As we sail away from summer into the (hopefully) cooler climes of autumn, a playlist filled with Yacht Soul might just be the perfect accompaniment to those post-Labor Day outdoor gatherings.
In case you’re thinking, “Sounds fun, but what exactly is ‘Yacht Soul’?,” it’s the supercool, sophisticated sibling of the “Yacht Rock” genre, a term coined fifteen years ago to describe 1970s and 1980s adult-oriented rock music infused with jazz and R&B recorded primarily in California by acts such as Steely Dan, The Doobie Brothers, Toto, Kenny Loggins and Christopher Cross.
“Yacht Soul” heightens the soul, R&B and jazz elements of the music while dropping a dollop of funk in the mix.
The following quotes from soultracks.com perhaps illuminate the distinctions best:
…Donald Cleveland says that we have Yacht Soul question entirely backwards. “To be honest, Yacht Rock should have been called Yacht Soul from the start. Anybody with ears knows that. The only thing ‘rock’ about Yacht is the label that was on the albums as originally released, so they could be filed separately from the ‘Soul’ albums. It was just easier for the White people listening to this music with obvious soulful stylings to just keep the White ‘rock’ labeling going, even if the musicians themselves were influenced by and working from a framework of Black Soul.”
Mama’s Gun lead singer Andy Platts agrees. “Really if we’re honest, you don’t get ‘Yacht Rock’ without the evolution of Black music in the first place, from which it borrows heavily, so perhaps this just underscores the issues with appropriating and using terms like the ‘yacht’ label.”
Songs like “Just The Two of Us” by Grover Washington, Jr. and Bill Withers, “Forget Me Nots” by Patrice Rushen, “Give Me The Night” by George Benson, “Rio De Janiero Blue” by Randy Crawford and Joe Sample and “Golden Time of Day” by Maze are strong examples of the style.
A Year of Good Black News, written by yours truly, is filled with facts, history, bios, quotes, jokes and trivia in easy-to-read entries delivered on the daily.
The calendar’s official drop date is Tuesday, October 12, and if you pre-order at Workman.com using the code: GOODBLACKNEWS from now until December 31, you will receive 20% off.
A Year of Good Black Newsoffers fun Black facts about inventors, entrepreneurs, musicians, comedians, historians, educators, athletes and entertainers, as well as info shared in fun fact categories like “Lemme Break It Down: Black Lexicon,” “We Got Game: Black Trivia,” “Get The Knowledge: Black Museums and Landmarks” and “You Know We Did That, Right?: Black Inventors.”
Here’s a sneak peek inside:
Although I’m biased because I wrote it, the A Year of Good Black News Page-A-Day 2022 calendar is an awesome way to get inspired every day by the good things Black people do (and have done) for centuries, but haven’t always been widely known or shared.
Well, no more! If this site is for you, this calendar is, too!
It’s also a great gift for family members, friends, teachers, kids and loved ones. Did I mention if you use the code: GOODBLACKNEWS at Workman.com, you get 20% off?
Or, if you prefer, you can also order from the retailers below:
While our #MusicMonday main man and selector Marlon West takes a well-earned break from creating thoughtful and unique playlists exploring the musical diaspora, I’m stepping in to post two curations honoring the woman of the weekend, Aretha Franklin.
Respect, the MGM biopic starring Jennifer Hudson as the Queen of Soul, was released exclusively in theaters this past Friday and earned almost $9 million in its first weekend. In addition to being a satisfying film experience, Respect makes you appreciate even more how creative and intelligent Aretha was in her musical expression across all genres.
In addition to being an unparalleled singer who could turn tunes by other artists into her own signature songs, Franklin also composed, arranged and produced several of her biggest hits.
In honor of those aspects of her genius, I offer the playlists “How I Got Over”: Aretha Franklin’s Cover Songs, which includes (of course) “Respect,” by Otis Redding, “Until You Come Back To Me” by Stevie Wonder and “Spanish Harlem” originally recorded by Ben E. King:
Well, Aretha stans, the movie moment we’ve long been waiting for is finally –FINALLY– here. Today, just three days shy of the third anniversary of her passing, the MGM feature film about the one and only Queen of Soul, Respect, hits theaters nationwide.
As Editor-in-Chief of Good Black News (and not-so-undercover Aretha Franklin freak), I was able to attend a press screening of the movie a few weeks ago, as well as interview its writer Tracey Scott Wilson (The Americans) and original score composer Kris Bowers (The United States vs. Billie Holiday, Space Jam: A New Legacy, King Richard).
Directed by Tony Award nominee Liesl Tommy from a screenplay by Emmy Award nominee Wilson and starring Academy Award-winning vocal powerhouse Jennifer Hudson (who also executive produced), Respect is a treasure not only because it is a film about a Black woman made by Black women, but also because it satisfies on every level — visually, musically, and dramatically.
“Liesl wanted this to be a movie about and for and with and celebrating Black women because that’s what Aretha did her entire life,” writer Wilson said. “That was one of her missions in life, to honor Black women and put them front and center.”
The biopic covers a span of approximately 20 years in Franklin’s life, from her youthful choir solo singing in her father’s church to recording and producing Amazing Grace, a live double album of gospel music in the church of early teacher and friend Rev. James Cleveland (warmly and lovingly portrayed by Tituss Burgess).
Jennifer Hudson stars as Aretha Franklin and Forest Whitaker as her father C.L. Franklin in RESPECT (Photo credit: Quantrell D. Colbert)
Performances across the board are top notch – Hudson not only understood the assignment, she embodied it and transcended it by capturing Aretha’s quiet and graceful exterior while navigating how to express the caldron of explosive feeling and creativity within.
Forest Whitaker‘s note-perfect performance as Aretha’s formidable, flawed, savvy and controlling preacher father C.L. Franklin again proves why he is a lauded master of the craft.
As Aretha’s first husband and manager Ted White, Marlon Wayans charms with his nuanced combination of sexiness, intelligence and manipulation that make the dynamic of White and Franklin’s relationship live so well in the gray areas of both real and fatal attraction, especially when it gets violent.
Although they had limited screen time, Audra McDonald has so much gravity and grace as Aretha’s mother Barbara Franklin, she is broken spirit personified and Mary J. Blige pops off the screen as Aretha’s mentor/menace/musical motivator Dinah Washington.
Actor Jennifer Hudson and director Liesl Tommy on the set of RESPECT (Photo credit: Quantrell D. Colbert)
Tommy’s direction is as subtle as it is rich and powerful — the movie doesn’t feel like a movie if you know what I mean — but like an inside look into a lived experience. Franklin remains a mystery in many ways, which I found to be an insightful nod to Aretha’s own choice and agency to fiercely protect and guard her interior life.
Tommy and Wilson take what is known about the relationships and traumas in Franklin’s life and, like Franklin, let their fullest expression explode like dynamite through the music.
The way the music is presented within the storytelling (not to mention Hudson’s astounding vocals), from the expected highs like “Respect” or the emotional, fractured rehearsal of “Precious Memories,” is ambrosia for the ears, heart and soul.
The creation of “Ain’t No Way” in the movie plays as a grand glimpse into Aretha’s musicality and artistry as well as her connection with her sisters Erma and Carolyn (younger sister Carolyn Franklin wrote the song and is teaching it to Aretha in the scene) and this pivotal moment is a stand out.
According to Wilson, not only is that song a favorite of director Tommy, it also pays homage to rarely seen ABC news documentary footage of the same:
“It’s just them in rehearsal, and it’s Carolyn teaching her the song that she wrote. I must have watched that video like 100 times. Just seeing the dynamic between them — Ted White is standing there, the Muscle Shoals guys are standing there — and she’s just teaching her this song,” Wilson said.
“And Carolyn could read music and Aretha couldn’t, so she’s speaking to her not only in a way musically that Aretha can understand but she’s also speaking to her as a sister. And just seeing that I knew it had to be in the movie because it so encapsulates their relationship so well, it captures Carolyn’s brilliance, it captures their sisterly camaraderie and love, and also the dynamic of Ted who’s there who is clearly becoming just an appendage and not the main attraction anymore.”
“Liesl had in mind that the score was going to handle a lot of her trauma in the story and that was going to be the focal point of the score. And the other thing that I started to feel was revealing itself in the story… is how much she’s finding her way back to God and her faith and church and also in a lot of ways this pure connection she had with her mother.”
The score itself, Bowers said, was loosely inspired by the sound of the church, which, as Aretha’s life and career highs and lows unfold, is calling her back to it.
“A lot of the textures are organ sounds… and I just kind of stretched them out and did different things to them to create more of a texture and layers on top of the score.”
“The theme itself not only was meant to feel somewhat like a hymn but her trauma theme is actually her mother’s theme in reverse. A lot of [the score] is trying to find ways to create some sort of throughline to that so it can continue to pull her toward that calling of God and her faith.”
As a bonus, the film’s final moments close with the actual footage of Aretha’s unparalleled Kennedy Center Honors performance of “Natural Woman” from 2015. It’s such an outstanding narrative choice, it brought tears to the eyes of this Aretha devotee.
Although the film passes quickly through Aretha’s Columbia records output and ends well before her transition to her Clive Davis and Arista years, it’s an impressive exploration of, to paraphrase Wilson, “the woman with the greatest voice in the world finding her own voice.”
James Weldon Johnson, an NAACP field secretary, civil rights activist, Broadway composer and professor who investigated and spoke out about lynchings in the first decades of the 20th century, also wrote the classic novel The Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man, first published in 1912.
But perhaps the publication Weldon is best known for was that of a song he wrote with his brother John Rosamond Johnson. In 1900, in honor of Tuskegee Institute founder Booker T. Washingtonas part of a tribute to Abraham Lincoln‘s birthday, they crafted a poem that was read by 500 schoolchildren entitled “Lift Every Voice and Sing.”
The poem celebrated freedom as it recognized a brutal past never to be repeated. “Lift Every Voice and Sing” was so well received that the brothers set it to music and by 1919 the NAACP dubbed it “the Negro national anthem.” It has functioned in that capacity ever since.
The Johnson brothers pictured on the cover of this 1973 version of the sheet music
Sung for decades at countless meetings, events, and ceremonies, a 1990 version of the song performed by Melba Moore (which can be heard here on GBN’s “Black Americana” playlist ) was entered into the Congressional Record and, in 2016, into the National Recording Registry.
Singing this song today makes as much sense as any other American anthem, as it is a song of independence from tyranny, inhumanity and injustice. It is sung in honor of Americans who died building this country by progeny who seek to embrace the liberty, hope and prosperity freedom promises.
Enjoy Aretha Franklin, whose voice literally was designated an American natural resource, singing the song we might all lift our voices to sing. Full lyrics published below.
On this Monday nestled between Juneteenth and Independence Day, Lori Lakin Hutcherson and I thought it prudent to offer this collection of music celebrating freedom and liberty.
Many of these tracks even have the word freedom in their title. Others have just long been associated with the fight for Civil Rights and reform for years.
There are tracks here long-considered, classics, and other new songs on the subject. Clocking in at under 6 hours, this one is a comparatively short collection for me.
Hope you dig this collection of Freedom songs. And if there are any overt omissions, hit me in the comments, y’all.
Many may know Lorraine Hansberry as the award-winning playwright of the now-classic 1959 Broadway play A Raisin in The Sun, adapted into a 1961 movie starring Sidney Poitier and Ruby Dee in 1961, and remade for television in 2008 starring Phylicia Rashad, Audra McDonald, Sanaa Lathan and Sean Combs.
Some may know of her family’s fight to end restrictive housing covenants in Chicago that went all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court (Hansberry v. Lee), or of her civil rights activism and advocacy for universal healthcare, women’s rights, and for the demise of colonialism and imperialism.
A few may even know of her embrace of her queer identity and desire to fight for gay rights at the end of her life.
I know all of these things because my personal connection to Lorraine Hansberry started when she became the first (and only) Black woman writer I got to read as a part of English curriculum in either middle school or high school in the 1980s.
We read Raisin In The Sun as a class in 11th grade AP English. So when my teacher Dr. Victor had his students spend our spring semester studying one author in depth of our own choosing, I chose Lorraine.
Today being her birthday would have been reason enough to honor the life and career of the one and only Janet Jackson.
But in 2021, it’s also turned out to be once-in-a-lifetime event — the weekend Ms. Jackson has decided to sell over 1,000 personal and professional items viaJulien’s Auctions to fans and collectors alike — and donate a portion of the proceeds to children’s charity Compassion International.
(Sunday, May 16 is the last day to watch and/or bid during the auction. You can do so here.)
As a personal fan who lives in Los Angeles, I was able to go to the public display prior to the auction. Seeing her iconic outfits and costumes along with personal items from her childhood and homes was, in a word, mesmerizing.
If you’ve grown up with her like I and a lot of GenX has, it’s easy to take Janet’s legacy and prowess for granted. But when you look at the history, the music, the videos, her eras across the decades and the impact of them all represented in one place, you fully realize what a uniquely innovative, influential artist she has been, is, and always will be.
With producing partners Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis, Jackson has crafted some of the most insightful and inspirational — and hey, let’s say it, danceable — issue-oriented songs ever.
Today, we celebrate her contributions to elevating our consciousness and calling for action on topics such as discrimination, poverty, racism, illiteracy, domestic violence, depression, sexism and homophobia with the playlist “The Knowledge” – Janet Jackson Social Justice Music:
“Rhythm Nation” is not only represented on this list by its titular track, but also by “The Knowledge,” “State of the World,” “Livin’ In A World (They Didn’t Make)” and its connective tissue interludes, but also by “The Skin Game,” a track about racial discrimination from that didn’t make the album but was a B-side to its “Come Back To Me” single.
“Like so many Black people, I have my own stories of being profiled — of being stopped, searched and frisked twice in the same month by cops skeptical about a Black woman driving a fancy car. And you have to think, if the cops stop me, how much worse must it be for others?” she wrote. “Yet we go on.”
Janet recently revived “Skin Game” during at her State of the WorldTour, at the 2018 Essence Festival and during her Global Citizens performance in 2018. Check out the kick-ass opening sequence below:
On her 1993 Janet. album, Jackson offered “New Agenda” with Public Enemy’s Chuck D, “This Time” about domestic violence with opera singer Kathleen Battle.
On 1997’s The Velvet Rope, Janet tackled self-esteem and self-worth on “You,” the unhealthy reliance on connections made through the internet on “Empty,” feelings of depression and worthlessness “Special,” homophobia on “Free Xone” and overcoming racial and gender discrimination on the hidden track “Can’t Be Stopped.”
The depth and breadth of this album’s themes are discussed deftly by Ayanna Dozier in her book on The Velvet Rope from the acclaimed 33 1/3 series about music’s most impactful albums.
“Got Til It’s Gone” (seen below) and “Together Again” are also included because visually, this pair of Afrocentric videos were all about self-possession, expression and finding joy in the most difficult of circumstances — in South Africa during apartheid in “Got Til It’s Gone,” and healing oneself through the acknowledgement of the importance of lives of those who passed from AIDS and need to celebrate not stigmatize their lives in “Together Again.”
“What About” mixes the softness of her sweetest love songs with a hard rock edge reminiscent of “Black Cat” as she delivers a tour de force on domestic violence.
Jackson’s performance at the 1998 VH1 Fashion Awards was poignant, powerful and unforgettable:
Rounding out the playlist are the songs “Black Eagle” and “Shoulda Known Better” from her number-one album from 2015, Unbreakable, which acknowledge the work that still needs to be done, how difficult it is to overcome the complex issues of racism and abject poverty and how heart-breaking they are, but why it’s still worth trying.
Though not released as a single or official video, “Shoulda Known Better” was used by a fan to make a video tribute to the victims of the Orlando shooting in 2016, and Janet Jackson shares it as part of her official YouTube channel:
I hope I get to add new songs to this list later this year, if Janet resumes the Black Diamond Tour and releases the Black Diamondalbum, both postponed from 2020 due to the global pandemic.
Or even if she records an entirely new project, I have no doubt that in some form, Ms. Jackson’s outspoken caring and compassion for the world will come through once again.
As any regular (or even new) follower of Good Black News may have noticed, we really love music here. Its creators, its history, its present and its future. And days like today – the 71st birthday of musical legend, genius and icon Stevie Wonder – are some of the most exciting, because we get to think of new ways to share about an artist who has given so much to the culture and community.
Last year, in honor of Stevie’s 70th, GBN published a month of differently-themed Stevie playlists, (links to all below). But for the generations who didn’t grow up on Stevie Wonder — particularly the 10-and-under set — where to start? How about right here, with our curated, kid-friendly playlist “Stevie For The Sweeties”:
I remember exactly when I took my children’s musical education and exposure into my own hands — April 21, 2016 — the day Prince passed. My kids didn’t understand why Mommy was so upset and was playing Prince music all the time — in the car, in the house, on the TV, for weeks — because they didn’t know who he was or why his music was important.
It was a wake-up call for me to make a conscious effort to introduce them to the musical greats. Since they were 8 and 6 at the time, I started putting together kid-friendly playlists on iTunes (the very first I called “Prince for My Patooties”) that they could listen to on their own, with friends, or at school during breaks, without any worries about playing any songs that could be objectionable for language or subject matter, and sequenced in a way to keep their interest.
“Stevie For The Sweeties” starts with “Fun Day,” moves into “Sir Duke” (which has been a magic tonic to my sons ears since he was a toddler, and where Stevie himself does some hat tipping to generational forebears by name checking Count Basie, Glenn Miller, Louis “Satchmo” Armstrong, Ella Fitzgerald and of course, “Sir”Duke Ellington), “I Wish” (which I remember me, my sister Lesa and my cousins David and Darryl singing to as little kids while we played “Three Flies Up” in my Auntie Brenda’s front yard), and “Fingertips Pts. 1& 2”, where Stevie himself was barely double digits in age.
Those great songs and so many more classics to enjoy with the younger set like “Do I Do” (featuring trumpet-great Dizzy Gillespie on an effervescent solo), “I Love Every Little Thing About You,” “Isn’t She Lovely” (which Stevie wrote about his first-born daughter Iesha), “Bird of Beauty” and “You Are The Sunshine of My Life” are part of “Stevie For The Sweeties.”
I hope you enjoy with the sunshines and lovelies in your life, and thank you, thank you, thank you, Stevie Wonder, for your incredible music and life. We love you. Happy Birthday!
Although the COVID-19 pandemic disrupted movie releases in theaters for the majority of 2020, the UCLA report took that into consideration and tracked online and streaming movie releases as well. The data from those releases offer similar results — diversely-cast films generate more interest from audiences.
UCLA’s 2021 report states that in 2020, films with casts with at least 41% to 50% diversity took home the highest median gross at the box office, while films with casts less than 11% diversity performed the worst.
These films include the Will Smith/Martin Lawrence action comedy Bad Boys for Life, which was 2020’s top-earning film at the box office with $426.5 million; the No. 2 Tenet starring John David Washington, which grossed $362.9 million; Birds of Prey, which came in at No. 5 with $201.9 million; and Onward, which came in seventh with $141.9 million.
The UCLA report states that the new evidence from 2020 supports findings from previous reports in this series suggesting that America’s increasingly diverse audiences prefer diverse film content in the following ways:
People of color accounted for the majority of opening weekend, domestic ticket sales for six of the top 10 films released in theaters in 2020 (ranked by global box office), as well as half of the tickets for a seventh top 10 film.
Among the large number of top films released via streaming platforms in 2020 — largely due to the pandemic and theater closures — ratings for White, Black, Latinx and Asian households and viewers 18-49 were all highest for films featuring casts that were from 21 percent to 30 percent minority.
Households of color accounted for a disproportionate share of the households viewing eight of the top 10 films released via streaming platforms in 2020, ranked by total household ratings, and approached proportionate representation for the other two.
In 2020, total social media interactions for films released via streaming platforms peaked for films with casts that were from 21 percent to 30 percent minority.
In 2020, films with casts that were from 41 percent to 50 percent minority enjoyed the highest median global box office receipts, while films with casts that were less than 11 percent minority were the poorest performers.
In 2020, seven of the top 10 theatrical films for Asian and Black moviegoers, ranked by each group’s share of opening weekend box office, featured casts that were over 30 percent minority. Four of the top 10 theatrical films for Latinx moviegoers and just one of the top 10 theatrical films for White moviegoers had casts that exceeded 30 percent minority.
Seven of the top 10 streaming films ranked by the Asian share and Black share of total households had casts that were over 30 percent minority in 2020. Among the top 10 films ranked by Latinx and White household share, six had casts that exceeded the 30 percent minority threshold.
The report also notes that while gains have been made in certain areas in regards to casting, director and writer representation for people of color still has a ways to go, with percentages for both in 2020 were still over 74% white.
