Al Green

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Al Green

Al Green

Al mother-fuckin’ Green. What can really be written about this legend that hasn’t already been expressed before? He didn’t get the nickname of The Greatest Living Soul Singer by being some basic-ass-singer who sings the standards. At 73-years-old, Al Green is not only a living legend but one of America’s greatest treasures. Although Al Green suffers from the same Greatest Hits stigma as previous write-up Abba, meaning that Al Green’s albums and deep cuts often get lost up in the shuffle of his better known songs such as karaoke staples “Let’s Stay Together” and “Love & Happiness”. The two biggest constants in Green’s music revolve around sex and God. I don’t really know where to go from there- I just thought it was worth mentioning. Green’s hay-day was with record label Hi Records, which came to fruition when a singer, a few people and former producers of Sun Records went and started their own label. Their (and Al’s) commercial peak was in the early 1970’s. Al road the label to success with hits such as “Tired of Being Alone”, “I’m Still in Love with You”, “Call Me”, or a personal favorite of mine, the Hank Williams’ cover “I’m So Lonesome I Could Cry”. Al Green would cover everyone from the Beatles to the Box Tops, but they became originals by the time Al Green was done singing them. Al’s collaboration with producer Willie Mitchell saw some of the best records ever released from 1970-1973. The single “I Can’t Get Next to You”, with it’s slow, fretful Southern 6/8 bump-and-grind beat, saved Al from one-hit-wonder-dom. Since then, he’s  been riding the waves of his amazing-soulful-voice. Often compared to Marvin Gaye, but never given the due respect as that Motown legend, Al Green and Marvin Gaye's lives definitely have some parallelisms. Both had a soulful and sex-filled life. Both encountered dark times, whereas Gaye’s ended with his death by the hands of his father, Green’s life changed on October 18, 1974, when Mary Woodson, a woman who had walked away from her family to be with Green, attacked him in his bathroom with a pan of boiling hot grits while he was taking a shower. Woodson then shot and killed herself, with Green's own gun in his Memphis home. After this, Green left the music field for awhile, becoming an ordained minister. He devoted his life to Christ and community not only before Kanye was making it trendy- but before Kanye was even alive! Imagine going to church and having Al Green as your pastor. Now that’s wild stuff, with some weird twists and turns. Green's Christianity was always an enormous presence in his music, even before he gave up secular singing for a while; his constant awareness of mortality and divinity is what raised the stakes on his love songs. His best album, Call Me, followed "You Ought to Be With Me" with "Jesus Is Waiting", and the ever-present tension between the sacred and the secular on his records came to a head on 1977's "Belle": "It's you that I want, but it's Him that I need".  Let's analyze the two themes of Al Green: sex and God; there are a lot of similarities between the two. Faith can be hard. Relationships can be hard. There are trust issues, hiccups, dwindlings. It took Al Green some time away from the spotlight to figure out how to come to terms with his religious beliefs and his image as a 70's sex symbol.  

A lot of Al Green’s songs were composed with Teenie Hodges and produced by Hi Records soul maestro Willie Mitchell, however, no-matter who the team would have been the real magic is in that voice, a velvety, comforting timbre that glides into the upper octaves without even the slightest strain. His voice is so distinct: that raspy, quavering thing, rising and falling with the grace of a blue jay in springtime. He has a super-human falsetto. He makes it sound so easy. 

Anyways,let’s talk about the song you know him for, “Let’s Stay Together”. It’s been certified fresh in popular cultures since it was released in 1971, hitting number one and making Al a star. Whether making it on Pulp Fiction’s soundtrack, or Barrack Obama singing it for some reason, this song is in America’s DNA. I just want to point out, that not only is this song amazing, but the album of the same name is just as amazing. Included on that albums is one of my favorite covers Al Green does, the six-minute-plus cover of the Bee Gees' ballad "How Can You Mend a Broken Heart", on which his vocal is so light and flexible it seems to be fluttering in the breeze coming off the drums. Anyways, let’s finish this with where Al is today. 

As mentioned before, after taking time off to focus on God after the grits incident, Al came back after about a 20+ year hiatus, and after trying to recreate the magic with Willie Mitchell, it wasn’t until 2008’s Questlove produced album Lay It Down that The Greatest Soul Singer Alive really found his groove and was officially back. You can find and see Al Green performing live on the festival circuit as well as hear him through his new music, released sporadically.

I will leave this post with what the reviews (from professional music journalists!) of his Lay It Down album. 

 

Everything on Lay it Down is gorgeous, memorable and absolutely stunning.

One of popular music's great voices is being flattered by his surroundings in a way he hasn't in a long, long time.

Featuring some of the Reverend's finest work in years, Green's latest is proof positive that as important as it is to show up, you still need to know how to lay it down.

Singing gets no more graceful than Green’s hot buttered tenor, which he plies here with every micron of grace and soul he can muster. Add the Dap-King Horns (able backers of Sharon Jones and Amy Winehouse) and this is more than a soul album. It’s an album with soul.

Playing up his role as elder statesman, Green gets away with delivering the familiar back-in-the-day sermon because listeners expect it from an icon of the past. However, by infusing such consistent gentleness throughout the entire record, he pulls off the unthinkable in the early 21st century--a momentary respite.

There is no better place to spend 45 minutes than in Lay It Down's dreamy, sensual, gritty, and tender sound world.

Green's voice remains lithe magic, and he's brought in such contemporary all-stars as Anthony Hamilton (on the album's two best tracks, "You've Got the Love I Need" and the slinky title song), John Legend and Corinne Bailey Rae for help.

Beyond Green’s wriggly, giggly, purring-to-screaming magnificence (as well as two smoking support vocals by young acolyte Anthony Hamilton), this is an album of intricate groove.

Lay It Down (with tasty guest spots from John Legend, Anthony Hamilton, and Corinne Bailey Rae) makes it clear that Green's devotion to the primacy of his music's groove has only deepened with age.

From the gentle fire of the first, and title track, this is Green in the role of Love Man and in very fine form. 

Because Lay It Down recalls the sound of Green's best so well, it also demands comparison with his best songs, a benchmark the album never really approaches. But by any other standard, Lay It Down is a worthy addition to one of soul's most distinguished discographies.

Bonus Beats:

Here is legendary jam band Gov't Mule covering Al Green’s “I’m A Ram”

It's not easy being...

Al Green