I drove cross-country with a tape of "Fulfillingness’ First Finale".<\/p>\n
I don’t buy albums anymore.\u00c2\u00a0 I’m disappointed with the whole concept.\u00c2\u00a0 Oh, I get any disc I want for free, but I want almost none of them.\u00c2\u00a0 Every day somebody I don’t know tracks me down to ask me whether they can send me their CD.\u00c2\u00a0 As if I’m really going to play it.<\/p>\n
You see the religion is all gone.\u00c2\u00a0 It’s a singles business.\u00c2\u00a0 Who the artist is doesn’t matter.\u00c2\u00a0 He’s just a two-dimensional cardboard prop for the label to throw hundreds of thousands of dollars of marketing money behind.\u00c2\u00a0 The business can’t come back because those in power have lost sight of what made it all work, the artists.<\/p>\n
What does it mean to be an artist?<\/p>\n
It means to lay your soul down.\u00c2\u00a0 Your truth.\u00c2\u00a0 The fame is ancillary.\u00c2\u00a0 If the success comes first, then you’re an empty vessel.\u00c2\u00a0 It’s kind of like love.\u00c2\u00a0 Would you like to get all your sex at a brothel?\u00c2\u00a0 Sex without love isn’t as good as masturbation.\u00c2\u00a0 Because what makes sex so good is the connection between the two people who are doing it.\u00c2\u00a0 What made the records of yore so good was the connection between the creator and the listener.<\/p>\n
Oh, don’t tell me you’re into this artist or that.\u00c2\u00a0 It’s kind of like the movie business.\u00c2\u00a0 We’ve seen it all.\u00c2\u00a0 It’s just endless remakes.\u00c2\u00a0 Endless riffs on what’s come before.\u00c2\u00a0 But what if an artist went off on his own path, only following his own muse, desirous of connecting but unwilling to compromise.\u00c2\u00a0 Then you’d have Stevie Wonder.<\/p>\n
It wasn’t like Stevie Wonder was following a textbook.\u00c2\u00a0 There was no manual.\u00c2\u00a0 He felt locked up in a Motown ghetto while rock bands were playing R&B influenced material.\u00c2\u00a0 He decided to bridge the gap.<\/p>\n
There was nobody watching.\u00c2\u00a0 His label was in the singles business.\u00c2\u00a0 They had no presence in the rock world.\u00c2\u00a0 And the white youngsters digging the Stones, they thought Stevie Wonder was a hits artist, just a blind singer who could play the harmonica.<\/p>\n
Now during the sixties, the whites had paid attention to the blacks.\u00c2\u00a0 The suburban rockers were Sly and the Family Stone fans.\u00c2\u00a0 But by ’72, Top Forty was over and there was nobody black on FM.<\/p>\n
This was what Stevie Wonder was up against.<\/p>\n
There was a first foray, a toe dip in the water.\u00c2\u00a0 "Music Of My Mind" is a very good album.\u00c2\u00a0 But it had a basic, throwaway Motown cover.\u00c2\u00a0 In an era when rock acts paid almost as much attention to the packaging as the music, "Music Of My Mind" was easy to ignore.<\/p>\n
But then came "Talking Book".\u00c2\u00a0 With Braille on its cover.\u00c2\u00a0 And "Superstition" in its grooves.<\/p>\n
Imagine if Dr. Dre had a sense of melody.\u00c2\u00a0 Imagine the kind of music he’d make.\u00c2\u00a0 Hopefully, something like "Superstition".<\/p>\n
Word was it was written for Jeff Beck.\u00c2\u00a0 But then Stevie realized it was just too good.\u00c2\u00a0 He kept it for himself.<\/p>\n
Synths were just coming into vogue.\u00c2\u00a0 But no one was using electronic instruments as the basis, the UNDERPINNING, for pop music.\u00c2\u00a0 That riff played on the synth was enough to draw you to the track like a mouse to cheese.\u00c2\u00a0 And then the offhanded way Stevie sang.\u00c2\u00a0 The OPPOSITE of Mariah Carey.\u00c2\u00a0 He wasn’t selling the lyrics by slapping you in the face, it was like he was on your couch telling you a story, you BELIEVED HIM!\u00c2\u00a0 And then came the HORNS!\u00c2\u00a0 The concoction ELATED you, you couldn’t stop drinking it in.\u00c2\u00a0 "Superstition" is what music is about.\u00c2\u00a0 Something so infectious that you’re immediately hooked and taken away from your regular life.<\/p>\n
But "Superstition" wasn’t the only good track on "Talking Book", far from it.<\/p>\n
I learned about the album from a college friend whose father worked at WMCA.\u00c2\u00a0 She wore a Good Guys sweatshirt around campus.\u00c2\u00a0 She accosted me by her dorm and TOLD ME, there was this Stevie Wonder record I HAD to hear.<\/p>\n
She was right.\u00c2\u00a0 If an artist came out with an album as good as "Talking Book" today people would fall over dead upon hearing it, they’re just not prepared for something this good.<\/p>\n
There was "You Are The Sunshine Of My Life" for my father’s set.\u00c2\u00a0 But we liked it too, because it wasn’t a cheap shot, since the rest of the album ROCKED, and had SOUL!<\/p>\n
Pound for pound this is the best selection of album tracks of all time.\u00c2\u00a0 Even better than "Who’s Next".\u00c2\u00a0 After all, there was no "My Wife".<\/p>\n
You had the sultry "Maybe Your Baby".\u00c2\u00a0 "Tuesday Heartbreak".\u00c2\u00a0 "You’ve Got It Bad Girl".\u00c2\u00a0 The exquisite "Blame It On The Sun".\u00c2\u00a0 And none of these are my FAVORITES!<\/p>\n
Do you know "Big Brother"?<\/p>\n
Your name is big brother The acoustic guitar had the feel of a record cut in COLORADO!\u00c2\u00a0 As if some country rocker was speaking from his soul.\u00c2\u00a0 But the record was cut in the metropolis, and the lyrics were about the ghetto.\u00c2\u00a0 A black man singing for a white audience about how they were bleeding heart liberals.\u00c2\u00a0 Ice-T’s records had as much truth, but nowhere near the subtlety, never mind the musicality.<\/p>\n But the piece de resistance is "I Believe (When I Fall In Love It Will Be Forever)".<\/p>\n The track walks a fine line between schmaltz and credibility.\u00c2\u00a0 Whereas Billy Joel falls on the wrong side of the divide, over-emoting platitudes, as you listen to Stevie’s song you just know he’s singing from the bottom of his heart.<\/p>\n Why, in all the discussion of the best rock albums of all time, "Talking Book" is never in the Top Ten, is just testimony to the short memory of white people.\u00c2\u00a0 "Talking Book" is a masterpiece every bit as good as "Rubber Soul".\u00c2\u00a0 (AND, just as innovative in its time!)<\/p>\n Then came "Innervisions".\u00c2\u00a0 Not quite as good as "Talking Book", but what’s better, the aforementioned "Rubber Soul" or "Revolver"?<\/p>\n The key track, of course, is "Living For The City".<\/p>\n But check out "Too High" all these years later.\u00c2\u00a0 Never mind "Higher Ground" or "All In Love Is Fair".\u00c2\u00a0 But it’s the closer which is magical, "He’s Misstra Know-It-All".\u00c2\u00a0 Nobody throws away songs this good anymore.\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0 They don’t put this much effort into songs that will never be singles.\u00c2\u00a0 That’s how we got addicted to albums.\u00c2\u00a0 Because the song you NEVER heard on the radio was just as good as the ones you did.<\/p>\n I bought "Fulfillingness’ First Finale" the day it came out.\u00c2\u00a0 I had to.<\/p>\n And the fact there was only a year between all of these albums…\u00c2\u00a0 There was no remix album, just all new material every year.<\/p>\n The big hit off "Fulfillingness’ First Finale" was "Boogie On Reggae Woman".\u00c2\u00a0 I won’t say it’s the WORST song on the record, but it’s far from the best.<\/p>\n It wasn’t the in-your-face tracks that made "Fulfillingness’ First Finale" so great, but the quiet ones, the SUBTLE ones, that you only got a few plays in.\u00c2\u00a0 And we always played our albums multiple times, digesting them, from beginning to end.\u00c2\u00a0 The day Alicia Keys cuts something as heartfelt as "They Won’t Go When I\u00c2\u00a0 Go" is the day I believe she’s a major artist.\u00c2\u00a0 "They Won’t Go When I Go" sounds like it was cut in a church.\u00c2\u00a0 It’s got the feel of Elton John’s "Sixty Years On"…HAUNTING!<\/p>\n But then there’s "Creepin’".<\/p>\n Love is so amazing…<\/em><\/p>\n If you know the track your heart is turning to butter now.\u00c2\u00a0 "Creepin’" is what music used to be.\u00c2\u00a0 A mental movie.\u00c2\u00a0 That you snuck into in your car, your bedroom.\u00c2\u00a0 An aural landscape you could identify with.<\/p>\n But my favorite is "Heaven Is 10 Zillion Light Years Away".<\/p>\n It’s the sound of the stringed instrument coupled with Stevie Wonder’s emotion that ENRAPTURES YOU!<\/p>\n But in my heart I can feel it 1976’s "Songs In The Key Of Life" gets all the accolades.\u00c2\u00a0 But anybody who says this is their favorite Stevie Wonder album telegraphs to me that they’re not a true fan.\u00c2\u00a0 The media had finally caught up with this blind musician, acknowledged him as a national treasure, and overhyped a very good record, with moments of genius, but what had come before…those three albums, "Talking Book" to "Innervisions" to "Fulfillingness’ First Finale", that run was every bit as good as the Stones’ from "Let It Bleed" to "Sticky Fingers" to "Exile On Main Street".<\/p>\n And I was there.\u00c2\u00a0 From discovery to the public hosannas.<\/p>\n It didn’t happen overnight.\u00c2\u00a0 The hype machine was not that good.\u00c2\u00a0 They didn’t have musical stars playing Rockefeller Center on the "Today Show".\u00c2\u00a0 There was no MTV.\u00c2\u00a0 "Rolling Stone" still had credibility.\u00c2\u00a0 It was like living through the run from Nintendo to PlayStation to PS2.\u00c2\u00a0 But as good as video games can be, they can’t touch your soul like music.\u00c2\u00a0 Still, music was a parallel universe, a secret club, that nobody was paying attention to, like the video game world, and we just couldn’t get enough of it.<\/p>\n Don’t blame Stevie Wonder for the end of the golden era.\u00c2\u00a0 This blind man had something to prove.\u00c2\u00a0 That he was a major musician who needed to be taken seriously.\u00c2\u00a0 He did everything he could, he achieved his goal, and when he found out all the success could not make his life work, he just couldn’t do it anymore.<\/p>\n That’s why these artists create such great work.\u00c2\u00a0 They have a need to COMMUNICATE!\u00c2\u00a0 They’re loners, who want in.\u00c2\u00a0 And the only entrance ticket they’ve got is music.\u00c2\u00a0 They just believe if they do good enough work, the door will open, they’ll be accepted, they’ll find love and happiness.<\/p>\n The motivation is different today.\u00c2\u00a0 Musicality is secondary to stardom.<\/p>\n Of course, there are real musicians out there.\u00c2\u00a0 But they’re not the ones in the spotlight, INSURING they stay in the spotlight.\u00c2\u00a0 When was the last time you played "How To Dismantle An Atomic Bomb"?\u00c2\u00a0 And that came out only a YEAR ago!<\/p>\n There was only one Renaissance.\u00c2\u00a0 There’s been art since.\u00c2\u00a0 Even some greats.\u00c2\u00a0 Manet, Monet, Picasso.\u00c2\u00a0 Still, there was only one golden era.\u00c2\u00a0 I think we lived though the golden era of music.\u00c2\u00a0 From ’64 to ’74.\u00c2\u00a0 I don’t expect it to come back.\u00c2\u00a0 But if some of the values from that time became paramount again, maybe the picture would start to tilt, the scene would become vibrant again.<\/p>\n First of all, there must be emphasis on quality work overall, not just singles.\u00c2\u00a0 Except for "Living In The City", the best tracks of Stevie Wonder’s historic run were NOT singles.<\/p>\n Second, freedom must be given back to the musicians.\u00c2\u00a0 It’s not like the above albums were Stevie Wonder’s first.\u00c2\u00a0 But only when he got contractual freedom, to do whatever he wanted, did he come up with true greatness.\u00c2\u00a0 Executives meddling in music is like U.S. ski team coaches telling Bode Miller what to do.\u00c2\u00a0 Bode had to do it HIS way to win the World Cup.<\/p>\n Third, we must have open airwaves.\u00c2\u00a0 The pricks in charge of the major labels are INSURING that a reasonable alternative to Top Forty radio can’t exist, cutting their noses to spite their faces without even realizing it.\u00c2\u00a0 It’s only when we have a healthy EXPOSURE system that we have great music.<\/p>\n It’s got nothing to do with ripping and burning.\u00c2\u00a0 Nothing to do with piracy.\u00c2\u00a0 It’s got to do with the MUSIC!\u00c2\u00a0 There hasn’t been enough respect of the MUSIC!\u00c2\u00a0 We’ve turned off the public.\u00c2\u00a0 Hell, even I’VE been turned off.\u00c2\u00a0 By endless TV specials, bogus Grammy shows, vapid music television.\u00c2\u00a0 Who can believe in something so heavily flogged, so overexposed?<\/p>\n What I’m looking for is religion.\u00c2\u00a0 Something so gorgeous, something so inspirational, that I want to take it with me everywhere I go, to the point I can remember where I was when it was playing.<\/p>\n Wyoming is desolate.\u00c2\u00a0 I’d just graduated from college.\u00c2\u00a0 I was alienated.\u00c2\u00a0 But what got me through my tenure on I-80 was the cassettes I’d made.\u00c2\u00a0 Containing music I thought was made for ME, not businessmen, not gatekeepers, like "Fulfillingness’ First Finale".<\/p>\n 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You say that you’re watching me on the telly
Seeing me go nowhere<\/em><\/p>\n
FEEL HIS SPIRIT!<\/em><\/p>\n