THE DEATH OF R & B?
Country music, blues, jazz, gospel, rock ‘n’ roll and R & B—these are the bedrock styles of music in America. And all of them at one time or another have been considered an endangered species. In the case of R & B, its death was proclaimed—an analyzed-- in print back in 1988 by Nelson George in his book THE DEATH OF RHYTHM & BLUES. And you hear with reasonable frequency these days the question: what happened to R & B? How come there isn’t any good R & B any more?
The question rings a bit odd to me at this moment, considering that today I enjoyed very much the new Anthony Hamilton CD BACK TO LOVE, which lovingly and pretty effectively updates classic R & B for today’s listeners. Anthony Hamilton is a true R & B singer, very much rooted in classic R & B of the late Sixties and early Seventies. The most salient fact about him for this discussion is that he sells a lot of records today—hundreds of thousands of each release and has radio hits (“Woo,” the hit from his new album, is really good!). And he’s been doing this successfully for close to 10 years.
But Anthony Hamilton is notable because he is exceptional, one of a small handful of true R & B artists who continue to experience commercial success and have profile in the mainstream culture. Of course there are many other artists making R & B music, ranging from revivalists such as Sharon Jones & The Dap Kings, Tre & The Revelations, Eli Reed & The Paper Boys, neo-soul artists who meld R & B vocal styles, from the Seventies especially, with elements of hip-hop or jazz (Jill Scott or Lalah Hathaway for instance) or contemporary iterations of R & B styles such as Mary J. Blige or Cee-Lo Green. So, no R & B isn’t dead, but the small numbers of current R & B releases with any kind of national profile (only a few dozen annually according to Grammy nomination lists) suggest it may be on life support. As far commercial radio play goes, it is pretty much ghetto-ized on “urban adult contemporary” stations—whose playlists are dominated by hits of the 70’s and 80’s to cater to their mostly over-35 demo—with a few releases slipping through on “mainstream urban” stations, whose playlists are dominated by hip-hop to cater to their under 25 target demo. There are is a whole host of vibrant R & B/”soul” artists with generally small grassroots, niche or underground audiences generally 30 and up but they are off the radar of most as their music is not being exposed into the mainstream. R & B is well on its way to becoming a traditional music—like blues. Does it really have to be that way?
The mainstream media tends to treat R & B with benign neglect, covering just a few favored artists. The year-end “best of” lists of Rolling Stone and The New York Times had virtually no R & B releases on them, unless you count Beyonce (I don’t) and Rolling Stones’ inclusion of the album by Charles Bradley, a not especially great Sixties-style R & B singer dug up by revivalist Daptone Records. In so doing, they ignored really fine singles and albums by Jill Scott, Anthony Hamilton, R Kelly, Mint Condition, Anthony David, Donell Jones, Kindred The Family Soul, Betty Wright, Syleena Johnson, Kelly Price, Ledisi, and more. And these were not obscure releases; many sold well, quite a few had radio hits. But they weren’t considered of interest or of importance by the mainstream (mainly white) music critics.
It is interesting to note that 60’s R & B/soul revivalist artists tend to have white audiences while neo-soul or artists drawing on 70’s R & B tend to have black audiences.This suggests something about the way the artists are marketed or the appeal of their images to their respective audiences.
What, then, are the reasons for the decline of R & B? I remember the beginning of the change when disco became popular and all of a sudden singers such as Gladys Knight, Patti Labelle, and Aretha Franklin were having trouble scoring hits. Disco was first and foremost a producer’s medium, albeit one with live musicians—for a while, anyway! Shortly after that, in the early Eighties, new technology—drum machines, synth basses, keyboard synthesizers, sequencers-- became available that enabled recordings to be made by one person, thus accelerating the trend of producer as artist. This trend diminished the value of studio musicians; where musicians were used, it rarely was in a live band performance context, so the spontaneous interplay of musicians was lost. The “cut-and-paste” aesthetic of hip-hop and its immense popularity as the new music of a generation (or two!) further devalued the contributions of musicians and singers. Singers became just one more element to be plugged in by the producer and technology enabled the producer to shape, fix and otherwise enhance a weak singer’s vocals. Video—via MTV and BET—exploded, placing a premium on looks over musical talent. One wonders if Aretha Franklin had emerged in 1989 instead of the Sixties whether she would have made it! The rise of hip-hop and dj culture decimated the live band club scene, particularly in the realm of black music. Where the Seventies and early Eighties had a multitude of great black music bands, as I write now there is only one prominent R & B band on the national stage—Mint Condition. So the spontaneous gestation that used to take place in the clubs, where new talent could hone their chops and learn the art of performing, has largely disappeared. As commercial radio formats tightened and hip-hop started to dominate, R & B started to recede from popular consciousness. By the mid-Nineties, aspiring artists who might be drawn to R & B had few artistic models to learn from. And fewer young folk were interested anyway; after all, you could get someone to make you some beats, rap over it and have a shot at making some big money.
So that’s where we’re at today; R & B has been marginalized and is in danger of become a traditional music, created for niche audiences, at best. Could it stage a resurgence? Anything is possible but much would have to change. The hope is that there is a musical void that people would like to see filled. You often hear statements such as “where is the good R& B today?” The funny thing is, sometimes the person saying that refers to the Nineties as a time when R & B was really good! George Clinton has stated the place to find real funk today is in church. Many churches have live bands for services and of course the choirs continue to be training grounds for young singers. You can still hear great singers in church and it is there that musicians and singers can perform without the pre-fab constrictions of commercial music-making. If a consistent live outlets for R & B/funk/soul could emerge , along the lines of the fabled Black Lilly in Philadelphia during the late Nineties and early 2000’s, that would be a step in the right direction; even one such outlet in every large and medium-size city. And a new radio format would be nice—one combining R & B, groove jazz, neo-soul, a bit of dance music, maybe a touch of hip-hop, intelligently programmed. You can find such programming on the internet (we recommend Soul Patrol Radio at www.soul-patrol.net for a wide-ranging black music experience). Any serious resurgence generally is led by a young artist—a new Prince, perhaps, fantastically talented who can appeal to a young generation. Let an exciting new young R & B artist break through and you we might have something. Until then, we need to support the quality R & B artists that are recording and performing live. But that takes some pro-active looking, which seems to be beyond all but a small percentage of people. But those people can keep the flame burning until a few more logs get thrown on the fire!
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