finds, that is great stuff. There is one vid clip I have seen where he has an both arms around someone's shoulders, being semi-carried, limping, then all of a sudden he digs down deep and gets the energy back for one more song....hilarious stuff.
Man, the PCP, the booze - The Booze! - guns, the interstate car chases, James Brown was living the life most of us are afraid to, rocking and rolling the whole time.
25th December 2006 09:29 PM
fireontheplatter
quote:sirmoonie wrote:
Goodness graciousness, that man fucking rocked - he did much more important things than this vid clip below, but it was what came to mind - he's out on love!
i listened to this a few times today......he is so off the wall. what a crack up.
26th December 2006 08:58 AM
Nasty Habits
Ridiculously genius footage from Paris 1966 including, starting at about 3 minutes in, his riff on "The Last Time". Dig the scream at 8:00. Wow.
The ultimate cape schtick, from the TAMI show:
Also from TAMI - Night Train - one of the greatest things you will ever see in your life. Elvis used to rent a theater out in Memphis and watch this footage over and over and over again.
26th December 2006 09:02 AM
justinkurian
26th December 2006 09:11 AM
nankerphelge
Had the fortune to catch him live in DC a few years ago and I was amazed at the entire show. I wanted to catch him again as he played in the area fairly frequently, but unfortunately for me, our paths never crossed again.
A sad sad loss.
Papa didn't take no mess...
26th December 2006 10:35 AM
polytoxic
The end of an era. Rest in peace, James Brown.
Our Mick is among the first with a testimonial:
(ABC News) All Christmas day, famous fans from Mick Jagger to Snoop Dogg to the Rev. Al Sharpton shared memories of their mentor and idol, while lesser-known fans left candles on Brown's Hollywood Walk of Fame star in Los Angeles and streamed to his statue in his boyhood hometown of Augusta, piling mementos and flowers at its base.
"He was a whirlwind of energy and precision, and he was always very generous and supportive to me in the early days of the Stones," Jagger said. "His passing is a huge loss to music."
26th December 2006 10:53 AM
GotToRollMe
quote:Nasty Habits wrote:
The ultimate cape schtick, from the TAMI show:
LOL! There it is! What a character he was. What a dancer, singer...hell, what a fuckin' PERFORMER he was! I still can't believe he's gone...he was so ingrained into our collective memory...he was just one of those guys you thought would be around forever (kinda like Mick, actually). *sigh* The man may be gone, but the legend will live forever.
26th December 2006 05:24 PM
Soldatti
Very sad news, RIP James.
26th December 2006 05:28 PM
Gimme Shelter
RIP James
26th December 2006 09:13 PM
texile
the funk has left the building..
the rythyms, beats, grooves, shouts, grunts are what funk is all about.
jb was a genius -
that guitar, bass and drum assault was singular...
and the music is purely primal..
the way music should be when it comes from the guts, sweat, sex and heart.
26th December 2006 10:43 PM
Nellcote
James Brown Remembered Around The World
December 26, 2006, 10:10 AM ET
"Godfather of Soul"James Brown remained the hardest-working man in show business to the end, telling friends from his hospital bed that he'd be in Times Square on New Year's Eve, even though he had pneumonia. His heart gave out a few hours later, on Christmas morning.
All Christmas day, famous fans from Mick Jagger to Snoop Dogg to the Rev. Al Sharpton shared memories of their mentor and idol, while lesser-known fans left candles on Brown's Hollywood Walk of Fame star in Los Angeles and streamed to his statue in his boyhood hometown of Augusta, Ga., piling mementos and flowers at its base.
"Y'all lost the Godfather of Soul, but I lost my father. I know the whole world loved him just as much as we loved him, so we're not mourning by ourselves," Brown's daughter Venisha Brown told the Augusta Chronicle as she stood near the statue, fighting back tears.
The 73-year-old pompadoured dynamo, whose classic singles include "Papa's Got a Brand New Bag" and "I Got You (I Feel Good)," died of heart failure less than two days after he had been hospitalized with pneumonia and only three days after leading his annual holiday toy giveaway in Augusta.
"I ain't got the same energy," Brown had told the New York Post a week earlier as he discussed his planned concert tour, "but I'm sharper. Father Time, knowledge and prayer -- I pray a lot," Brown had said. He described himself as "like Will Rogers: I love everybody. So this is not a hard job for me."
The entertainer with the rough-edged voice and flashy footwork also had diabetes and prostate cancer that was in remission. But he initially seemed fine at the hospital and talked about his New Year's Eve show at B.B. King's Blues Club in New York, his manager Frank Copsidas said.
Brown was himself to the end, at one point saying, "I'm going away tonight," said friend Charles Bobbit, who was with Brown when he died. "I didn't want to believe him," he said. A short time later, Brown sighed quietly, closed his eyes and died, Bobbit said.
One of the major musical influences of the past 50 years, James Brown was to rhythm and dance music what Bob Dylan was to lyrics. "He was a whirlwind of energy and precision, and he was always very generous and supportive to me in the early days of the Stones," Mick Jagger said. "His passing is a huge loss to music." Rapper Snoop Dogg called him "my soul inspiration."
"He made soul music a world music," said Sharpton, who toured with Brown in the 1970s and imitates his hairstyle to this day. "What James Brown was to music in terms of soul and hip-hop, rap, all of that, is what Bach was to classical music. This is a guy who literally changed the music industry. He put everybody on a different beat, a different style of music. He pioneered it."
Sharpton will officiate at Brown's funeral service, details of which were still incomplete, Copsidas said.
Brown's daughter-in-law Diane Dean Rouse told the Augusta Chronicle she hoped the funeral would be open to the people of Augusta. "He would want it open because he would want everybody to get there and because that's who he loved," she said.
**********************************
James Brown's Body to Lie at Apollo
Dec 26 6:50 PM US/Eastern
By LARRY NEUMEISTER
Associated Press Writer
NEW YORK
The body of soul singer James Brown will be returned Thursday to the site of his debut _ the legendary Apollo Theater in Harlem _ so the public that saw and heard him leave a lasting impression on music can see him one last time, the Rev. Al Sharpton said Tuesday.
Brown's body will rest on the stage of the Apollo from 1 p.m. to 8 p.m., and thousands of people will be permitted one more look at a man who steered modern music toward the rhythm-and-blues, funk, hip-hop, disco and rap beats popular today, said Sharpton, a close friend of Brown for decades.
"It would almost be unthinkable for a man who lived such a sensational life to go away quietly," Sharpton told The Associated Press in an interview from Georgia, where he was making funeral arrangements with Brown's children.
Sharpton said he and the children viewed Brown's body Tuesday.
"I looked at his body. I was walking in half disbelief and sadness but proud," he said. "I couldn't even begin to describe it, to walk around his house and he not be there."
Sharpton said the public Apollo viewing will be followed by a private ceremony Friday in Brown's hometown, Augusta, Ga., and another public ceremony, officiated by Sharpton, a day later at the James Brown Arena there.
"His greatest thrill was always the lines around the Apollo Theater," Sharpton said of the 125th Street landmark. "I felt that James Brown in all the years we talked would have wanted one last opportunity to let the people say goodbye to him and he to the people."
Brown, known as the Godfather of Soul, died of congestive heart failure on Christmas morning in Atlanta at age 73. He had been scheduled to perform on New Year's Eve in Manhattan at B.B. King's blues club.
Sharpton said he and Brown's children talked Tuesday about the moment after the Rev. Martin Luther King's assassination when Brown stepped to a microphone and told gathering crowds of angry people to go home.
"And they went home," Sharpton said. "For them to riot for a man who lived a life of peace would send the wrong message. He always said he was surprised and humbled that he had that influence."
Sharpton said Brown was "always very sensitive as to how people could be remembered."
The Apollo began recruiting and showcasing talent in 1934. Early acts included "Pigmeat" Markham and Jackie "Moms" Mabley. Before long, Lena Horne, Count Basie, Duke Ellington, Aretha Franklin and Brown were making their debuts. Audiences cheered the likes of Ella Fitzgerald, Billie Holiday, Michael Jackson, Fats Waller, Fats Domino, Bo Diddley, Jerry Lee Lewis, Harry Belafonte, Sidney Poitier, Sammy Davis Jr. and Nina Simone. Comedians such as Redd Foxx and Richard Pryor performed, too.
Sharpton said he had been like a son to Brown since they met in 1973, introduced by Brown's son, Teddy, shortly before the teenager died in a car crash.
He said the son had wanted to encourage his father's support for Sharpton's youth organization, leading Brown to begin a lifelong commitment to Sharpton's civil-rights projects.
"I became the son he lost," Sharpton said.
Sharpton said Brown always knew his place in history.
"He used to tell me, `There are two American originals, Elvis and me,'" Sharpton said. "'Elvis is gone, and I've got to carry on.'"
27th December 2006 05:30 AM
Ten Thousand Motels
Larry King
KING: A fond farewell to a giant who left us early Christmas morning. James Brown, a man who truly changed the course of the past 50 years of American popular music.
I knew James Brown well. He performed at one of my cardiac galas, and I was honored to have him on this program a few times. In fact, I once asked him how the hardest working man in show business kept on keeping on.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE) JAMES BROWN: Ow, I feel good.
KING: No slowing down?
BROWN: No, Larry. I'm trying to keep up with you, Larry.
KING: You see us everywhere, right?
BROWN: I see all over the world. That's one of the things that I think servicemen and people traveling abroad really appreciate, God bless you and CNN, for keeping the American people well -- well relaxed enough...
(CROSSTALK)
KING: You know we're there, right?
BROWN: Oh, yes. It's like home. You know, like I'm going back and getting my -- it's like going to church, I'm going back and getting my -- reenergized again.
KING: "Universal James" is the 79th album in your career.
BROWN: Yes, 79th studio album.
KING: That's got to be close to some sort of record.
BROWN: Oh, I think it's probably a leading record.
KING: Sinatra right around.
BROWN: Individual, you know. No, but you can't get away from Old Blue Eyes, because...
KING: What do we mean by "Universal James?"
BROWN: It's because I'm an American artist that's known everywhere in the universe. Any person in the land knows James, and then the astronauts play my records when they go in space.
KING: Also, I think probably more people have seen you in concert than any other act.
BROWN: I think so.
KING: You pack outdoor stadiums.
BROWN: Oh, yes, we go places -- we were fortunate to get 300,000 people before the flood in St. Louis and 200,000 people in Memphis.
KING: How do you keep your energy going, though? You're not a subtle act, James.
BROWN: No. I pray to God and I thank God and I trust people and I draw from good spirits of people that are positive, and I can say...
KING: You mean, you create this atmosphere?
BROWN: Yes, you create it, and people giving it back and going crazy over you, and you see the familiar people, people like (inaudible), looks so good, Larry. I'm so proud of you, I don't know what to do.
KING: How much of the tune "Georgelna..."
BROWN: "Georgelina."
KING: "Georgelina," is your life?
BROWN: Basically all of it. I'm in this tug of war between Georgia and South Carolina. I was born in Carolina and raised in Georgia. And they...
KING: Georgelina?
BROWN: Yes, I made it from Georgia, so I live on one side of (inaudible) area and I do my business in Georgia, and...
KING: And the story tells of your life?
BROWN: It tells of my life. It tells of my hard time.
KING: Bad and the good?
BROWN: Bad and the good. But you know, when you look behind, it takes all of that to make that -- it's like the wind blowing one way all the time, it's good for it to blow both ways. I thank God for it. I was just in South Carolina this morning, the general assembly, where I received a proclamation honoring me for all of the things that are positive that has happened. I'm on the stop the violence campaign. And...
KING: I want to ask you about that. You are a real bounce-off- the-floor kind of guy, right?
BROWN: Yes.
KING: I mean, you are a classic survivor.
BROWN: Yes.
KING: Now, what is this violence thing you're on?
BROWN: Well, education plays a tremendous part. People can't deal with the system even in prison. They go there, and they come back, and get in more trouble than they were before.
We've got to educate our people. We've got to educate our people, because you can't do it if you don't know it. And it goes -- it starts from the home, and we are coming from a long ways back. Basically, the Afro-American is really in trouble, because my father stopped in second grade, my mother in the fourth grade. And there is no way you can deal with the criteria of the job market and things like that.
KING: So you deal with your fists.
BROWN: You deal with the fists, you know, you deal it with -- the brawn's way. And when you see a young kid out on the street that could make $1,000 a day selling drugs and his father can't make $1,000 in a month, it's kind of hard to take him off of that.
KING: You even have a song about it, right?
BROWN: I have a song called "How Long." Just dealing with all the substance from 1941, the bombing of Hiroshima, and up to today. Violence, violence, violence. We compound it. And when you compound violence, you can only get a negative, so you're compounding the negatives.
KING: You were violent at times in your life, weren't you?
BROWN: When I was a boxer, (inaudible) was my trainer -- I've never been violent, but I might have done (ph) some violence -- if it gets tough and I have to move, I got to move, whatever, whether it's driving a truck or whatever it is.
KING: What do you make of the fact that there seems to be more of it now?
BROWN: There's more of it because when you look at the rap music, I'm sure that it changes, like the '60s, you know. You're talking about the problem, you raise the question. But they use four- letter words and not God, not three-letter word, not love, this other kind of word. The words that you wouldn't take home to mama. And I urge and challenge all the young people to not go at it this way.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
27th December 2006 10:20 AM
gustavobala
i like him!
great loss!
RIP James!
27th December 2006 11:23 PM
The Archives
James Brown
News
I apologize if this has been posted already:
Brown Funeral, Biopic Set
12/27/2006 11:54 AM, E! Online
Josh Grossberg
James Brown is going out the same way he came in—with a flourish.
Funeral plans for the Godfather of Soul, who died on Christmas Day of congestive heart failure at age 73, have been finalized. At the same time, as tributes from fans and fellow musicians around the world continue to pour in, Spike Lee has announced he'll direct a biopic based on Brown's life.
In honor of his unforgettable debut at the historic Apollo Theater in Harlem, which culminated in his top-selling 1962 album, Live at the Apollo, Vol. 1, and marked his breakthrough on the pop charts, Brown's body will lie in state at the venue on Thursday from 1 p.m. to 8 p.m. to give fans a chance to pay their last respects.
The Reverend Al Sharpton, a close friend of the showman for over three decades, confirmed the funeral arrangements on Tuesday after consulting with Brown's children in Georgia.
"It would almost be unthinkable for a man who lived such a sensational life to go away quietly," Sharpton told the Associated Press. "His greatest thrill was always the lines around the Apollo Theater. I felt that James Brown, in all the years we talked, would have wanted one last opportunity to let the people say goodbye to him and he to the people."
Following the public viewing, a private funeral service is set for Friday in Brown's hometown of Augusta, Georgia. Sharpton will then preside over a public memorial to be held on Saturday in Augusta at the 8,500-seat James Brown Arena starting at 1 p.m. The services are expected to draw A-list entertainers and thousands of fans.
Among the musicians who've felt the indelible influence of Brown are Rolling Stones frontman Mick Jagger (who called Brown a "whirlwind of energy and precision"), rock icon Little Richard (an "innovator...an emancipator") and Michael Jackson, who would never have dreamed up the Moonwalk if it weren't for Mr. Dynamite.
Funk bass superstar Bootsy Collins, who held down the rhythm in Brown's backing band the JBs in the early '70s, called Brown the "God of rhythm and music."
"Me along with countless other musicians were his Sons. No one else will ever come close. For he is declared this day by all Funkateer's across the globe: 'The Funkiest Mutha in the Universe,' " the colorful Collins, who also played with George Clinton's Funkadelic, wrote on his Website.
Usher, who learned some stage moves first-hand from Brown, called his mentor "one of America's greatest cultural icons...He was not only the Godfather of Soul, he was the Godfather to the entire music industry."
Indeed, aside from rockers and R&B'ers, rappers hailed Brown for laying the funky beats and lyrical groundwork for what eventually evolved into rap.
"I am hurt. That's my godfather, my soul inspiration, the hardest-working man in show business of all time," said Snoop Dogg in a statement. "He'll be missed, but his music and his legacy will live on through me, in every way you can imagine."
Diddy told MTV that James Brown was the reason he "fell in love with music," while Ice Cube saluted Brown as "not only the Godfather of Soul, but the godfather of funk and rap. Music will never be the same."
Nas, meanwhile, recalled presenting an award to Brown earlier this year.
"He smiled while I told him how I used his music with mine and how much he's done for us and how I love him," the rap star told MTV. "I'm lucky to have had that moment, I shook his hand. He was pure greatness."
Hollywood is also getting in on the tribute act.
Spike Lee has come aboard to helm a feature film about Brown that will be produced by Imagine Entertainment's Brian Grazer and Paramount, the studio confirmed Wednesday.
Lee will rework a script that had been variously worked on by Jezz and John Henry Butterworth and Steven Baigelman. Brown lent his support to the project before his death, selling the film rights to his life story and music, in addition to meeting with the writers, who also interviewed several of his longtime sidemen.
No word yet who'll don the cape to play the Hardest Working Man in Show Business (Eddie Murphy, anyone?), but producers reportedly hope to begin shooting in either late 2007 or early 2008.
Brown was no stranger to the big screen, having played a crazed preacher in 1980's The Blues Brothers and The Blues Brothers 2000. He also wrote and performed the Grammy-winning "Living in America" for 1985's Rocky IV.
"Fortunate were those of us who were able to engage his talents and witness his latest shows," said Blues Brother Dan Aykroyd, "the greatest onstage revue of music in the history of our planet."
The late, great Sex Machine kept working right up until the end. Even after he was hospitalized last weekend, he expressed hope to perform as scheduled on New Year's Eve at Manhattan's B.B. King's Blues Club.
Club promoters have since transformed a promotional poster in front of the Times Square venue into a makeshift memorial, with "In Memory Of" splashed across the top. Fans have scrawled messages on the poster, including "The Papa's got a brand-new bag" and "The Day the Funk Stood Still," and flowers have piled up next to the theater.
(B.B. King's announced today that Chaka Khan will take over the New Year's Eve slot along with some unnamed special guests; all original tickets sold for Brown's show will be honored at the door.)
An impromptu shrine has also gone up around a statue of Brown in Augusta. Fans draped a red scarf and U.S. flag over the monument in a nod to the singer's traditional concert finale, when his band members would wrap him in a cape of the American flag.
But the battle over Brown's estate is just beginning. His 37-year-old partner and longtime backup singer, Tomi Rae Hynie, who's also the mother of Brown's five-year-old son, is seeking legal status as his widow.
Brown's attorney, Buddy Dallas, said Hynie was married to a Texas man when she tied the knot with Brown in 2000, thus voiding their union. While she subsequently got an annulment, Dallas says she and Brown never swapped vows again to make it official.
Dallas has barred Hynie from entering the house she shared with Brown in Beech Island, South Carolina, following his death. Per published reports, Hynie is currently holed up in an Augusta hotel without clothes and money. She has claimed that Dallas is attempting to freeze her out of a stake in Brown's estate and insists she has documented proof that a judge has ruled that she and Brown were indeed married.
For the time being, Dallas said that Brown's estate has been left in a trust for his children.
For more on Brown's legacy, see our photo retrospective.
28th December 2006 12:45 AM
Kilroy
Damn James Brown was great.>
28th December 2006 04:15 AM
Ten Thousand Motels
Soul Brother had sports roots
By Thom Loverro
December 28, 2006
Washington Times
James Brown's heart stopped beating Christmas morning, and a piece of my heart did as well.
I first saw James Brown in a movie theater on Flatbush Avenue in Brooklyn. I was 10 years old, and watching this historic concert film called the TAMI Show, which stood for something called the Teenage Awards Music International show. It was a concert that featured the Beach Boys, the Supremes, Chuck Berry, Marvin Gaye, Lesley Gore, the Rolling Stones and a host of other major acts -- a combination of American pop and the British invasion.
Oh, and this force of nature the likes of which I and most of white America had never seen before.
James Brown stole the show. He was so electric, so overpowering, that the Stones protested having to follow him as the final act of the concert, because they knew they had nothing compared to what everyone had just witnessed.
I went back to my friends after the movie and told them about this guy who they kept having to drag off the stage and cover him with a cape, and he would keep running back and out performing.
After that, I was a prisoner of love.
In the days following his death, there has been much written about the influence that Brown had on generations of performers to come -- Ice Cube, Diddy and other rappers and hip hop artists have given their props to Brown.
And there is no denying he was one of the most influential performers of his time. But I wonder if they know that the origins of Soul Brother No. 1's persona can be traced back to a white boy from Nebraska named George Wagner -- Gorgeous George, the professional wrestler who was one of the biggest stars of television in its infancy.
Not only that, but Gorgeous George was also a big influence on another of the greatest performers of our time -- Muhammad Ali.
How do you think Chuck D and company would like that?
Gorgeous George had an act in the 1950s in which he grew his hair long, dyed it platinum blond and pinned it back with gold-plated bobby pins. He wore elaborate robes, and was escorted into the ring by a male valet, who would spray the ring with perfume, entering the ring to the tune "Pomp and Circumstance." He was a heel who drove the crowds crazy with his underhanded tactics in the ring, sometimes inciting a riot among crowds. His motto was, "Win if you can, lose if you must, but always cheat!"
Brown has said in various interviews over the years that he got the idea to wear a cape on stage from watching Gorgeous George.
Now, that act might not have worked if Brown had pursued one of his other passions growing up. In his autobiography, Brown wrote he might have been a baseball player.
"People who knew me thought I was going to play baseball," he wrote. "I was a left-handed pitcher with a good fastball, a sharp curve and a wicked floater."
He also considered becoming a boxer and said he developed some of his stage footwork from fighting, though it wasn't conventional. Brown wrote about fighting in "battle royals," where he would be blindfolded with one hand tied behind his back and in the ring with a group of fighters under the same conditions.
"You swing at anything that moves, and whoever's left standing at the end is the winner," wrote Brown, who was a southpaw. "It sounds brutal, but a battle royal is really comedy. I'd be out there stumbling around, swinging wild and hearing the people laughing. I didn't know I was being exploited; all I knew was that I was getting paid a dollar and having fun -- I was too classy for battle royals, though, because I could really box."
But that stage was reserved for another performer, a kid from Louisville who also grew up watching Gorgeous George and later met the wrestler -- Cassius Clay, who later changed his named to Muhammad Ali.
"I saw 15,000 people coming to see this man get beat, and his talking did it," Ali said. "I said, 'This is a good idea!' "
Both Brown and Ali emerged on the national scene in 1964 -- Brown in his TAMI performance and Ali in his stunning upset of Sonny Liston. Unfortunately, Gorgeous George would not live to see his legacy carried on. He died the previous year -- on Christmas, just like the man who took his cape and carried it on as the hardest working man in show business.
28th December 2006 11:44 AM
Saint Sway
only at Rocks Off would Ed Bradley's death get more love than James Brown's
gotta love this asylum!
[Edited by Saint Sway]
28th December 2006 04:19 PM
monkey_man
28th December 2006 07:10 PM
monkey_man
quote:Saint Sway wrote:
only at Rocks Off would Ed Bradley's death get more love than James Brown's
gotta love this asylum!
But Gerald Ford getting more love than The Godfather. . .that's just wrong!!!
29th December 2006 10:51 AM
Bitch
It was all over the NY local news yesterday, James' open casket was open to the public at The Apollo Theatre. It was packed. Interesting way to go out, isnt it?
29th December 2006 11:00 AM
Ten Thousand Motels
29th December 2006 11:11 AM
Ten Thousand Motels
THOUSANDS PAY TRIBUTE TO BROWN
LATEST: Thousands of fans paid their last respects to soul legend JAMES BROWN at the Apollo Theater in New York City yesterday (28DEC06), where he was lying in state. The star, who died on Monday (25DEC06), was carried in a gold coffin through the streets of Harlem on a horse-drawn carriage while well-wishers danced and sang his hits in tribute to the singer. Inside the auditorium, fans marched past his casket on the stage where he made his 1956 debut. Brown wore a blue suit, white gloves and silver shoes. Brown's close friend REVEREND AL SHARPTON said, "This man stood for us, the common man. "It was James Brown that with one song erased the word negro from our vocabulary forever and made us say it and say it loud, that we were black and we were proud. "We didn't line these streets because he had hits. Plenty of people had hits but none got them on their own terms. "He never bent, buckled or bowed. He never diluted his music." A private ceremony for family and friends will follow in Brown's Augusta, Georgia hometown today (29DEC06) before a public funeral service there on Saturday (30DEC06). 29/12/2006 12:20
29th December 2006 11:35 AM
Ten Thousand Motels
Walking the Line for James Brown
By Nicholas Powers | December 29, 2006
The Village Voice
Thousands of New Yorkers sang and danced in the cold Thursday to give James Brown a final goodbye. The Godfather of Soul died over Christmas at age 73. Early yesterday morning, a white carriage pulled by two horses brought Brown's body to the Apollo Theater in Harlem.
By noon, hundreds of visitors had arrived; thousands more would come before nightfall. Record stores along 125th Street blasted Brown's hard funk into the chill air. I stood in circle of people, watching a homeless woman flap her knees as we whooped and hollered. A man joined her, then another until we stopped watching, stepped in, and rode Brown's rhythms with our hips, grinning wildly.
The joy was catching. Police bobbed their heads. After dancing, I got in one of the two lines that began at the Apollo Theater and wove around the block. The mainly black crowd waited in line for hours in what felt more like family reunion than a funeral.
A man held his radio above his head, showering us with Brown's funk. As he passed by, the older black woman leaned over and told me, "His music was hopeful."Â Soon she was telling me of her childhood in New York and listening to James Brown, and why Prince, not Michael Jackson, is the real heir to his throne. It was like that, with people sharing memories and gossip. Three hours, we later we turned the corner to 125th Street.
City Councilman Charles Barron worked the crowed, shaking hands as behind him media trucks hummed and satellite dishes blinked in the air. Reporters dug through the line of people for stories. Others dug into the line for spots. A woman asked a group of whites if she could cut in. They stuttered a no and she just stood in with them. The older black woman I'd been talking to murmured, "She's knew better than to ask us."
We began to tell progress by feet, then inches. Whomever you were around you were stuck with. One brother with a skull-cap kept yelling, "Holla black from your core!" The white couple behind me stopped chatting and got still. A lot of us held our breath waiting to see how crazy he was until another brother with a fedora hat turned and bellowed, "I'll say it loud. I'm black and I'm cold!"
Another hour passed. We stamped the chill off our feet. The wind seemed to freeze our voices as we waited. A macabre sense of humor settled in. A young man began it. "We should just grab his body and pass him along," he said. "Let everyone see him real quick." Laughter rippled down the line. "Yeah, I'm going to grab his hand and give myself an autograph," a woman snapped back.
Near the Portabella store, a TV jutted out above our heads. The slow-blinking lady pointed to it. On the screen flashed a video of Brown. He howled into the microphone, then stood and leaned in, cooing a syllable that became a shriek. He danced and dipped into a split. "Damn, ain't no one can do that," the brother in the hat said. "Michael Jackson got all his moves from James, but was nowhere as good."
Brown did in death what he did in life, made strangers into family. The hustler, the white liberal couple, the crazy woman and the old school fans danced together. The line moved and we squeezed forward a foot and the bright Apollo sign was in our faces.
Around 6 p.m., family of Brown went in to the Apollo for a private prayer. We waited for an hour, shuffling inch by inch until the NYPD opened the barricades again. We crushed into the opening. "Hold back," an officer said. "Hold back!"
It was warm inside the theaer. On the walls around us were photos of black performers from Nina Simone to James Brown and Al Green. They looked like royalty in a museum of the black voice. As if all these faces had shaped and reshaped our need to be heard, lifting it so the world could hear us.
"We made it," I said. My friend nodded back. "Yep, we did." I lost sight of her as we lined up to enter the auditorium. Overhead played a crackly recording from Brown's 1962 Apollo concert. "He is the best blues singer in the world. He is the best country singer in the world. He is the best soul singer in the world," shouted the announcer to an audience that would never hear him again.
Close friends and family sat in the front rows, studying Brown as if too etch in the mind every detail before he was beyond sight. I walked up the stairs to the coffin. He lay inside, his face stoic, his blue suit glittering. He had on silver shoes. I thought, man, what a beautiful defiance of death to be buried in shoes that shine. The ushers hurried us off the stage, and I walked outside to the Harlem streets that hummed like an open-air church. It was out here in the ecstatic joy that I could understand how James Brown, a man raised in a brothel and taught to sing in a church, achieved his success. He created a religion even sinners could believe in.
30th December 2006 02:53 AM
guitarman53
On the T.A.M.I. show, he wanted to be the headline act, instead the Stones were, there's that famous quote from him "I'm going make them wish they never left England" A fantastic showman, singer & dancer, Michael Jackson learned a few steps from him, for sure, he was a total original.
Search for information in the wet page, the archives and this board:
The Rolling Stones World Tour 2005 Rolling Stones Bigger Bang Tour 2005 2006 Rolling Stones Forum - Rolling Stones Message Board - Mick Jagger - Keith Richards - Brian Jones - Charlie Watts - Ian Stewart - Stu - Bill Wyman - Mick Taylor - Ronnie Wood - Ron Wood - Rolling Stones 2005 Tour - Farewell Tour - Rolling Stones: Onstage World Tour A Bigger Bang US Tour
NEW: SEARCH ZONE:
Search for goods, you'll find the impossible collector's item!!!
