Sam Cooke

Listen/Download – Sam Cooke – A Change Is Gonna Come

 

Greetings all.

Due to the impending election, I’m going to be doing something special this week, under the banner of Soul the Vote (yeah, I know. Not the most original idea but it says what I want it to, so, y’know…).

I will be re-posting some socially/politically relevant classics all week long, culminating in a special Election edition of the Funky16Corners Radio Show this coming Friday, 11/4.

Today is a post from December of 2014, on the 50th anniversary of Sam Cooke’s death. Though I’m reposting both sides, the one to focus on here (for obvious reasons) is ‘A Change Is Gonna Come’. Let’s all hope it’s a good one.

There is a lot at stake here, and while I realize that politics is not everyone’s bag, there is a tremendous amount at stake here, and if you are willing to throw your lot in with a maniac like that, then we don’t really have much to say to each other.

So dig the sounds, spread the word, and get your ass out there and vote.

Keep the Faith

Larry

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I hope the new day finds you well.

I think I’ve mentioned this before, but in case I haven’t, here’s something…

As a more than casual student of the interconnected nature of the Tao, and someone who has experienced the (extremely) odd coincidence now and again, the way that my life intersects with certain records often causes me to take note.

Many a time, have I been in search of a particular disc for a long time, then I get a sudden urge to look again, and there it is.

The same kind of thing often happens when I write up a record (or get ready to do so) and then I discover that some important event tied to that record (birthday, death, anniversary etc) is coming up at the same time.

I had been trying to get my hands on Sam Cooke’s final LP ‘Shake’ (specifically to get the LP-only track ‘Yeah Man’) for some time. Considering the popularity of Cooke, and the fact that the album contained no less than three hits, it surprised me how scarce a record it was, and how hard it would be to get a copy at a reasonable price.

So this fall, when I had all but given up trying, I scored a copy of the ‘Shake’ 45, and then a few weeks later  a copy of the LP verily fell in my lap (sometimes – to paraphrase my man DJ Prestige –  it less me finding the record, than the record finding me).

Last week I sat down to digimatize the discs, and what should pop up on my radar but the fact that the 50th anniversary of Cooke’s death (12/11/64) was about a week away.

Cooke has been – thanks entirely to his untimely passing – at the top of the list of transitional (and hugely influential) figures of soul music.

This is not to say that he never made any ‘pure’ soul, because the tracks above will testify to that, but rather that the bulk of his post-gospel career was divided pretty evenly between R&B, pop music and crooning.

Cooke was a brilliant singer and songwriter, and there are all indications that he would (like Jackie Wilson, an artist who’s career paralleled his) have entered the soul ‘mainstream’ had he lived, but sadly, we’ll never know.

Today’s 45, which was released about a month before the ‘Shake’ LP (it was already charting within a few weeks of his killing) was a substantial hit, both sides making it into the R&B Top 10 by the end of January 1965.

It is a study in contrasts, with ‘Shake’, a hard driving (and influential) soul number, backed with the epic civil rights ballad ‘A Change Is Gonna Come’.

‘Shake’, later covered by Otis Redding and the Small Faces among others, features some surprisingly raw rhythm guitar (Bobby Womack) running through its middle, surrounded by booming horns and solid percussion. It was recorded at Cooke’s last session, less than a month before his death.

‘A Change Is Gonna Come’ is one of those records that has an eerie depth to it. It hearkens back to Cooke’s gospel roots, but despite the title, it has never seemed to me like a hopeful song. It has the ring of inevitable resolution about it, but only as viewed through great amounts of struggle and pain.

Cooke sang the song on the Tonight Show in February of 1964 (the performance has since been lost) and never performed the song live again.

Listening to ‘A Change Is Gonna Come’, it now seems inevitable that a song and performance so powerful would be seen as a landmark of sorts.

That it was released almost simultaneously with his death has cemented that status.

So toast the memory of the mighty Sam Cooke,  dig the sounds, and I’ll see you on Friday.

 

Keep the faith

Larry

 

 

 

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