can’t stop now
Copyright © 2011 by Mario Mejia. Printed and hand-bound in San Francisco for can’t stop now, The Curtis Mayfield Legacy event. Limited press run of 500. Text set in Arial and Georgia. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
ISBN 0-7871-0680-1
Designed by Mario Mejiahttp://mariomejia.us
THE CURTIS MAYFIELD LEGACY
MM PUBLISHING
can’t stop now
Curtis Mayfield is to soul music what Bach was to the classics and Gershwin and Irving
Berlin were to pop music.
–ARETHA FRANKLIN
cabrini green 12tenth grade 26the impressions 40
curtis 56
blaxploitation 70
curtom records 84
paralysis 100
new world order 114
keep on pushing 128
MOVE ON UP
ROOTS
CAN’T STOP NOW
• PART ONE •
roots
can’t stop now: roots
Born on June 3, 1942, Curtis Lee Mayfield grew up in a poor Chicago family that moved from neighborhood to
neighborhood. By the time he was in high school his family had settled in the Cabrini-Green public housing projects on the city’s north side. Mayfield’s strongest early musical influence came from his membership in a local gospel group called the Northern Jubilee Gospel Singers, which included three cousins and acquaintance Jerry Butler. Mayfield told the Detroit News in 1974, “I was writing music when I was 10 or 11 years old.” Mayfield’s grandmother was a preacher in the Traveling Souls Spiritualist Church, and traces of church and gospel music are unmistakable in many of his compositions. Mayfield attended Chicago’s Wells High School but left in the tenth grade to join what would become the Impressions.
The Impressions began performing in the mid-1950s as the Roosters, in Chattanooga, Tennessee; their lineup comprised of Fred Cash, Sam Gooden, Emanuel Thomas, and the brothers Richard Brooks and Arthur Brooks. Seeking to advance their musical careers, Gooden and the Brooks brothers went north to Chicago in 1957, settling in the Cabrini-Green projects. Jerry Butler was a senior in high school at the time, and he acted as a replacement for the Impressions vocalists who had stayed
• CHAPTER ONE •
cabrini green
15
behind in Tennessee. According to Robert Pruter in Chicago Soul, Butler encouraged Mayfield to join the group, saying they needed someone “who could play an instrument and who could help us get our harmony together.” By now, Mayfield was writing gospel-influenced songs and had learned to play the guitar.
The group made some early recordings for the Bandera label and were discovered by Eddie Thomas of Vee Jay Records, who became their manager and changed their name to the Impressions. The single “For Your Precious Love” was released on the company’s subsidiary label, Falcon, and featured Jerry Butler’s lead vocals. Its first issue sold over 900,000 copies. A Vee Jay executive signed the Impressions to a recording contract immediately after hearing them, which he reportedly liked for their spiritual feel—a genuine departure from the doo-wop harmonies of the day.
Vee Jay promoted them as “Jerry Butler and the Impressions” and then developed Butler as a solo artist. After three singles, Butler left the group to go out on his own. Mayfield told Pruter, “When Jerry left... it allowed me to generate and pull out my own talents as a writer and a vocalist.” Mayfield’s soprano singing, however, contrasted sharply with Butler’s baritone leads. The group released a few singles with Mayfield as leader and was
can’t stop now: roots
then dropped by Vee Jay. From 1959 to 1961, the Impressions did not work as a group; Mayfield began writing songs and playing guitar for Butler in 1960.
By 1961 Mayfield had saved enough money—about a thousand dollars—to regroup the Impressions and take them to New York City to arrange a recording session. In July of that year they recorded “Gypsy Woman” for the ABC-Paramount label. Mayfield was only 18 when the group signed with ABC-Paramount. “Gypsy Woman” was the start of a seven-year string of rhythm and blues and pop hits—all composed by Mayfield. The Brooks brothers left the Impressions in 1962; the remaining members continued as a trio throughout the 1960s.
In 1963 the group recorded “It’s All Right,” which Chicago Soul’s Pruter termed “the first single to define the classic style of the 1960s Impressions.” Producer Jerry Pate “lifted the energy level considerably, adding blaring horns and a more forceful, percussive bottom,” wrote Pruter. “It’s All Right” was a crossover hit that went to Number Four on the pop charts and Number One on the rhythm and blues charts in the fall of 1963. The song featured “the lead switching off from among the three [group members] and the two others singing in harmony with the lead,” elaborated Pruter. Though the song represented a
spiritualistic church
17
new sound in rhythm and blues, critics have long noted that the feel of “It’s All Right” sprung directly from his gospel roots.
In 1964 the Impressions became a major act with a series of strong singles that included “I’m So Proud,” “Keep On Pushing,” and “Amen.” By most accounts, Mayfield was very profoundly motivated by the emergence of the civil rights movement. Civil rights leaders Martin Luther King, Jr., and Jesse Jackson adopted “Keep On Pushing” as an unofficial theme song for the movement. Chicago Tribune contributor Dan Kening wrote that Mayfield’s “inspirational lyrics reflected a strong black consciousness while preaching the tenets of hard work, per- sistence, and faith as the key to achieving equality.”
In addition to composing, singing, and playing the guitar, Mayfield was also interested in setting up his own record label. In 1960, at the age of 21, he made the unprecedented move of establishing his own music publishing company, Curtom, while recording at Vee Jay. Mayfield began developing two labels in 1966, Mayfield and Windy C., but it was in 1968 that he founded his most successful label, also called Curtom. The budding entrepreneur took the Impressions away from ABC and also recorded and produced other acts. Mayfield’s songwriting and producing abilities were a key factor in the label’s success.
“At a very young age my early musical aspirations were derived
from involvement with the
through my grandmother”spiritualistic church
can’t stop now: roots
In August of 1970 Mayfield announced his departure from the Impressions. He began his solo career the following year, offering “a biting commentary of the American scene and impre- ssions of oppressed people,” according to a review in Billboard. A New York Times music critic said of his first solo album, Curtis: “Mayfield himself continues to be a kind of contemporary preacher-through-music. He sings in a breathlessly high, pure voice, breaking his phrases into speech-like patterns, his rhythms pushed by the urgency of his thoughts.... His message seems as important to him as his melody.” Including songs of up to ten minutes, Curtis established Mayfield as an album rather than a singles artist.
Mayfield began a successful career writing soundtracks for films with the 1972 movie Superfly. The controversial film depicted the life of a drug dealer and was part of the then popular genre of “blaxploitation” films. According to a New York Times review, “Mayfield’s music is more specifically anti-drugs than the philosophical content of the movie, and it is also considerably more stylish in design and execution.” Two Top Ten hit singles resulted from the soundtrack: “Freddie’s Dead” and “Superfly,” respectively.
19
can’t stop now: roots
During the 1970s Mayfield continued to write soundtracks and solidified his reputation as a solo artist. His solo compo- sitions featured a more intense style than was expressed in those he had written for the Impressions; instructive lyrics and social commentary were the norm. Bucking pervasive negative criticism, Pruter assessed Mayfield’s 1970s output positively, writing, “Some of the very best black popular music of the 1970s came from Mayfield, who despite the many misses during the decade was one of the creative leaders in establishing a new contemporary style of rhythm and blues, one with a militant, harder edge.”
Mayfield joined the Impressions in 1983 for a reunion tour. Original members Butler, Mayfield, Gooden, and Cash sang the 1960s hits of the Impressions along with Butler and Curtis Mayfield’s more popular solo efforts. According to Robert Palmer of the New York Times, the performances “amounted to a capsule history of recent black popular music, from the slick doowop and grittier gospel-based vocal group styles of the 1950s to Mr. Butler’s urbane pop-soul, Curtis Mayfield’s soul message songs and later funk, and the styles the Impressions have tackled as a group.”
“I was writing music
when I was 10 or 11 years old.”
21
Mayfield’s influence on new generations of performers is evident. His 1960s compositions for the Impressions have enjoyed numerous cover versions from a wide range of popular singers. Mayfield’s characteristic falsetto and innovative guitar work—the latter a clear inspiration to guitar colossus Jimi Hendrix—helped set new standards for contemporary music. And critics have pointed out that his anti-drug messages, most emphatically expressed in the songs for Superfly, are echoed in the films of the young black filmmakers who gained prominence in the late 1980s. Controversial rap singer and actor Ice-T, who lent vocals to “Superfly 1990,” said in tribute to the artist, “There’s only been a couple of people I’ve met [in the music business] that to me are really heavy. Curtis is one of them.”
Mayfield was known for introducing social consciousness into African American music as well as R&B and wrote songs protesting social and political equality. He had written and recorded most of the anthemic soundtracks during the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960’s and the soundtrack to the blaxploitation film Super Fly with The Impressions. Super Fly is regarded as an all-time great that influenced many and truly
This time.
Eddie
you
should
know
better
Brother you know
you’re wrong
Think of the tears and fears
You’d bring your folks back homeThey’d say where did he go wrong My Lord
We planned and worked hard from the very startTried to make him better than all the rest
But the brother proved to be s o m u c h l e s sEddie is everybody’s friend
But sometimes you wondernow and then
The only time he choose youIs when there’s something to loose
Through his p e r s o n a l l o s sAnd the friend pays the cost
A l l t h e t i m e Must be something that is freezing his mind
That has made him through greed so very blindand I don’t think he’s gonna make it,
23
invented a new style of modern black music. Just as the Civil Rights Act passed into law in 1964, his group The Impressions produced music that became the soundtrack to a summer of revolution. Black students sang their songs as they marched to jail or protested outside their universities, while King often marched to peaceful sounds of Mayfield’s Keep On Pushing, People Get Ready and We’re A Winner. Mayfield had quickly become a civil rights hero.
Mayfield, along with several other soul and funk musicians, spread messages of hope in the face of oppression, pride in being a member of the black race and gave courage to a generation who were demanding their human rights. Mayfield has been compared to of Martin Luther King Jr arguably for making a greater lasting impact in the civil rights struggle with his music. By the end of the decade he was a pioneering voice in the black pride movement along with James Brown and Sly Stone. Paving the way for a future generation of rebel thinkers, Mayfield paid the price, artistically and commercially, for his politically charged music. Irrespective of the persistent radio bans and loss of revenue, Mayfield continued his quest for equality right until his death. His lyrics on racial injustice, poverty and drugs became the poetry for a generation. Mayfield
know
25
was also a descriptive social commentator. As the influx of drugs ravaged through black America in the late 1960s and 1970s his bittersweet descriptions of the ghetto would serve as warnings to the impressionable. Determined to warn all about the perils of drugs, Freddie’s Dead remains one of the most graphic tales of street life. After hearing the Rev. Martin Luther King deliver his “I Have a Dream” speech that August day in 1963, the crowd of 250,000 sang “We Shall Overcome.” In 1965, another gospel song emerged–People Get Ready by Mayfield and the Impressions. Keep On Pushing and People Get Ready were two songs that became embedded in the national movement for civil and social rights, heard at all the rallies and marches, songs-as-inspiration. His song “People Get Ready” was written in the year after the march on Washington’s. For many, it captured the spirit of the march –the song reaches across racial and religious lines to offer a message of redemption and forgiveness.
Mayfield produced many of the songs that helped shape and define the Black Power Movement, exemplifies the workings of music in the BPM and their 1967 song ‘We’re a Winner’ can be seen as one defining element of the movement. Mayfield’s
can’t stop now: roots
uncompromising look at racism and his calls for black pride and economic determinism place him firmly within the BPM. Significantly, when he and his friend Eddie Thomas founded the Custom record label to protect black artists from the exploitation that they often suffered with other record labels, not only was the BPM ideal of black entrepreneurship realized but also the BPM had a record label that was synonymous with Black Power. Empowered in part by the ownership of his own label and in part by his affiliations with other artists, Mayfield presented a crucial look at American racism in ‘This is My Country’ with lyrics that spoke of ‘three hundred years of slave driving, sweat and welts on my ‘We’re a Winner’ conveys the essential ideological message of the BPM.
can’t stop now: roots
• CHAPTER TWO •
By the time Curtis Mayfield was in high school his family had settled in the Cabrini-Green public housing projects
on the city’s north side. Mayfield’s strongest early musical influence came from his membership in a local gospel group called the Northern Jubilee Gospel Singers, which included three of his cousins and acquaintance Jerry Butler. Mayfield told the Detroit News in 1974, “I was writing music when I was 10 or 11 years old.” Mayfield’s grandmother was a preacher in the Traveling Souls Spiritualist Church, and traces of church and gospel music are unmistakable in many of his compositions. Mayfield attended Chicago’s Wells High School but left in the tenth grade to join what would become the Impressions.
The Impressions began performing in the mid-1950s as the Roosters, in Chattanooga, Tennessee, their lineup com-prised of Fred Cash, Sam Gooden, Emanuel Thomas, and the brothers Richard and Arthur Brooks. Seeking to advance their musical careers, Gooden and the Brooks brothers went north to Chicago in 1957, settling in the Cabrini-Green projects. Jerry Butler was a senior in high school at the time, and he acted as a replacement for the Impressions vocalists who had stayed behind in Tennessee. According to Robert
tenth grade
29
Pruter in Chicago Soul, Butler encouraged Mayfield to join the group, saying they needed someone “who could play an instrument and who could help us get our harmony together.” By this time, Mayfield was writing gospel-influenced songs and had learned to play the guitar.
The group made some early recordings for the Bandera label and were then discovered by Eddie Thomas of Vee Jay Records, who became their manager and changed their name to the Impressions. The single “For Your Precious Love” was released on the company’s subsidiary label, Falcon, and featured Jerry Butler’s lead vocals. Its first issue sold over 900,000 copies. A Vee Jay executive signed the Impressions to a recording contract immediately after hearing the song, which he reportedly liked for its spiritual feel—a genuine departure from the doo-wop harmonies of the day.
Vee Jay began promoting the group as “Jerry Butler and the Impressions” and then developed Butler as a solo artist. After three singles, Butler left the group to go out on his own. Mayfield told Pruter, “When Jerry left... it allowed me to pull out my own talents as a writer and a vocalist.” Mayfield’s soprano singing, however, contrasted sharply with Butler’s baritone leads. The group released a few singles with Mayfield
can’t stop now: roots
as leader and was then dropped by Vee Jay. From 1959 to 1961, the Impressions did not work as a group; Mayfield began writing songs and playing guitar for Butler in 1960.
By 1961 Mayfield had saved enough money—about a thousand dollars—to regroup the Impressions and take them to New York City to arrange a recording session. In July of that year they recorded “Gypsy Woman” for ABC- Paramount. Mayfield was only 18 when the group signed with ABC-Paramount. “Gypsy Woman” was the beginning of a seven-year string of rhythm and blues and pop hits—all composed by Mayfield. The Brooks brothers left the group in 1962; the three remaining members continued as a trio throughout the 1960s.
In 1963 the group recorded “It’s All Right,” which Chicago Soul’s Pruter termed “the first single to define the classic style of the 1960s Impressions.” Producer Jerry Pate “lifted the energy level considerably, adding blaring horns and a more forceful, percussive bottom,” wrote Pruter. “It’s All Right” was a crossover hit that went to Number Four on the pop charts and Number One on the rhythm and blues charts in the fall of 1963. The song featured “the lead switching off from
“Mayfield absorbed the
of blues and gospel music”city’s rich heritage
31
among the three and the two others singing in harmony with the lead,” elaborated Pruter. Though the song represented a new sound in rhythm and blues, critics have long noted that the feel of “It’s All Right” sprung directly from his gospel roots.
In 1964 the Impressions became a major act with a series of strong singles that included “I’m So Proud,” “Keep On Pushing,” and “Amen.” By most accounts, Mayfield was profoundly motivated by the emergence of the civil rights movement. Civil rights leaders Martin Luther King, Jr., and Jesse Jackson adopted “Keep On Pushing” as an unofficial theme song for the movement. Chicago Tribune contributor Dan Kening wrote that Mayfield’s “inspirational lyrics reflected a strong black consciousness while preaching the tenets of hard work, persistence, and faith as the key to equality.”
In addition to composing, singing, and playing the guitar, Mayfield was also interested in setting up his own record label. In 1960, at the age of 21, he made the unprecedented move of establishing his own music publishing company, Curtom, while recording at Vee Jay. Mayfield began developing two labels in 1966, Mayfield and Windy C., but it was in 1968 that he founded his most successful label, also called Curtom.
can’t stop now: roots
The budding entrepreneur took the Impressions away from ABC and also recorded and produced other acts. Mayfield’s songwriting and producing abilities were a key factor in the label’s success.
In August of 1970 Mayfield announced his departure from the Impressions. He began his solo career the following year, offering “a biting commentary of the American scene and impressions of oppressed people,” according to a review in Billboard. A New York Times music critic said of his first solo album, Curtis: “Mayfield himself continues to be a kind of contemporary preacher-through-music. He sings in a breath lessly high, pure voice, breaking his phrases into speechlike patterns, rhythms pushed by the urgency of his thoughts.... His message seems as important to him as his melody.” Including songs of up to ten minutes, Curtis established Mayfield as an album rather than a singles artist.
Mayfield began a successful career writing soundtracks for films with the 1972 movie Superfly. The controversial film depicted the life of a drug dealer and was part of the popular genre of “blaxploitation” films. According to a New York Times review, “Mayfield’s music is more specifically anti-
Been with you a l l t h e t i m e
Something
you
that
never
had
Slid in on an oily rag
The price is right upon the tag
You put it in a brand new bagThis thing will let you be y o u r s e l f
And won’t offend nobody elseNothing like you ever saw
And it’s not against the lawcheck out your mind
People thinking they’ve been tookJust finding out they overlooked
They never found the m i s s i n g l i n kForget they had a mind to think
Why don’t you...Check out your mind
Trust in me and I in youNo matter what you see me do
I’m doing for all I’m worthNone do me better on this earth
Why don’t you...Check out your mind
35
drugs than the philosophical content of the movie, and it is also considerably more stylish in design and execution.” Two Top Ten hit singles resulted from the soundtrack: “Freddie’s Dead” and “Superfly.”
Throughout the 1970s Mayfield continued to solidify his reputation as a solo artist. His solo compositions featured a more intense style than was expressed in those he had written for the Impressions; instructive lyrics and social commentary were the norm. Bucking pervasive negative criticism, Pruter assessed Mayfield’s 1970s output positively, writing, “Some of the very best black popular music of the 1970s came from Mayfield, who despite the many misses during the decade was one of the creative leaders in establishing a new contemporary style of rhythm and blues, one with a militant, harder edge.”
Mayfield joined the Impressions in 1983 for a reunion tour. Original members Butler, Mayfield, Gooden, and Cash per- formed the 1960s hits of the Impressions along with Butler and Mayfield’s more popular solo efforts. According to Robert Palmer of the New York Times, the performances “amounted to a capsule history of recent black popular music, from the slick doowop and grittier gospel-based vocal group
never
This thing will let you be y o u r s e l f
And it’s not against the law
can’t stop now: roots
styles of the 1950s to Mr. Butler’s urbane pop-soul, Curtis Mayfield’s soul message songs and later funk, and the styles the Impressions have tackled as a group.”
Mayfield’s influence on a new generation of performers is widely evident. His 1960s compositions for the Impressions have enjoyed numerous cover versions from a wide range of popular singers. Mayfield’s characteristic falsetto and unique guitar work—the latter a clear inspiration to guitar colossus Jimi Hendrix—helped set a new standard for contemporary music. Critics have pointed out that his anti-drug messages, most emphatically expressed in the songs for Superfly, are echoed in the films of the young black filmmakers who gained prominence in the late 1980s. Controversial rap singer and actor Ice-T, who lent vocals to “Superfly 1990,” said in tribute to the artist, “There’s only been a couple of people I’ve met that to me are really heavy. Curtis is one of them.”
Mayfield was known for introducing social consciousness into African American music as well as R&B and wrote songs protesting social and political equality. He had written and recorded most of the anthemic soundtracks during the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960’s and the soundtrack to the blaxploitation film Super Fly with The Impressions. Super Fly
37
is regarded as an all-time great that influenced many and truly invented a new style of modern black music. Just as the Civil Rights Act passed into law in 1964, his group The Impressions produced music that became the soundtrack to a summer of revolution. Black students sang their songs as they marched to jail or protested outside their universities, while King often marched to the peaceful sounds of Mayfield’s Keep On Pushing, People Get Ready and We’re A Winner. Mayfield had quickly become a civil rights hero.
Mayfield, along with several other soul and funk musicians, spread messages of hope in the face of oppression, pride in being a member of the black race and gave courage to a generation who were demanding their human rights. Mayfield has been compared to of Martin Luther King Jr arguably for making a greater lasting impact in the civil rights struggle with his music. By the end of the decade he was a pioneering voice in the black pride movement along with James Brown and Sly Stone. Paving the way for a future generation of rebel thinkers, Mayfield paid the price, artistically and commercially, for his politically charged music. Irrespective of the persistent radio bans and loss of revenue, Mayfield continued his quest for equality right until his death. His
“Even before reaching his teen years he had
formed his first groupThe Alphatones”
39
lyrics on racial injustice, poverty and drugs became the poetry for a generation. Mayfield was also a descriptive social commentator. As the influx of drugs ravaged through black America in the late 1960s and 1970s his bittersweet descriptions of the ghetto would serve as warnings to the impressionable. Determined to warn all about the perils of drugs, Freddie’s Dead remains one of the most graphic tales of street life. After hearing the Rev. Martin Luther King deliver his “I Have a Dream” speech that August day in 1963, the crowd of 250,000 sang “We Shall Overcome.” In 1965, another gospel song emerged – People Get Ready by Mayfield and the Impressions. Keep On Pushing and People Get Ready were two songs that became embedded in the national movement for civil and social rights, heard at all the rallies and marches, songs-as-inspiration. His song “People Get Ready” was written in the year after the march on Washington’s. For many, it captured the spirit of the march –the song reaches across racial and religious lines to offer a message of redemption and forgiveness.
Mayfield produced many of the songs that helped shape and define the Black Power Movement, exemplifies the workings of music in the BPM and their 1967 song ‘We’re
can’t stop now: roots
a Winner’ can be seen as one defining element of the movement. Mayfield’s uncompromising look at racism and his calls for black pride and economic determinism place him firmly within the BPM. Significantly, when he and his friend Eddie Thomas founded the Custom record label to protect black artists from the exploitation that they often suffered with other record labels, not only was the BPM ideal of black entrepreneurship realized but also the BPM had a record label that was synonymous with Black Power. Empowered in part by the ownership of his own label and in part by his affiliations with other artists, Mayfield presented a crucial look at American racism in ‘This is My Country’ with lyrics that spoke of ‘three hundred years of slave driving, sweat and welts on my ‘We’re a Winner’ conveys the essential ideological message of the BPM. Music, as exemplified by Curtis Mayfield, was to foster mobilization by presenting the political ideology of Black Power that enforced notions of black pride, but it also offered a venue for the creation of black culture that was not defined by the dominant white culture.
41
can’t stop now: roots
• CHAPTER THREE •
The Impressions provided a critical link between Fifties rhythm & blues and Sixties soul. They pioneered and
epitomized the sound of Chicago soul, a marriage of gospel and pop influences with a timely conscience. From the beginning, leader Curtis Mayfield was an innovative song writer and producer whose work with the Impressions was typified by sophisticated yet celebratory grooves, elaborately detailed vocal arrangements, and lyrics that addressed and advanced the black freedom movement of the Sixties. On the strength of such indelible songs of striving and transcendence as “People Get Ready,” “Keep On Pushing,” and “We’re a Winner,” Mayfield has been credited with authoring “the soundtrack to the civil-rights movement.”
The Impressions came together as a union between Sam Gooden and brothers Richard and Arthur Brooks (members of a vocal group called the Roosters) and songwriter/ producers Jerry Butler and Curtis Mayfield (of the Northern Jubilee Gospel Singers). Their debut single, “For Your Precious Love,” was a masterpiece of dramatic, resonant soul testifying that sold 900,000 copies and rose to #11 on the Top Forty. Released in 1958, it was credited to “The Impressions Featuring Jerry Butler,” and the spotlighting
the impressions
43
of the song’s lead vocalist resulted in jealousies leading to Butler’s departure that same year. For a few years thereafter the Impressions foundered, but they regained their footing and discovered their signature sound in the early Sixties with Mayfield in command. First, Mayfield cowrote and performed on “He Will Break Your Heart,” a stately soul gem that became Jerry Butler’s first solo hit. In 1961, a re-formed Impressions, which found Butler replaced by Fred Cash, released “Gypsy Woman,” a marriage of Brazilian rhythms and sensuous soul distinguished by Mayfield’s sweet falsetto.
Having been reduced to a trio by the departure of the Brooks brothers, the Impressions soared through the Sixties with a string of chart successes that established the group as the social conscience of soul music. Their biggest hit was “It’s All Right” (#1 R&B, #4 Pop), a casual, easygoing soul shuffle that provided much-needed comfort and solace to a nation reeling from the recent assassination of President John F. Kennedy. The Impressions songs that have had the greatest staying power are those, like “People Get Ready” and “Amen,” that provided inspiration to those caught up in the social struggles of the Sixties. All the while, Mayfield’s work outside the group as a songwriter and producer yielded
can’t stop now: roots
a bumper crop of Chicago-soul hits for such artists as Major Lance (“The Monkey Time,” “Um, Um, Um, Um, Um, Um”) and Gene Chandler (“Just Be True,” “Nothing Can Stop Me”).
After leaving the Impressions in 1970, Mayfield addressed issues of black identity and self-assertiveness with an even greater sense of urgency as a solo artist. He founded his own Curtom label and connected with such topical fare as “(Don’t Worry) If There’s a Hell Below We’re All Going to Go.” His solo career found him giving freer reign to his guitar playing, a choppy, rhythm-based funk style that owed much to his Chicago blues heritage. (Among other things, Mayfield had played guitar on a few Jimmy Reed sessions.) Mayfield hit his creative and commercial peak in the Seventies with the soundtrack to Superfly, a blend of smoldering rock-disco grooves and pointed social commentary that yielded the Top Five hits “Freddie’s Dead” and “Superfly.”
Throughout his career, Mayfield’s willingness to give voice to the truth–and the simultaneously dignified and funky ways in which he’s musically cast forthright sentiments –have made him one of the great soul icons of the age. Mayfield was paralyzed from the neck down in a 1990 accident when a lighting tower fell on him prior to a show in New York.
“The Impressions provided a
between Fifties rhythm & blues and Sixties soul.”
critical link
45
However, this tragic setback has not diminished his spirit or his career. In 1996, he released his 25th solo album, New World Order. In his own words: “How many 54-year-old quad- riplegics are putting albums out? You just have to deal with what you got, try to sustain yourself as best you can, and look to the things that you can do.” He died in 1999.
Since their origination, The Impressions have maintained their reputation as one of the most successful and highly respected vocal groups of the past near half century. Since the release of ‘For Your Precious Love’ in July ’58 the Impressions, evolving through a number of personnel changes have created over 50 hit singles and have recorded a dozen albums, several of them charting in the USA and Europe. Jerry Butler and Curtis Mayfield left the Impressions to become two very successful solo acts but the heart of this superb group still are veteran members Sam Gooden and Fred Cash and this is their story.
Jerry Butler and Curtis Mayfield met up with three guys from Chattanooga Sam Gooden, Richard and Arthur Brooks in their hometown of Chicago in 1957 and this quintet formed the Impressions. They hit the American R&B and pop charts at #3 R&B/#11 Hot 100 pop in July ’58 with their first record ‘For Your Precious Love’. It was a classic soul ballad that meant
can’t stop now: roots
nothing outside the US but put this young group on TV and sent them around the States on tour. Unfortunately they could not match the records success with their next few recordings and lead singer left for a solo career. Fred Cash flew in from Chattanooga as Jerry’s replacement and Curtis assumed the lead spot but he could not reverse their downward sales trend and VeeJay dropped them.
Butler’s career however was on the rise and Curtis parked the Impressions to join him on tour as his guitarist. Over the following 18 months Curtis and Jerry combined to write and perform the three hit records that set up Butler’s career starting with ‘He Will Break Your Heart’, ‘Find Another Girl’ and ‘I’m A Telling You’ all hitting top ten on R&B and top 30 pop. When Mayfield had saved enough money he took the Impressions to New York to relaunch their own careers with ‘Gypsy Woman’ that found international success in November ’61. History seemed to repeat itself and their next five singles all failed to chart. The group split in half when Curtis decided to relocate back to Chicago in ’62. The Brooks brothers stayed in New York to set up their own Impressions and Curtis, Sam & Fred continued with ABC as a trio. Their classic recording of ‘It’s All Right’ put them firmly back on top in October ’63 when it
against the kingdom’s throne.
People
get ready
there’s a train a coming.
you don’t need
no baggage
you just get on board.
All you need is faithto hear the diesels humming.
You don’t need no ticket,you just thank the lord
So people get ready,for there’s a train to Jordan.
Picking up passengersc o a s t t o c o a s t
Faith is keyopen the doors and board em.
There’s hope for allamong those loved the most
There is no roomfor the hopeless s i n n e r
who would hurt all mankindjust save h i s o w n
Have pity on thosewhose choices grow thinner
for there’s n o h i d i n g p l a c e
49
went to #1 US R&B and #4 pop and this time their success set up a run of 20 hit singles including ‘Talkin’ Bout My Baby’, ‘Keep On Pushing’, ‘You Must Believe Me’, ‘People Get Ready’, ‘Woman’s Got Soul’, ‘You’ve Been Cheatin’’, ‘Can’t Satisfy’ ‘We’re A Winner’ and many others with ABC. Mayfield set up Curtom records in ’68 and built a superb roster around the Impressions who continued to hit the charts with ‘Fool For You’ and ‘This Is My Country’, ‘Choice Of Colors’ and ‘Check Out Your Mind’. Curtis went solo in 1970 and was replaced by Leroy Hutson and for the first time the Impressions did a limited tour of Europe.
Sales began to fall away and Hutson also went solo on Curtom. The Impressions brought in two new members Reggie Torian and Ralph Johnson and in April ’74 they topped the US R&B singles charts once again (and went to #17 pop) with ‘Finally Got Myself Together’ that also sold well in Europe. ‘Sooner Or Later’ and ‘Same Thing It Took’ both scored high on R&B but after that record sales began to tail off and Johnson left to form his own group Mystique. The Impressions quit Curtom and signed to Cotillion with new lead Nate Evans. Though they never returned to the same level of public accep- tance the Impressions continued to make great records like
can’t stop now: roots
‘This Time’ and ‘You’ll Never Find’. They joined producer Carl Davis at ChiSound in ’79 and made two great albums there entitled ‘Come To My Party’ and ‘Fan The Fire’.
The Impressions however were far from finished. After 11 years with the Group, Reggie Torian relinquished his place to Vandy (‘Smokey’) Hampton, who had spent the past ten years singing with the Soul Majestics and the Chi-Lites. After Chi-Sound ceased operation the Impressions found plenty of steady work on tour, playing revues and often making appearances on Gospel TV. The group, that still included Sam, Fred, and Nate Evans, celebrated their Silver Anniversary in 1983. In the latter part of ‘82 on his return from a successful UK tour, Curtis, once again linked up with Jerry Butler and the Impressions to create, rehearse and celebrate their Silver Anniversary with a nationwide US tour that was a big success all over America. The group got a one shot deal with MCA and had a low R&B chart single entry with “Can’t Wait ‘Til Tomorrow’ in February ’87.
After the ripple of interest that the Impressions Ripete ‘Something Said Love’ single caused in ‘89, they went into the studio with producer Jerry Michaels and cut two or three albums (30 tracks) worth of material. The group still contained
51
the two veteran members Sam Gooden and Fred Cash with Vandy Hampton, who had been in the line up since ‘82 and Ralph Johnson who had returned to replace Nate Evans. Twenty of these cuts were updated versions of the Impressions back catalogue, written by Curtis and re-recorded to appeal to a new generation of fans unaware of the group’s long history. Johnson led the new songs like ‘Draw The Line’, ‘In The Middle’, ‘Winning Combination’, and ‘I Can Make It Go Away’ whilst Hampton handled the Mayfield songs and ‘What A Feeling’, ‘I Found You’. In the spring of 2000 Edel Records issued The Impressions - A tribute to the memory of Curtis Mayfield. Meanwhile the Impressions were about to tour South Africa and record with Eric Clapton on his next album. In July ‘01 Ideal Music put together Remembering Curtis by the Impressions that gained UK release later in the year. This album contains 20 Mayfield songs beautifully reinterpreted by the Impressions as only they can. UK labels have reissued almost all their recorded product. Ace issued all their ABC albums on four great 2fer CDs plus their Rarities album that mops up all the other tracks available. Sequel issued all the Curtom albums in a similar fashion plus the two ChiSound albums on one 2fer.
“A marriage of
influences with a timely conscience”
gospel and pop
53
After spending most of their adult lives based in Chicago, Sam and Fred both returned home to their roots in Chattanooga, Tennessee, the city where they both grew up during the 40s and early 50s. They had lived with their families in Atlanta, Georgia in the early nineties but by ‘97 they’d returned to Chattanooga. Willie Kitchens Jr a fellow Chattanoogan joined their line up and in late 2000 Eric Clapton invited their partici-pation on his Reptile album. They appeared with Clapton on selected tour dates and at the Albert Hall.
These days the Impressions, now back to a trio since Vandy’s departure tour for about six months of the year they are currently looking for a record deal and have recently been appearing in Las Vegas with Jerry Butler.
In the mid-1960s, The Impressions, were compared with Motown acts such as The Temptations, The Miracles, and The Four Tops. After 1965’s “Woman’s Got Soul”, and the #7 pop hit “Amen”, The Impressions failed to reach the R&B Top Ten for three more years, finally scoring in 1968 with the #9 “I Loved and Lost”. “We’re a Winner”, which hit #1 on the R&B charts that same year, represented a new level of social awareness in Mayfield’s music. Mayfield created his own label, Curtom, and moved The Impressions to the label.
can’t stop now: roots
Over the next two years, more Impressions message tracks, including the #1 R&B hit “Choice of Colors” (1969) and the #3 “Check Out Your Mind” (1970), became big hits for the group.
It should also be noted that ‘The Impressions’ were a huge influence on Bob Marley and The Wailers and other ska/rock-steady groups in Jamaica: The Wailers modelled their singing/ harmony style on them and in part borrowed their look, too. There are many covers of Impressions songs by The Wailers, including ‘Keep On Moving’, ‘Long Long Winter’ and ‘Just Another Dance’. Pat Kelly covered ‘Soulful Love’ and The Heptones covered ‘I’ve Been Trying’. No doubt the social consciousness of Curtis Mayfield’s lyrics appealed as well as the spectacular harmonies.
After the release of the Check Out Your Mind LP in 1970, Mayfield left the group and began a successful solo career, the highlight of which was writing and producing the Super Fly soundtrack. He continued to write and produce for The Impressions, who remained on Curtom. Leroy Hutson was the first new lead singer for the group following his departure.
55
• PART TWO •
move on up
can’t stop now: move on up
• CHAPTER FOUR •
Mayfield announced his departure from the Impressions in
August of 1970. He began his solo career in 1971, offering “a
biting commentary of the American scene and impressions of oppressed
people,” according to Billboard. A New York Times music critic said of his
first solo album, Curtis: “Mayfield himself continues to be a kind of
contemporary preacher-through-music. He sings in a breathlessly high,
pure voice, breaking his phrases into speech-like patterns, his rhythms
pushed by the urgency of his thought… He is not a lyrical singer, and his
message seems as important to him as his melody.” Including songs of
up to ten minutes in length, Curtis established Mayfield as an album
rather than a singles artist.
Mayfield began a successful career writing soundtracks for films with
the 1972 movie, Superfly. Somewhat controversial, the film glorified the
curtis
59
life of a drug pusher and was part of a popular genre of “blaxploitation”
films. According to a New York Times review, “Mayfield’s music is more
specifically anti-drugs than the philosophical content of the movie, and
it is also considerably more stylish in design and execution.” Two top-ten
hit singles resulted from the soundtrack: “Freddie’s Dead” and “Superfly.”
Throughout the 1970s, Mayfield continued to write soundtracks for
several films and solidified his reputation as a solo artist. Mayfield’s solo
career featured harder sounding songs than he wrote for the Impressions,
with didactic lyrics and social commentary. In spite of adverse criticism,
Pruter assessed Mayfield’s 1970s output positively, writing, “Some of
the very best black popular music of the 1970s came from Mayfield,
who despite the many misses during the decade was one of the creative
leaders in establishing a new contemporary style of rhythm and blues.
can’t stop now: move on up
The Impressions regrouped in 1983 for a reunion tour. The original
members Butler, Mayfield, Gooden, and Cash performed the 1960s hits
of the Impressions along with the solo hits of Butler and Mayfield. As
reviewed by Robert Palmer in the New York Times, the performances
“amounted to a capsule history of recent black popular music, from the
slick doo-wop and grittier gospel-based vocal group styles of the 1950s
to Mr. Butler’s urbane pop-soul, Curtis Mayfield’s soul message songs
and later funk, and the styles the Impressions have tackled as a group.”
Palmer continued: “The Impressions were one of the two top rhythm-
and-blues vocal groups of the 1960s; the other was the Temptations.
Both were rooted in the rich traditions of black gospel music.”
Mayfield’s influence on a new generation of listeners was evident in
many ways. His 1960s compositions for the Impressions have enjoyed
61
numerous cover versions from a wide range of popular singers. Some
critics have suggested that his anti-drug messages, most emphatically
expressed in the songs for Superfly, fit well with the new films created by
young black filmmakers. Popular rap singer and actor Ice-T, who sang
on “Superfly 1990” with Mayfield, said in tribute to the artist, “There’s only
been a couple of people I’ve met [in the music business] that to me are
really heavy. Curtis is one of them.”
Curtis Mayfield is among an elite few members of the Rock and Roll
Hall of Fame who have been inducted more than once. Mayfield was first
inducted with the Impressions in 1991 and then as a solo artist in 1999.
His solo career, which began in 1970, is significant for the forthright way
in which he addressed issues of black identity and self-awareness. He
has been cited as an influence by such latter-day performers as Lenny
“Mayfield’s ability to voice hard truths through funky,
has rendered him one of the great soul icons.”
uplifting music
can’t stop now: move on up
Kravitz, Public Enemy and Arrested Development. Mayfield’s ability to
voice hard truths through funky, uplifting music has rendered him one of
the great soul icons.
In 1968, while still with the Impressions, Mayfield launched the Curtom
label (his third, after the Mayfield and Windy C imprints). Two years later,
his solo debut, Curtis, appeared. It contained one of his most forthright
message songs, “Don’t Worry (If There’s a Hell Below We’re All Going
to Go),” and was the first of eleven albums that he released in the
Seventies. Whereas his Sixties work both with the Impressions and as a
songwriter-producer defined Chicago soul-a regional scene comparable
to Motown in Detroit and Stax in Memphis-Mayfield left his imprint on the
Seventies by couching social commentary and keenly observed black-
culture archetypes in funky, danceable rhythms. He explained the shift
Just move on up
Now child
and dont you cry
Your folks might
understand you by and by
Just move on up
Toward your destinationThough you may find
From time to time complications
Bite your lipAnd take the trip
For there may be rough road aheadAnd you cannot slip
Just move on upA n d k e e p o n w i s h i n g
Remember your dream is your only schemeSo keep on pushing
Take nothing lessBut the supreme best
Do not obey rumors people sayYou can pass the test
Just move on upTo a greater day
With just a little faithIf you put your mind to it
You can surely do it
Hush
65
in subject matter as “a feeling in me that there need to be songs that
relate not so much to civil rights but to the way we as all people deal
with our lives.”
Working on a seemingly parallel track with Marvin Gaye circa What’s
Going On, Mayfield’s second solo album, Roots (1971), sounded urgent
pleas for peace and brotherhood over extended, cinematic soul-funk
tracks that laid out a fresh musical agenda for the new decade.
Mayfield’s solo career found him giving freer reign to his guitar playing,
a choppy, rhythm-based style that owed much to his Chicago blues
heritage and a self-devised tuning based on the black keys of the
piano. His most popular and lasting work was Superfly, a film soundtrack
in which he painted a gritty portrait of black life in America’s inner cities.
Mayfield struck a creative and commercial motherlode with Superfly‘s
Your folks might
Bite your lip
can’t stop now: move on up
“There need to be songs that relate not so much to civil rights but to the way we as all people
smoldering rock-disco grooves and pointed social commentary. The
soundtrack album yielded massive crossover hits in “Freddie’s Dead”
and “Superfly.” Against a hypnotic backdrop of conga drums, strings and
wah-wah guitar, Mayfield sang of a high-rolling ghetto drug dealer’s life-
style in a sweet, stinging falsetto. As an aural document, Mayfield’s music
for this classic “blaxploitation” film anticipated the reality-based rap and
hip-hop of the Nineties.
Throughout his career Mayfield also shone brightly as a producer
and songwriter for other artists, including soul and R&B giants like Jerry
Butler and Major Lance (in the Sixties) and Aretha Franklin, the Staple
Singers, and Gladys Knight and the Pips (in the Seventies). As a solo
artist, he continued to score R&B hits into the mid-Eighties, many of them
in a disco vein.
deal with our lives.”
67
A freakish onstage accident in August 1990 left Mayfield paralyzed
from the neck down. However, this tragedy did not diminish his spirit or
end his career. In 1996, he released his 25th solo album, New World
Order. In his own words: “How many 54-year-old quadriplegics are
putting albums out? You just have to deal with what you got, try to
sustain yourself as best you can, and look to the things that you can do.”
Despite his positive attitude, Mayfield’s health steadily deteriorated. He
lost a leg to diabetes in 1998 and died a year later at age 57. On that
day, the music world lost a man of great talent and conscience. In the
words of Aretha Franklin, “Curtis Mayfield is to soul music what Bach
was to the classics and Gershwin and Irving Berlin were to pop music.”
Curtis Mayfield was an early comer to the world of music. When he
was barely ten years old he was already writing music, and by the time
69
he was fifteen he was invited to join the group the Impressions, a group
that would come to be known world-wide for its rhythm and blues sound
found in such songs as “Gypsy Woman,” the song for which the group
was eventually honored with a place in the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame.
Mayfield went on to an incredibly successful solo career during which he
became famous for popular songs like “Superfly” and “Freddie’s Dead.”
He was a political man, many of whose songs, such as “We’re a Winner,”
“I’m So Proud,” and “People Get Ready,” were unofficially assocated
with the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s. In 1990 Mayfield was
injured during a concert rehearsal and paralyzed. He didn’t let that stop
him, however, and before his death in 1999 Mayfield wrote more music
and was admitted as a solo artist into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame.
can’t stop now: move on up
Mayfield’s influence on a new generation of listeners was evident in
many ways. His 1960s compositions for the Impressions have enjoyed
numerous cover versions from a wide range of popular singers. And some
critics have suggested that his anti-drug messages, most emphatically
expressed in the songs for Superfly, fit well with the new films created by
young black filmmakers. Popular rap singer and actor Ice-T, who sang on
“Superfly 1990” with Mayfield, said in tribute to the artist, “There’s only been
a couple of people I’ve met in the music business that to me are really
heavy. Curtis is one of them.”
can’t stop now: move on up
• CHAPTER FIVE •
Curtis Mayfield was known for introducing social consciousness
into African American music as well as R&B and wrote songs
protesting social and political equality. He had written and recorded
most of the anthemic soundtracks during the Civil Rights Movement of
the 1960’s and the soundtrack to the blaxploitation film Super Fly with
The Impressions. Super Fly is regarded as an all-time great record that
influenced many and truly shaped a new style of modern black music.
Just as the Civil Rights Act passed into law in 1964, his group The
Impressions produced music that became the soundtrack to a summer
of revolution. Black students sang their songs as they marched to jail
or protested outside their universities, while King often marched to the
peaceful sounds of Mayfield’s Keep On Pushing, People Get Ready
and We’re A Winner. Mayfield had quickly become a civil rights hero.
blaxploitation
73
Mayfield, along with several other soul and funk musicians, spread
messages of hope in the face of oppression, pride in being a member of
the black race and gave courage to a generation who were demanding
their human rights. Mayfield has been compared to of Martin Luther
King Jr arguably for making a greater lasting impact in the civil rights
struggle with his music. By the end of the decade he was a pioneering
voice in the black pride movement along with James Brown and Sly
Stone. Paving the way for future generations of rebel thinkers, Mayfield
paid the price, artistically and commercially, for his politically charged
music. Irrespective of the persistent radio bans and loss of revenue,
Mayfield continued his quest for equality right until his death. His lyrics
on racial injustice, poverty and drugs became the poetry for a genera-
tion. Mayfield was also a descriptive social commentator. As the influx
can’t stop now: move on up
of drugs ravaged through black America in the late 1960s and 1970s
his bittersweet descriptions of the ghetto would serve as warnings
to the impressionable. Determined to warn all about the perils of drugs,
Freddie’s Dead remains one of the most graphic tales of street life.
After hearing the Rev. Martin Luther King deliver his “I Have a Dream”
speech that August day in 1963, the crowd of 250,000 sang “We Shall
Overcome.” In 1965, another gospel song emerged–People Get Ready
by Mayfield and the Impressions. Keep On Pushing and People Get
Ready were two songs that became embedded in the national move-
ment for civil and social rights, heard at all the rallies and marches,
songs-as-inspiration. His song “People Get Ready” was written in the
year after the march on Washington’s. For many, it captured the spirit
of the march–racial and religious redemption and forgiveness.
75
“Mayfield left his imprint on the Seventies by couching social
commentary and keenly observed
in funky, danceable rhythms.”
Mayfield produced many of the songs that helped shape and define
the Black Power Movement, exemplifies the workings of music in the
BPM and their 1967 song ‘We’re a Winner’ can be seen as one defining
element of the movement. Mayfield’s uncompromising look at racism
and his calls for black pride and economic determinism place him firmly
within the BPM. Significantly, when he and his friend Eddie Thomas
founded the Custom record label to protect black artists from the
exploitation that they often suffered with other record labels, not only
was the BPM ideal of black entrepreneurship realized but also the BPM
had a record label that was synonymous with Black Power. Empowered
in part by the ownership of his own label and in part by his affiliations
with other artists, Mayfield presented a crucial look at American racism
in ‘This is My Country’ with lyrics that spoke of ‘three hundred years
black-culture archetypes
can’t stop now: move on up
of slave driving, sweat and welts on my ‘We’re a Winner’ conveys the
essential ideological message of the BPM. By the time We’re a Winner
was recorded, the BPM was a powerful, complex movement that
incorporated politics, capitalism, internationalism and the arts that had
its roots in the social circumstances and political opportunities of the
post-World War II era. The title itself was a strong statement against
inferiority complexes historically propagated among blacks by power
brokers representing white social and cultural values, but the lyrics
offer more than a critique–they offer an affirmative view of black
culture that could foster mobilization and sustain political action
under even threatening circumstances. Music, as exemplified by Curtis
Mayfield, was to foster mobilization by presenting the political ideology
of Black Power that enforced notions of black pride, but it also offered
Is do or die
Had a mind wasn’t dumbBut a weakness was shown
Cause his hustle was wrongHis mind was his own
But the man lived a l o n eThe games he plays he plays for keeps
Hustling times in ghetto streetsTaking all that he can take
Gambling with the odds of fateTrying to get over
The aim of his roleWas to move a lot of blow
Ask him his dream what does it meanHe wouldn’t know
Can’t be like the restIs the most he’ll confess
But the t i m e ’ s r u n n i n g o u tAnd there’s no happiness s u p e r f l y
You’re gonna make your fortune by and byBut if you lose
don’t ask no question whyThe only game you know
This cat of the slum
But a hell of a man
Hard to understand
The dudes have envied him for so long
Has an air of great power
The man of the hourA lot of things going on
There’s a set going strong
With the moon shinning bright
Darkest of night
79
a venue for the creation of black culture not defined by the dominant
white culture. Curtis Mayfield is among an elite few members of the
Rock and Roll Hall of Fame who have been inducted more than once.
Mayfield was first inducted with the Impressions in 1991 and then as a
solo artist in 1999. His solo career, which began in 1970, is significant
for the forthright way in which he addressed issues of black identity
and self-awareness. He has been cited as an influence by such latter-
day performers as Lenny Kravitz, Ice-T, Public Enemy and Arrested
Development. Mayfield’s ability to voice hard truths through funky,
uplifting music has rendered him one of the great soul icons.
In 1968, while with the Impressions, Mayfield launched the Curtom
label (his third, after the Mayfield and Windy C imprints). Two years
later, his solo debut, Curtis, appeared. It contained one of his most
Gambling with the odds of fate
can’t stop now: move on up
“Urgent pleas for peace and brotherhood over extended, cinematic
that laid out a fresh musical agenda for the new decade.”
forthright message songs, “Don’t Worry (If There’s a Hell Below We’re
All Going to Go),” and was the first of eleven albums that he released
in the Seventies. Whereas his Sixties work both with the Impressions
and as a songwriter-producer defined Chicago soul-a regional scene
comparable to Motown in Detroit and Stax in Memphis-Mayfield left his
imprint on the Seventies by couching social commentary and keenly
observed black-culture archetypes in funky, danceable rhythms. He
explained the shift in subject matter as “a feeling in me that there need
to be songs that relate not so much to civil rights but to the way we as
all people deal with our lives.”
Working on a seemingly parallel track with Marvin Gaye circa What’s
Going On, Mayfield’s second solo album, Roots (1971), sounded urgent
pleas for peace and brotherhood over extended, cinematic soul-funk
soul-funk tracks
81
tracks that laid out a fresh musical agenda for the new decade.
Mayfield’s solo career found him giving freer reign to his guitar playing,
a choppy, rhythm-based style that owed much to his Chicago blues
heritage and a self-devised tuning based on the black keys of the
piano. His most popular and lasting work was Superfly, a film soundtrack
in which he painted a gritty portrait of black life in America’s inner cities.
Mayfield struck a creative and commercial motherlode with Superfly‘s
smoldering rock-disco grooves and pointed social commentary The
soundtrack album yielded massive crossover hits in “Freddie’s Dead”
and “Superfly.” Mayfield sang of a high-rolling ghetto drug dealer’s
lifestyle in a sweet, stinging falsetto. As an aural document, Mayfield’s
music for this classic “blaxploitation” film anticipated the reality-
based rap and hip-hop of the Nineties.
83
Throughout his career Mayfield also shone brightly as a producer
and songwriter for other artists, including soul and R&B giants like Jerry
Butler and Major Lance (in the Sixties) and Aretha Franklin, the Staple
Singers, and Gladys Knight and the Pips (in the Seventies). As a solo
artist, he continued to score R&B hits into the mid-Eighties, many of
them in a disco vein. Getting back to his roots, Mayfield joined the
Impressions in 1983 for a reunion tour and revived his dormant Curtom
label in 1990.
Throughout the 1970s Mayfield continued to write soundtracks and
solidify his reputation as a solo artist. His solo compositions featured a
more intense style than was expressed in those he had written for the
Impressions; instructive lyrics and social commentary were the norm.
Bucking pervasive negative criticism, Pruter assessed Mayfield’s 1970s
can’t stop now: move on up
output positively, writing, “Some of the very best black popular music
of the 1970s came from Mayfield, who despite the many misses during
the decade was one of the creative leaders in establishing a new
contemporary style of rhythm and blues, one with a militant, harder
edge.” Mayfield’s characteristic falsetto and innovative guitar work—
the latter a clear inspiration to guitar colossus Jimi Hendrix—helped
set a new standard for contemporary music. And critics have pointed
out that his anti-drug messages echoed in the films of the young black
filmmakers who gained prominence in the late 1980s.
can’t stop now: move on up
• CHAPTER SIX •
In addition to composing, singing, and playing the guitar, Mayfield
was also interested in setting up his own record label. In 1960, at the
age of 21, he made the unprecedented move of establishing his own
music publishing company, Curtom, while recording at Vee Jay. Mayfield
began developing two labels in 1966, Mayfield and Windy C., but it was
in 1968 that he founded his most successful label, also called Curtom.
The budding entrepreneur took The Impressions away from ABC and
also recorded and produced other acts. Mayfield’s songwriting and
producing abilities were a key factor in the label’s success.
In August of 1970 Curtis Mayfield announced his departure from the
Impressions. He began his solo career the following year, offering
“a biting commentary of the American scene and impressions of oppr-
essed people,” according to a review in Billboard. A New York Times
curtom records
87
music critic said of his first solo album: “Mayfield himself continues
to be a kind of contemporary preacher-through-music. He sings in a
breathlessly high, pure voice, breaking his phrases into speech-like
patterns, his rhythms pushed by the urgency of his thoughts… His
message seems as important to him as his melody.” Including songs of
up to ten minutes, Curtis established Mayfield as an album rather than
a singles artist.
Mayfield began a successful career writing soundtracks for films
with the 1972 movie Superfly. The controversial film depicted the life of
a drug dealer and was part of the then-popular genre of “blaxploitation”
films. According to a New York Times review, “Mayfield’s music is more
specifically anti-drugs than the philosophical content of the movie, and
it is also considerably more stylish in design and execution.”
can’t stop now: move on up
Throughout the 1970s Mayfield continued to write soundtracks and
solidify his reputation as a solo artist. His solo compositions featured a
more intense style than was expressed in those he had written for the
Impressions; instructive lyrics and social commentary were the norm.
Bucking pervasive negative criticism, Pruter assessed Mayfield’s 1970s
output positively, writing, “Some of the very best black popular music of
the 1970s came from Mayfield, who despite the many misses during
the decade was one of the creative leaders in establishing a new
contemporary style of rhythm and blues, with a militant, harder edge.”
Mayfield joined the Impressions in 1983 for a reunion tour. Original
members Butler, Mayfield, Gooden, and Cash performed the 1960s
hits of the Impressions along with Butler and Mayfield’s more popular
solo efforts. According to Robert Palmer of the New York Times, the
89
performances “amounted to a capsule history of recent black popular
music, from the slick doo-wop and grittier gospel-based vocal group
styles of the 1950s to Mr. Butler’s urbane pop-soul, Curtis Mayfield’s
soul message songs and later funk, and the styles the Impressions
have tackled as a group.”
Mayfield’s influence on a new generation of performers is widely
evident. His 1960s compositions for the Impressions have enjoyed nu-
merous cover versions from a wide range of popular singers. Mayfield’s
characteristic falsetto and innovative guitar work—the latter a clear
inspiration to guitar colossus Jimi Hendrix—helped set a new standard
for contemporary music. And critics have pointed out that his anti-drug
messages, most emphatically expressed in the songs for Superfly,
are echoed in the films of the young black filmmakers who gained
“One of the first ever record labels owned by an
recording artist.”African-American
can’t stop now: move on up
prominence in the late 1980s. Controversial rap singer and actor Ice-T,
who lent vocals to “Superfly 1990,” said in tribute to the artist, “There’s
only been a couple of people I’ve met in the music business that to me
are really heavy. Curtis is one of them.”
In 1968, while still with the Impressions, Mayfield launched the
Curtom label (his third, after the Mayfield and Windy C imprints). Two
years later, his solo debut, Curtis, appeared. It contained one of his
most forthright message songs, “Don’t Worry (If There’s a Hell Below
We’re All Going to Go),” and was the first of eleven albums that he
released in the Seventies. Whereas his Sixties work both with the
Impressions and as a songwriter-producer defined Chicago soul-a
regional scene comparable to Motown in Detroit and Stax in Memphis
Mayfield left his imprint on the Seventies through couching social
I’ll see you when you get there
Dictate the lawThat’s partly flaw
Cat calling love ballingfussing and cussing
Top billing now is killingFor peace no one is willing
Kind of make you get that feelingEverybody smoke,
Use the pill and the dopeEducated fools
From uneducated schoolsPimping people is the rule
Everybody’s prayingAnd everybody’s saying,
But when it comes time to do,Everybody’s laying
But they don’t knowThere can be no show
and if there’s hell below,We’re all gonna go
While the judge and his juries
People running from their worries
HurryThey’re all p o l i t i c a l a c t o r s
Police and their backers
Blacks and the crackers
and the whities,
brothersSisters
93
commentary and keenly observed black-culture archetypes in funky,
danceable rhythms. He explained the shift in subject matter as “a feeling
in me that there need to be songs that relate not so much to civil rights
but to the way we as all people deal with our lives.”
Working on a seemingly parallel track with Marvin Gaye circa What’s
Going On, Mayfield’s second solo album, Roots (1971), sounded urgent
pleas for peace and brotherhood over extended, cinematic soul-funk
tracks that laid out a fresh musical agenda for the new decade. Mayfield’s
solo career found him giving freer reign to his guitar playing, a choppy,
rhythm-based style that owed much to his Chicago blues heritage
and a self-devised tuning based on the black keys of the piano.
His most popular and lasting work was Superfly, a film soundtrack in
which he painted a gritty portrait of black life in America’s inner cities.
can’t stop now: move on up
“Most of the acts on Curtom’s roster were either produced by Mayfield himself, or by his style.”
Mayfield struck a creative and commercial motherlode with Superfly‘s
smoldering rock-disco grooves and pointed social commentary. The
soundtrack album yielded massive crossover hits in “Freddie’s Dead”
and “Superfly.” Against a hypnotic backdrop of conga drums, strings
and wah-wah guitar, Mayfield sang of a high-rolling ghetto drug dealer’s
lifestyle in a sweet, stinging falsetto. As an aural document, Mayfield’s
music for this classic “blaxploitation” film anticipated the reality-based
rap and hip-hop of the Nineties.
Throughout his career Mayfield also shone brightly as a producer
and songwriter for other artists, including soul and R&B giants like
Jerry Butler and Major Lance (in the Sixties) and Aretha Franklin, the
Staple Singers, and Gladys Knight and the Pips (in the Seventies). As a
solo artist, he continued to score R&B hits into the mid-Eighties, many
heavily influenced
95
of them in a disco vein. Getting back to his roots, Mayfield joined the
Impressions in 1983 for a reunion tour and revived his dormant Curtom
label in 1990. Mayfield worked with Mavis Staples on the 1977 sound-
track for the film A Piece of the Action. He was in danger of overreaching
himself being writer, producer, performer, arranger, and businessman
but seemed to cope and still produce a remarkable output.
Throughout his career Mayfield also shone brightly as a producer
and songwriter for other artists, including soul and R&B giants like Jerry
Butler and Major Lance (in the Sixties) and Aretha Franklin, the Staple
Singers, and Gladys Knight and the Pips (in the Seventies). As a solo
artist, he continued to score hits into the mid-Eighties, many of them in a
disco vein. Getting back to his roots, Mayfield joined the Impressions in
1983 for a reunion tour and revived his dormant Curtom label in 1990.
97
Working on a seemingly parallel track with Marvin Gaye circa What’s
Going On, Mayfield’s second solo album, Roots (1971), sounded urgent
pleas for peace and brotherhood over extended, cinematic soul-funk
tracks that laid out a fresh musical agenda for the new decade.
Throughout the 1970s Mayfield continued to write soundtracks and
solidify his reputation as a solo artist. His solo compositions featured a
more intense style than was expressed in those he had written for the
Impressions; instructive lyrics and social commentary were the norm.
Bucking pervasive negative criticism, Pruter assessed Mayfield’s 1970s
output positively, writing, “Some of the very best black popular music
of the 1970s came from Mayfield, who despite the many misses during
the decade was one of the creative leaders in establishing a new
contemporary style of rhythm and blues, one with a militant, harder edge.”
can’t stop now: move on up
Mayfield’s influence on a new generation of listeners was evident in
many ways. His 1960s compositions for the Impressions have enjoyed
numerous cover versions from a wide range of popular singers. And some
critics have suggested that his anti-drug messages, most emphatically
expressed in the songs for Superfly, fit well with the new films created by
young black filmmakers. Popular rap singer and actor Ice-T, who sang on
“Superfly 1990” with Mayfield, said in tribute to the artist, “There’s only been
a couple of people I’ve met in the music business that to me are really
heavy. Curtis is one of them.”
• PART THREE •
can’t stop now
can’t stop now: can’t stop now
• CHAPTER SEVEN •
Native Chicagoan, Curtis Mayfield was enjoying the best comeback
year of his career in 1990. His soul vocal group the Impressions,
was nominated for a place in the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, and a successful
cover version of their 1961 hit “Gypsy Woman,” was recorded by Santana.
Take It to the Streets, Mayfield’s first album in more than five years, was
released in early 1990, and he toured the United States, Europe, and Japan
to promote it. Capitol Records was set to release the soundtrack to The
Return of Superfly, a rap sampler featuring four original songs written and
performed by Mayfield.
Then tragedy struck. On a windy summer night in August of 1990, Mayfield
was getting set to start a concert at Wingate Field in Brooklyn. As he was
plugging in his guitar, a gust of wind toppled a light tower near the stage,
paralysis
103
striking him in the head. The accident resulted in three broken vertebrae
and paralysis for Mayfield from the neck down. After spending a week in a
Brooklyn hospital, he was transferred to the Shepherd Spinal Center in Atlanta.
Keeping his spirits up, Mayfield began physical therapy in September of 1990
and made his first public appearance in February of 1991, when he donated
$100,000 to set up the Curtis Mayfield Research Fund at the Miami Project to
Cure Paralysis in Florida. His family was reportedly hopeful that his physical
therapy will enable him to make at least a partial recovery.
Mayfield might have been severly injured, but he wasn’t forgotten. Various
artists got together in 1994 to put out a tribute album in honor of the great
Curtis Mayfield, including Eric Clapton, Phil Collins, Stevie Wonder, Whitney
Houston, Aretha Franklin, B.B. King, Lenny Kravitz, the Isley Brothers, and
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Bruce Springsteen. Mayfield himself got back into the recording studio to do
“All Men Are Brothers” for the album. He told Guitar Player magazine that
the album meant a lot to him. “I was just overwhelmed. It brought tears to my
eyes. As they would record them, they would send me copies of each. I’d play
them over and over, and there wasn’t a song I didn’t like. It just goes to show
you that no matter how bad things might get, there’s always room for
something good to happen.”
And Mayfield’s music stayed alive. Rhino Records came out with a three-
CD boxed set of Mayfield’s music in 1996. It included music from his days with
the Impressions through to his later solo career. In 1997 Mayfield released
the new album New World Order. When asked how his music writing had
changed since his accident, Mayfield told People Weekly, “It’s difficult
105
simply because when an idea hits me, I can’t just up and grab a guitar or
recorder or a pencil and write it down… But I’m happy to know I can still lock
in lyrics, and I have enough voice and strength in my lungs to sing a song.”
As an even greater tribute to the man and his music, Mayfield was inducted
into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 1998 for his solo recordings.
Working on a seemingly parallel track with Marvin Gaye circa What’s
Going On, Mayfield’s second solo album, Roots (1971), sounded urgent
pleas for peace and brotherhood over extended, cinematic soul-funk tracks
that laid out a fresh musical agenda for the new decade. Mayfield’s solo
career found him giving freer reign to his guitar playing, a choppy, rhythm-
based style that owed much to his Chicago blues heritage and a self
devised tuning based on the black keys of the piano. His most popular and
“No matter how bad things might get,
for something good to happen.”there’s always room
can’t stop now: can’t stop now
lasting work was Superfly, a film soundtrack in which he painted a gritty
portrait of black life in America’s inner cities. Mayfield struck a creative and
commercial motherlode with Superfly‘s smoldering rock-disco grooves and
pointed social commentary. The soundtrack album yielded massive cross-
over hits in “Freddie’s Dead” and “Superfly.” Against a hypnotic backdrop of
conga drums, strings and wah-wah guitar, Mayfield sang of a high-rolling
ghetto drug dealer’s lifestyle in a sweet, stinging falsetto. As an aural
document, Mayfield’s music for this classic “blaxploitation” film anticipated
the reality-based rap and hip-hop of the Nineties.
Throughout his career Mayfield also shone brightly as a producer and
songwriter for other artists, including soul and R&B giants like Jerry Butler
and Major Lance (in the Sixties) and Aretha Franklin, the Staple Singers,
Whole lot of love among us
Tomorrow seems twice as badBut don’t you give up
Your life isn’t overLook to the good side
it could be twice as badAnd if comes another day
And I know there will some wayThere’ll be a whole lot of love
Whole lot of love among usWithout even trying
When I look into your eyesThere are beautiful things
But don’t you give upYour life isn’t over
Keep on keeping onSee what the love can bring
And if comes another dayAnd I know there will some way
There’ll be a whole lot of love
Rough times and
Things are so bad
so hard
life is
Sometimes
109
But don’t you give up
And if comes another day
When I look into your eyes
Things are so bad
life is
and Gladys Knight and the Pips (in the Seventies). As a solo artist, he
continued to score R&B hits into the mid-Eighties, many of them in a disco
vein. Getting back to his roots, Mayfield joined the Impressions in 1983 for a
reunion tour and revived his dormant Curtom label in 1990.
A freakish onstage accident in August 1990 left Mayfield paralyzed from
the neck down. However, this tragedy did not diminish his spirit or end his
career. In 1996, he released his 25th solo album, New World Order. In his
own words: “How many 54-year-old quadriplegics are putting albums out?
You just have to deal with what you got, try to sustain yourself as best you
can, and look to the things that you can do.” Despite his positive attitude,
Mayfield’s health steadily deteriorated. He lost a leg to diabetes in 1998 and
died a year later at age 57. On that day, the music world lost a man of great
can’t stop now: can’t stop now
“I was just
It brought tears to my eyes.”
talent and conscience. In the words of Aretha Franklin, “Curtis Mayfield is
to soul music what Bach was to the classics and Gershwin and Irving Berlin
were to pop music.”
Mayfield was heavily steeped in gospel music before he entered the pop
arena, and gospel, as well as doo wop, influences would figure prominently
in most of his ‘60s work. Mayfield wasn’t a staunch traditionalist, however.
He and the Impressions may have often worked the call-and-response
gospel style, but his songs (romantic and otherwise) were often veiled or
unveiled messages of black pride, reflecting the increased confidence and
self-determination of the African-American community. Musically he was an
innovator as well, using arrangements that employed the punchy, blaring
horns and Latin-influenced rhythms that came to be trademark flourishes of
overwhelmed.
111
Chicago soul. As the staff producer for the OKeh label, Mayfield was also
instrumental in lending his talents to the work of other Chi-town soul singers
who went on to national success. With Mayfield singing lead and playing
guitar, the Impressions had 14 Top 40 hits in the 1960s (five made the Top
20 in 1964 alone), and released some above-average albums during that
period as well.
Given Mayfield’s prodigious talents, it was perhaps inevitable that he
would eventually leave the Impressions to begin a solo career, as he did
in 1970. His first few singles boasted a harder, more funk-driven sound;
singles like “(Don’t Worry) If There’s a Hell Below, We’re All Gonna Go”
found him confronting ghetto life with a realism that had rarely been heard
on record. He really didn’t hit his artistic or commercial stride as a solo
113
artist, though, until Superfly, his soundtrack to a 1972 blaxploitation film.
Drug deals, ghetto shootings, the death of young black men before their
time: all were described in penetrating detail. Yet Mayfield’s irrepressible
falsetto vocals, uplifting melodies, and fabulous funk pop arrangements
gave the oft-moralizing material a graceful strength that few others could
have achieved. For all the glory of his past work, Superfly stands as his
crowning achievement, not to mention a much-needed counterpoint to the
sensationalistic portrayals of the film itself.
At this point Mayfield, along with Stevie Wonder and Marvin Gaye, was
the foremost exponent of a new level of compelling auteurism in soul. His
failure to maintain the standards of Superfly qualifies as one of the great
disappointments in the history of black popular music. Perhaps he’d simply
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reached his peak after a long climb, but the rest of his ‘70s work didn’t match
the musical brilliance and lyrical subtleties of Superfly, although he had a
few large R&B hits in a much more conventional vein, such as “Kung Fu,”
“So in Love,” and “Only You Babe.” Mayfield had a couple of hits in the early
‘80s, but the decade generally found his commercial fortunes in a steady
downward spiral, despite some intermittent albums.
In the mid-’90s, a couple of tribute albums consisting of Mayfield
covers appeared, with contributions by such superstars as Eric Clapton,
Bruce Springsteen, and Gladys Knight. Though no substitute for the man
himself, these tributes served as an indication of the enormous regard in
which Mayfield was still held by his peers.
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• CHAPTER EIGHT •
Several years after drawing deeply on his spiritual reserves, Mayfield
regained strength slowly, until an uplifting experience in 1994, when
an all-star cast of artists assembled to pay tribute to this great songwriter
and entertainer. Warner Brothers Records organized the recording of the
album, All Men Are Brothers: A Tribute To Curtis Mayfield, featuring all star
performers including Eric Clapton, Phil Collins, Whitney Houston, Bruce
Springsteen. John Mellencamp, Rod Stewart, B.B. King, Elton John, Gladys
Knight and Aretha Franklin, among others, all singing vintage Curtis Mayfield
material, and highlighted by a rendition of “Let’s Do It Again,” by Mayfield
himself, marking his first performance in the four years since the accident.
Inspired by this eventful album, Mayfield entered the studio on his own
again, two years later in 1996 where he produced a new album of original
new world order
117
material, New World Order, which became one of the most acclaimed
productions of his entire career. Both Aretha Franklin and Mavis Staples
appeared as guests on the album. This album was nominated for 3 Grammys.
Mayfield had a couple of hits in the early ‘80s, but the decade generally
found his commercial fortunes in a steady downward spiral, despite some
intermittent albums. On August 14, 1990, he became paralyzed from the
neck down when a lighting rig fell on top of him at a concert in Brooklyn,
NY. In the mid-’90s, a couple of tribute albums consisting of Mayfield
covers appeared, with contributions by such superstars as Eric Clapton,
Bruce Springsteen, and Gladys Knight. Though no substitute for the man
himself, these tributes served as an indication of the enormous regard in
which Mayfield was still held by his peers.
can’t stop now: can’t stop now
By the time he was in high school, his family had settled in the Cabrini-
Green projects on Chicago’s North Side. Mayfield’s strongest early musical
influence came from his membership in a local gospel group called the North-
ern Jubilee Gospel Singers, which included three cousins and Jerry Butler.
But young Mayfield was also interested in his own music. As Mayfield told
the Detroit News in 1974, “I was writing music when I was 10 or 11 years old.”
Mayfield’s grandmother was a preacher in the Traveling Souls Spiritualist
Church, and traces of church and gospel music are evident in many of his
compositions. Mayfield attended Wells High School on Chicago’s North
Side along with another popular singer, Major Lance, but he left when he
was in the tenth grade to begin performing with the Impressions.
119
The Impressions began playing around 1956 as the Roosters in
Chattanooga, Tennessee, with Fred Cash, Sam Gooden, Emanuel Thomas,
and the brothers Richard and Arthur Brooks. Seeking to advance their
musical careers, Gooden and the Brooks brothers went north to Chicago in
1957 and moved to the North Side in the Cabrini-Green projects. Jerry Butler
was a senior in high school at the time, and he acted as a replacement
for the vocalists who had stayed in Tennessee. Butler encouraged Mayfield
to join them, saying they needed someone “who could play an instrument
and who could help us get our harmony together,” as quoted by Robert
Pruter in Chicago Soul. By this time, Mayfield was writing gospel-influenced
songs and had learned how to play the guitar.
“It’s difficult simply because when an idea hits me,
I can’t just up and grab a guitar or recorder or a
pencil and write it down...”
can’t stop now: can’t stop now
The group made some early recordings for the Bandera label and were
then discovered by Eddie Thomas of Vee Jay records, who became their
manager and changed their name to the Impressions. Vee Jay and Chess
records were two of Chicago’s major rhythm and blues labels of the time,
and the Impressions made their first record for Vee Jay about six months
after Mayfield joined the group. Released on the company’s subsidiary label,
Falcon, “For Your Precious Love” featured Jerry Butler’s lead vocals. Its first
issue sold over nine hundred thousand copies. Vee Jay’s A&R man Calvin
Carter signed them immediately after hearing the song, which he reportedly
liked for its spiritual feel, a departure from the doo-wop harmonies of the day.
Vee Jay promoted the group as “Jerry Butler and the Impressions” and
developed Butler as a solo artist. After three singles, Butler left the group
121
We’re a winner
No more tears do we cryAnd we have finally dried our eyes
And we’re moving on upLord have mercy
We’re moving on upWe’re living proofAnd all’s alert
That we’re too fromThe good black dirt
And we’re a winnerEverybody knows it too
We just keep on pushingLike your leaders tell you to
At last that blessed day has comeAnd I don’t care where you come from
We’re all moving on upLord have mercy
I don’t mind leaving hereTo show the world we have no fear
Cause a feeble mind is in your way
Boy you can’t make it
anybody say
and never let
winnerWe’re a
we’re moving on up
123
And all’s alert
The good black dirt
We’re all moving on up
anybody say
to go out on his own. As Mayfield told Pruter, “When Jerry left… it allowed
me to generate and pull out my own talents as a writer and a vocalist.”
Mayfield’s soprano singing contrasted with Butler’s baritone leads. The
group released a few singles with Mayfield as leader and then was dropped
by Vee Jay. From 1959 to 1961, the Impressions temporarily split up, and
Mayfield began writing songs and playing guitar for Butler in 1960.
By 1961 Mayfield had saved enough money–about a thousand dollars
to regroup the Impressions and take them to New York for a recording
session. In July they recorded “Gypsy Woman” for ABC-Paramount.
Mayfield was only 18 when the group signed with ABC-Paramount, and it
was the beginning of a seven-year string of popular and rhythm and blues hits
that were all composed by Mayfield. Mayfield, Sam Gooden, Fred Cash, and
can’t stop now: can’t stop now
“How many 54-year-old quadriplegics are
putting albums out?”
Arthur and Richard Brooks sang on “Gypsy Woman.” The Brooks brothers
left the Impressions in 1962, and the remaining members continued as a trio
throughout the 1960s.
Mayfield, along with several other soul and funk musicians, spread
messages of hope in the face of oppression, pride in being a member of
the black race and gave courage to a generation who were demanding
their human rights. Mayfield has been compared to of Martin Luther King Jr
arguably for making a greater lasting impact in the civil rights struggle with
his music. By the end of the decade he was a pioneering voice in the black
pride movement along with James Brown and Sly Stone. Paving the way
for a future generation of rebel thinkers, Mayfield paid the price, artistically
and commercially, for his politically charged music. Irrespective of the per-
125
sistent radio bans and loss of revenue, Mayfield continued his quest for
equality right until his death. His lyrics on racial injustice, poverty and drugs
became the poetry for a generation. Mayfield was also a descriptive social
commentator. As the influx of drugs ravaged through black America in the
late 1960s and 1970s his bittersweet descriptions of the ghetto would serve
as warnings to the impressionable. Determined to warn all about the perils
of drugs, Freddie’s Dead remains one of the most graphic tales of street
life. After hearing the Rev. Martin Luther King deliver his “I Have a Dream”
speech that August day in 1963, the crowd of 250,000 sang “We Shall
Overcome.” In 1965, another gospel song emerged -- People Get Ready by
Mayfield and the Impressions. Keep On Pushing and People Get Ready
were two songs that became embedded in the national movement for civil
127
and social rights, heard at all the rallies and marches, songs-as-inspiration.
His song “People Get Ready” was written in the year after the march on
Washington’s. For many, it captured the spirit of the march–the song
reaches across racial and religious lines to offer a message of redemption
and forgiveness.
Mayfield produced many of the songs that helped shape and define the
Black Power Movement, exemplifies the workings of music in the BPM and
their 1967 song ‘We’re a Winner’ can be seen as one defining element of
the movement. Mayfield’s uncompromising look at racism and his calls for
black pride and economic determinism place him firmly within the BPM.
Significantly, when he and his friend Eddie Thomas founded the Custom
record label to protect black artists from the exploitation that they often
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suffered with other record labels, not only was the BPM ideal of black
entrepreneurship realized but also the BPM had a record label that was
synonymous with Black Power. Empowered in part by the ownership
of his own label and in part by his affiliations with other artists, Mayfield
presented a crucial look at American racism in ‘This is My Country’ with
lyrics that spoke of ‘three hundred years of slave driving, sweat and welts
on my ‘We’re a Winner’ conveys the essential ideological message of the
BPM. By the time We’re a Winner was recorded, the BPM was a powerful,
complex movement that incorporated politics, capitalism, internationalism
and the arts that had its roots in the social circumstances and political
opportunities of the post-World War II era.
can’t stop now: can’t stop now
• CHAPTER NINE •
Curtis Mayfield is among an elite few members of the Rock and Roll
Hall of Fame who have been inducted more than once. Mayfield was
first inducted with the Impressions in 1991 and then as a solo artist in 1999.
His solo career, which began in 1970, is significant for the forthright way in
which he addressed issues of black identity and self-awareness. He has
been cited as an influence by such latter-day performers as Lenny Kravitz,
Ice-T, Public Enemy and Arrested Development. Mayfield’s ability to voice
hard truths through funky, uplifting music has rendered him one of the great
soul icons.
In 1968, while still with the Impressions, Mayfield launched the Curtom
label (his third, after the Mayfield and Windy C imprints). Two years later,
his solo debut, Curtis, appeared. It contained one of his most forthright
keep on pushing
131
message songs, “Don’t Worry (If There’s a Hell Below We’re All Going to
Go),” and was the first of eleven albums that he released in the Seventies.
Whereas his Sixties work both with the Impressions and as a songwriter
producer defined Chicago soul-a regional scene comparable to Motown in
Detroit and Stax in Memphis-Mayfield left his imprint on the Seventies by
couching social commentary and keenly observed black-culture archetypes
in funky, danceable rhythms. He explained the shift in subject matter as “a
feeling in me that there need to be songs that relate not so much to civil
rights but to the way we as all people deal with our lives.”
Working on a seemingly parallel track with Marvin Gaye circa What’s
Going On, Mayfield’s second solo album, Roots (1971), sounded urgent
pleas for peace and brotherhood over extended, cinematic soul-funk tracks
can’t stop now: can’t stop now
that laid out a fresh musical agenda for the new decade. Mayfield’s solo
career found him giving freer reign to his guitar playing, a choppy, rhythm-
based style that owed much to his Chicago blues heritage and a self
devised tuning based on the black keys of the piano. His most popular and
lasting work was Superfly, a film soundtrack in which he painted a gritty
portrait of black life in America’s inner cities. Mayfield struck a creative and
commercial motherlode with Superfly‘s smoldering rock-disco grooves and
pointed social commentary. The soundtrack album yielded massive cross-
over hits in “Freddie’s Dead” and “Superfly.” Against a hypnotic backdrop of
conga drums, strings and wah-wah guitar, Mayfield sang of a high-rolling
ghetto drug dealer’s lifestyle in a sweet, stinging falsetto. As an aural
document, Mayfield’s music for this classic “blaxploitation” film antici-
133
pated the reality-based rap and hip-hop of the Nineties. Throughout his
career Mayfield also shone brightly as a producer and songwriter for
other artists, including soul and R&B giants like Jerry Butler and Major
Lance (in the Sixties) and Aretha Franklin, the Staple Singers, and Gladys
Knight and the Pips (in the Seventies). As a solo artist, he continued to score
R&B hits into the mid-Eighties, many of them in a disco vein. Getting back
to his roots, Mayfield joined the Impressions in 1983 for a reunion tour and
revived his dormant Curtom label in 1990.
Throughout his career Mayfield also shone brightly as a producer and
songwriter for other artists, including soul and R&B giants like Jerry Butler
and Major Lance (in the Sixties) and Aretha Franklin, the Staple Singers,
and Gladys Knight and the Pips (in the Seventies). As a solo artist, he
“You just have to deal with what you got,
try to sustain yourself as best you can, and look to the
things that you can do.”
can’t stop now: can’t stop now
continued to score R&B hits into the mid-Eighties, many of them in a disco
vein. Getting back to his roots, Mayfield joined the Impressions in 1983 for a
reunion tour and revived his dormant Curtom label in 1990.
A freakish onstage accident in August 1990 left Mayfield paralyzed from
the neck down. However, this tragedy did not diminish his spirit or end his
career. In 1996, he released his 25th solo album, New World Order. In his
own words: “How many 54-year-old quadriplegics are putting albums out?
You just have to deal with what you got, try to sustain yourself as best you
can, and look to the things that you can do.” Despite his positive attitude,
Mayfield’s health steadily deteriorated. He lost a leg to diabetes in 1998 and
died a year later at age 57. On that day, the music world lost a man of great
talent and conscience. In the words of Aretha Franklin, “Curtis Mayfield is
K e e p o n p u s h i n ’
I’ve got to
I can’t stop now
Move up a l i t t l e h i g h e r
Some way, somehow
‘Cause I’ve got my strength And it don’t make sense
Not to keep on pushin’ Hallelujah, hallelujah
Keep on pushin’ Now maybe some day
I’ll reach that h i g h e r g o a l I know that I can make it
With just a little bit of soul ‘Cause I’ve got my strength
And it don’t make sense Not to keep on pushin’
Now look-a lookA-look-a yonder
What’s that I see A great big stone wall
Stands there ahead of me But I’ve got my pride
And I’ll move on aside And keep on pushin’
Hallelujah, hallelujah
keep on pushing
137
to soul music what Bach was to the classics and Gershwin and Irving Berlin
were to pop music.” Mayfield received the Grammy Lifetime Achievement
Award in 1995. In February, 1998, he had to have his right leg amputated
due to diabetes. Mayfield was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame
on March 15, 1999. Health reasons prevented him from attending the
ceremony, which included fellow inductees Paul McCartney, Billy Joel,
Bruce Springsteen, Dusty Springfield, George Martin, and 1970s Curtom
signee and labelmate The Staple Singers.
Mayfield was active throughout the 1970s and 1980s, though he had a
somewhat lower public profile in the 1980s. On August 13, 1990, Mayfield
was paralyzed from the neck down after stage lighting equipment fell on him
at an outdoor concert at Wingate Field in Flatbush, Brooklyn, New York.
can’t stop now: can’t stop now
The accident set him back, but Mayfield forged ahead. He was unable to
play guitar, but he wrote, sang, and directed the recording of his last album,
New World Order. Mayfield’s vocals were painstakingly recorded, usually
line-by-line while lying on his back.
Mayfield received the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 1995. In
February, 1998, he had to have his right leg amputated due to diabetes.
Mayfield was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame on March 15,
1999. Health reasons prevented him from attending the ceremony, which
included fellow inductees Paul McCartney, Billy Joel, Bruce Springsteen,
Dusty Springfield, George Martin, and labelmate The Staple Singers.
139
Throughout his career, Mayfield’s willingness to give voice to the truth
and the simultaneously dignified and funky ways in which he’s musically
cast forthright sentiments - have made him one of the great soul icons of the
age. Mayfield was paralyzed from the neck down in a 1990 accident when
a lighting tower fell on him prior to a show in New York. However, this tragic
setback has not diminished his spirit or his career. In 1996, he released his
25th solo album, New World Order. In his own words: “How many 54-year-
old quadriplegics are putting albums out? You just have to deal with what
you got, try to sustain yourself as best you can, and look to the things that
you can do.”
can’t stop now: can’t stop now
In his own words: “How many 54-year-old quadriplegics are putting
albums out? You just have to deal with what you got, try to sustain yourself
as best you can, and look to the things that you can do.” Despite his positive
attitude, Mayfield’s health steadily deteriorated. He lost a leg to diabetes
in 1998 and died a year later at age 57. On that day, the music world lost a
man of great talent and conscience. In the words of Aretha Franklin, “Curtis
Mayfield is to soul music what Bach was to the classics and Gershwin and
Irving Berlin were to pop music.”
references
Burns, P. (2003). Curtis Mayfield. (1st ed.) Sanctuary Publishing.
Mayfield, C. (1996). Poetic license. (1st ed.). Beverly Hills: Penguin USA.
Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Museum. (2010). Curtis Mayfield. Retrieved from http://rockhall.com/inductees/curtis-mayfield/
Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Museum. (2010). The Impressions. Retrieved from http://rockhall.com/inductees/the-impressions/
Songwriters Hall of Fame. (2011). Songwriters hall of fame: Curtis may-field exhibit. Retrieved from http://songwritershalloffame.org/exhibits/C169
Werner, C. (2004). Higher ground. (1st ed.). New York: Crown Publishers.
In order of appearance:
Dread Scott; 17, 22Jean de Segonzac; 25Suncan Stone; 31Ted Leong; 36Andrze Banas; 39Gilles Petard; 45KENT Soul; 50, 53Curtom Records; 61,66, 69, 75, 95, 119, 132Warner Bros.; 80, 83, 124OM Electronics; 89,97Joseph O’Brien; 113Matthew Allen; 105CurtisMayfield.com; 110, 139
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With a distinctive, highly recognizable tenor voice, an unparalleled catalog of enduring pop and soul classics and an honored place in the
pantheon of American music, Curtis Mayfield is without question one of the most influential and beloved artist and songwriter of his time. From his rough beginnings to his tragic end, Mayfield always kept his head held high and kept pushing on. His legacy of empowerment and hope has been passed down many generations. The movement continues… it can’t stop now.
MM PUBLISHING
“No matter how bad things might get,
for something good to happen.”there’s always room
–CURTIS MAYFIELD
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