James Brown: 1933-2006
by Taylor Carik

During his amazing musical career that spanned over five decades, James Brown made an undeniable mark on American music, as well as on American history and culture.

He also went by a pretty fantastic set of nicknames.

"The Godfather of Soul" was born into the depressed South of the 1930s, where he was forced out of school, got arrested for breaking into a car, and served three years in jail — all by the time he was 18 years old.

It was while serving his sentence that James Brown found his salvation in music. Upon his release, he was recruited into Bobby Byrd's family gospel group, which soon became Brown's backup band on the southern "Chitlin' Circuit" of black clubs. The group performed tirelessly throughout the 1950s, developing and cultivating a faster and more rhythmic sound that laid the foundation for the early forms of funk.

By the early 1960s, "The Hardest Working Man in Show Business" had refined his stage show and signature sound, and by the middle of the decade had put out several successful soulful standards like "Papa's Got a Brand New Bag," "I Got You (I Feel Good)," and "It's a Man's Man's Man's World."

Brown also kept a tip-top musical crew. He would fine members of his ensemble (which employed future greats like Bootsy Collins and Maceo Parker) if they missed a note or a beat, illustrating not only his dedication and perfectionism, but also his talented musical ear that could, like a classical conductor, keep track of all the hustle and bustle of a stage full of swingin' musicians.

In the 1960s, James Brown began to use his widespread fame to make significant contributions to the American civil rights movement — at the expense of losing his white "crossover" audience. With positive songs like "Don't Be a Drop Out" and "Say It Loud — I'm Black and I'm Proud," Brown developed a strong connection to the black community. James Brown was so popular, in fact, that the race riots that followed Dr. Martin Luther King's death in April 1968 were averted in Boston because city officials broadcast James Brown's concert that evening on television and folks stayed in to watch it instead of taking to the streets.

And although Brown's popularity regressed as disco's swelled during the 1970s, he still remained an icon. He performed at Ali versus Foreman's "Rumble in the Jungle" in Zaire in 1974, wrote the soundtrack to the Blaxploitation film Black Caesar, and continued his musical success with the album Sex Machine.

Then in the '80s, new artists began to pay tribute to "The Soul Brother #1." He appeared with other soul music icons in The Blues Brothers, played his recent hit "Living in America" before the Apollo and Drago bout in Rocky IV, and was one of Eddie Murphy's more famous impressions on "Saturday Night Live."

But of course it seems that modern celebrity cannot exist without some scandal, and James Brown had his share of trouble, including problems with the IRS, an arrest for possession of PCP, a high speed chase from the police, a surreal episode where he wielded a gun at a neighboring insurance company while complaining of strangers using his bathroom, and a conviction for domestic abuse at age 70.

But Brown will undoubtedly be remembered more for his contribution to American music than for his personal problems and even his connections to American history. Along with originating funk and helping to make soul music mainstream, "Mr. Dynamite" is the one who made famous shouting out scat-like accents, as well as quick spins and furious foot shuffling done by today's famous front men (Michael Jackson, Mick Jagger, Prince, Beck and countless others closely mimic James Brown's style). Hip-hop continually samples James Brown's beats, and two weeks ago on his SNL appearance, Justin Timberlake took the stage with one of James Brown's signature fast shuffle flourishes.

E-mail Taylor Carik at cari0021 at umn dot edu.