In 1970, the musicians playing for James Brown walked out on him when he refused to meet certain demands about their employment. Brown had assembled some top notch players in his rise to success, but he was undaunted by their departure. He sent his jet airplane for the Collins brothers in Ohio, and they joined him onstage the next night without a single rehearsal. In the months that followed, the new band recorded "Sex Machine," "Super Bad," "...Get Involved," "Soul Power," and "Talking Loud..." Brown recorded a lot of hits before and and after this period, but the case could be made that this is his funkiest material. The musicians play off of one another with such attentiveness that Mr. Brown's on-the-fly intuitions about what should happen next become the structure of the compositions. The tracks from this time period are compiled in unedited form on the Funk Power CD. (I've a few dozen James Brown C.D.s, and this is far and away the most solid) On many other discs, you can hear fade out edits of these tracks. In fact, on the 45 rpm singles themselves the songs were often split in the middle to fit on two sides of the record. The full length performances are what you need. You can disagree with me, but you might as well be talking to a wall: the wall that your back is up against, while everyone else in 14+ minutes into the groove. Hipp-O's limited edition collection of the complete James Brown singles is sure to become an expensive second hand item, (And I'd really enjoy reading the extensive liner notes by the always informative Alan Leeds) but splitting these songs wrecks their momentum. What the world really needs, and I cross my fingers that they exist and that I might hear them some day, are alternative takes of these tracks. Even a few minutes of a flubbed chorus or misplayed verse. Because, of course, all you need is a good bar or two; two second fragments of JB material has been put to use to make music for thousands. If there is anything in the vaults, irregardless of its completeness. there is certainly an interest and market.
By 1971, many of the prodigal players had returned to the fold. March saw the band in Paris, where the show was recorded for an album that was not released until decades later. The bootleg video that I possess is footage from a TV broadcast of the same show that appears on a officially released CD....Whereas the sound on the CD is immaculate, the DVD is muddy and noisy and is screaming out to be cleaned up and married to the "Love Power" audio. The show is a monster: When you simply hear the audio, the speed with which the band tears through the older songs make them less satisfying than the studio recordings. When you watch the concert however, you see that th
e band is playing to the crowd and knows exactly how much they can take, what they expect, and when to deliver it to them. This is a well-honed showtime machine, the bases covered like a Swiss army knife: a go go dancer, a string section, the driving horns, the charismatic Bobby Byrd, two drummers. and, exclusive to this brief lineup: the raw edged Collins brothers...really holding it down on the one. As for Brown himself-as of 1971 he is pushing 40. And while he exerts more energy during this concert than most people do in a month, can it be said that the peak of his physical powers are a little while past?..Honestly- on dance moves and vocal effort, this is all as good as Boston 68, and the material is better.... the show and the band itself far, far more energetic.
There are a few other films of Mr. Brown in which he himself, personally, may have been a little closer to the top of his game. Shout Factory has finally put together a disc of the long awaited TAMI show and it is going to be available in a few short days. Rick Rubin has speculated that it might not only be the greatest filmed performance of James Brown, but the greatest filmed music performance period.
The Hardest Working Man in Show Business can be seen performing on a few other DVDs- none of which I've managed to see. I got the 68 Boston show five years ago as a badly cut up bootleg, but I haven't yet taken a look at the 3 DVD I Got the Feeling, with its documentary and some 68 Apollo footage...
There is also this: ---James Brown On Television Volume 1: The Sixties - 2 hours - "Hollywood A-Go-Go", "Music Scene", , "Where The Action Is", "The Hollywood Palace", "The Mike Douglas Show",
I spotted it on a Bomp list a while back. Hard to find any more specific details or review about it anywhere.
I've heard the bootleg of Zaire '74, which is a stellar performance- a peak for Brown perhaps, he acknowledges this by denying it during the concert itself. Not yet seen Soulpower, the documentary- which I've read contains three songs from Brown's set, and one each from the other performers...
On the outskirts of odds and ends, there is a BodyHeat disc that I pulled from a torrent. 4 episodes, I believe...Of interest more for the enjoyment of the dancers than anything live show or particular to JB...
Further out than that, Alan Leeds, JB's tour manager and archivist, makes mention of complete 1966 and 1967 shows HERE. Nothing concrete is said about them beyond that they exist, but the general discussion is of interest to fans of Brown or Prince, by whom Leeds was employed for many years.
Traders with other footage have made reference to their discoveries HERE and HERE
One of the trader's lists above mentions that he has two versions of this show, one with upgraded audio. As to which I have, I can't be certain. As I mentioned above, marrying this footage to the official CD release should already have been checked off on some industrious bootleggers to-do list. I downloaded exactfile and tried to run it on my DVD while it was in the drive, but the program crashed before I got any numbers... I'd like to have MD5s of all my reviews, so those of you who are playing along at home can compare your versions. I don't want to be forced to rip my boots to my harddrive in order to do this, however. Until a solution presents itself, we are going to have to refer to the menu shots, as I expect that these would be altered in the event of an upgrade
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