#Pops Staples

[nedison]

We The People - The Staple Singers (1972)

[leonardcohenofficial]

also in case you weren't aware this album is insane btw

[julio-viernes]

Nick Lowe en "Different Kind of Blue", plácida, reflexiva, otra favorita de "Indoor Safari". Que clase y que estilo. La interpreta aparentemente sin esfuerzo, como si fuera Pops Staples en "The Weight". Suavemente. Es otro tipo de soul, sin malabarismos ni ímprobos esfuerzos vocales, pero con verdad, que es lo que el soul se supone debe tener.

[guessimdumb]

The Staple Singers - Power of Love (1968)

Recorded as the Staples were moving to secular music, there's still a strong gospel sound backing Mavis' powerful and gritty vocals. Cool guitar by Pops, as well.

[sunset-supergirl]

Happy birthday Pops Staples

[lisamarie-vee]

[krispyweiss]

Album Review: Blind Boys of Alabama - Echoes of the South

Looking at the tracklist and hearing such songs as “Work Until My Days are Done” and “The Last Time,” it almost seems as if the Blind Boys of Alabama saw what was coming as they recorded Echoes of the South.

Two longtime members of the band - Benjamin Moore Jr. and Paul Beasley, whose falsetto features prominently on “Jesus You’ve Been Good to Me” - have since died and 91-year-old Jimmy Carter, the group’s last remaining tie to its 1944 founding, retired from touring just before the album was released.

That makes Echoes of the South - with its title in Braille on the cover - something of an ending and a new beginning as the group intends to soldier on with new members.

“Here we are, the Blind Boys of Alabama,” Carter intones as his brothers in music sing wordlessly behind him on the opening “Send it on Down.”

“You know, we’ve been around a long time. But the good news is, we’re still here.”

This album finds the Blind Boys in full gospel mode, sans guest singers and musicians, celebrating their partnership with Pop Staples’ “Friendship” and ending the LP with an apropos plea in “Heaven Help Us All.”

Echoes of the South is a fine coda to this iteration of the Blind Boys of Alabama. Already on the road with new members, the band will likely release a kind of debut album in the not-too-distant future.

“The spirit of the Blind Boys isn’t about what you can’t do; it’s about what you can do,” said singer Ricky McKinnie, who will carry on with Rev. Julius Love and the new cast. “As long as we stay true to that, as long as we sing songs that touch the heart, this group will live on forever.”

Amen.

Grade card: Blind Boys of Alabama - Echoes of the South - B

10/5/23

[cbjustmusic]

[leonardcohenofficial]

ideal blunt rotation + insane track list

[julio-viernes]

Gospel del mejor, The Staple Singers en directo interpretando “Why Am I Treated So Bad”. Grandes voces, gran guitarra y grandes palmas perfectamente cruzadas. En su naturalidad rozan la perfección. Favoritos de Sonic Boom, lógico, este señor no es gilipollas, los cuatro eran MARAVILLOSOS, de lo mejor que he puesto aquí. De nada por la ambrosía.

Por otro lado, Dorothy Lovecoates & The Gospel Harmonettes, with God on their side, interpretando “Strange Man”, portento del soul y el espiritual. En “The Handwriting On The Wall” (Okeh, 1967). Ambas en el doble recopilatorio “The Gospel Sound” (CBS, 1972).

[pear-pies]

Guitar Player Magazine - September 1992

[sunset-supergirl]

Happy birthday Pops Staples

[lisamarie-vee]

[krispyweiss]

Song Review: Blind Boys of Alabama - “Friendship”

The Blind Boys of Alabama have friendship.

They also have “Friendship,” the song made famous by Pops Staples, re-recorded by the Blind Boys and serving as the lead single from Echoes of the South, arriving Aug. 25 with braille on the cover.

Though they are a spiritual band, “Friendship” is a secular song, one that seems ideally suited to the Blind Boys of 2023 as it arrives in the wake of Ben Moore and Paul Beasley’s recent deaths and Jimmy Carter’s retirement from the road.

All three Blind Boys appear on the album.

Your welfare is my concern/you weigh less than you think/I’ll carry you to the second set/I love to hear you sing/we got a friendship/the kind that lasts a lifetime, they sing alongside Ricky McKinnie, Rev. Julius Love and Joey Williams.

The music is vaguely church-like and the Blind Boys of Alabama do sing like a choir as they alternate leads on the verses and come together in harmony on the chorus just as their various members have been doing since 1939.

“Despite recent membership changes, we believe, as long as everybody gives all that they have to give and we sing songs that touch the heart, we’ll live on forever,” the Blind Boys of Alabama said in a statement.

Amen to that.

Grade card: Blind Boys of Alabama - “Friendship” - B+

6/13/23

[gcmyers]

Uncloudy Day

“Private Space”- Available at the Principle Gallery, VA Oh, they tell me of a home where my friends have goneOh, they tell me of that land far awayWhere the tree of life in eternal bloomSheds its fragrance through the unclouded day —Uncloudy Day, Josiah K. Alwood  Still on a semi-hiatus here on the blog but wanted to continue playing my Sunday Morning musical selection. This week I am going…