"All You Need Is Love" meant empathy, intimacy, support, selflessness, and spiritual solidarity.
These are the tonics to alienation, segregation, hostility, selfishness, and existential emptiness.
(Note: Two of the videos are censored on YouTube because of prude hecklers. They're fine, I should know because I made all three of them.)
BESSIE SMITH -"You've Got To Give Me Some" (1928)
The expression of love is a sacred act and a spiritual pact.
It may be fleeting, may be only a cherished moment, or perhaps as deep as life is long. But the selfless act of giving of ourselves for another's benefit lifts us into the better angels of our nature. Hate only degrades and destroys. Love nourishes the individual soul and the human species. Without it, we will not survive.
RITA CHAO & The Quests/ NANCY SIT -"Hanky Panky" (1967)
Love is love and Hate ain't; it can't be legislated, leveled, or lynched. Let no one put it asunder.
These are my tributes to love; its stirrings, its courtship, its consumation, its playful dynamics and trusts, its gameplaying, its limitless range.
TINA TURNER -"Whole Lotta Love" (1975)
Love is the antidote to all harm; it is the pulsebeat of the human race.
Here's how the declarative statement, "I'm a Man!", took some terrific and unlikely paths.
_______________
Bo Diddley was inspired by the riff and swagger of Muddy Waters' Hoochie Coochie Man" (1954) to rewrite it as a youthful boast:
BO DIDDLEY -"I'm a Man" (1955)
Muddy Waters was a labelmate with Bo at the legendary Chess Records. He responded with a wry wink in this response:
MUDDY WATERS -"Mannish Boy" (1956)
Later, as a generation of rock groups kept homaging his work, Waters responded by re-recording his song in an Acid Rock style:
MUDDY WATERS -"Mannish Boy" (1968)
Acolyte JIMI HENDRIX can be heard in this candid studio jam taking that further:
JIMI HENDRIX -"Mannish Boy" (1969)
Jimi also used the phrase "I'm a man/ at least I'm trying to be" to kick off his song, "Steppin' Stone".
Coming round lately, here's BLACK STROBE (France) merging the tough Blues with a touch of Electronica:
BLACK STROBE -"I'm a Man" (2007)
Taking the electronic angle to fruition, here's perennials DEVO protesting violence against the common people:
DEVO -"Don't Shoot (I'm a Man)" (2008)
On a parallel track, The Spencer Davis Group, propelled by the soulful organ and vocals of young Steve Winwood, kicked out the jams with this proto-Funk classic of their own:
SPENCER DAVIS GROUP -"I'm a Man" (1967)
Here's organist Mick Weaver, working under the band name WYNDER K. FROG, tearing up the party some more:
WYNDER K. FROG -"I'm a Man" (1967)
And here's how many people know the song, in this stellar cover by the emerging band CHICAGO, with lead guitar and vocals by the late Terry Kath, along with bassist Peter Cetera:
CHICAGO -"I'm a Man" (1970)
The song was done in Disco versions by the appropriately named MACHO from Italy in 1978, and by rocker KEITH EMERSON for a 1981 film soundtrack.
Lately the song has been covered by these Texican brothers:
ROCK Sex is an inclusive club where no one is denied.
_______________
In life, there's not just one angle, and there's not just two in opposition.
That limitation is simply that... a limit of imagination. The big picture is only subjective and best seen from many angles. Every perspective is valuable because it opens up new possibility, which 'only' and 'either/or' are blind to.
Upshot: there is no Either/Or... there is only "And Also".
Here's a sterling example of each creator enriching creativity by bringing something more to the previous.
_______________
Blues was response music. It responded to life with common feelings, and it was responded to by other folks bringing their own feel. Since culture is creativity and commonality, every voice is valid and every face is irrelevant. It doesn't matter how you look, it's in how you feel. If you feel it, you are it. Blues is simply human feeling felt by other humans.
Essentially, you vamp, others amp. You put it out there, another takes it farther.
Muddy Waters started this particular cultural relay with his recording of Willie Dixon's song.
MUDDY WATERS -"You Need Love" (1962)
The Small Faces, led by Blues wailer Steve Marriott, expanded it texturally in their cover:
SMALL FACES -"You Need Loving" (1966)
Jimmie Page in turn wedded a crucially memorable original riff with Robert Plant's loose interpolation of those previous recordings to create their band's breakthrough hit. Like a childbirth, the combination of two things creates a new third thing of its own.
LED ZEPPELIN -"Whole Lotta Love" (1969)
If someone's impulse is to separate people's validity by how they look instead of how they sound, well, that prejudgement names itself.
Funkadelic aimed to eliminate all barriers of outlook and sound, and guitarist Eddie Hazel re-amped Zeppelin's new chord vamp into further territories with the intro song for their debut:
FUNKADELIC -"Mommy, What's A Funkadelic?" (1970)
Going her own way from Ike, Tina Turner deepened her Rock'n'Soul repertoire with this sexy grind on Zeppelin's song:
TINA TURNER -"Whole Lotta Love" (1975) *
* (I made this video. YouTube hecklers censor it, not because of its PG-rated sensuality, but for its diversity of human love.
Censors always miss the point.)
Lawyers will sue, separatists will divide, but those limits aside what is always missed is the real point: culture is a creative hand-off without boundaries. Give credit to individual creators? Of course. But limit creators from responding to life and each other? Never.
That doesn't protect creators, it kills creativity itself. True culture is about live and let live. And a whole lotta love.
"Liberation for all. Everything must be rethought." ______________
Two great things hybrid a third great thing. ROCK SEX is a metaphor for the creative connections that link our shared culture together. This Pop Culture hub explores the roots and branches of Music, Film, Art, Comics, and more. _______________
Rock'n'Soul music is a baton relayed by everyone. Learn the holistic history with the most advanced Music Playlists online!:
BLUES, MAMBO, JAZZ, ROCKABILLY, SURF, BEAT, SOUL, GARAGE, PSYCHEDELIA, FUNK, GLAM, PUNK, NEW WAVE, HIPHOP, POSTPUNK, GRUNGE, RIOT GRRRL, ELECTRO, next! _______________
This is our party and everyone is invited!
Posts
