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Aretha Franklin wasn't the queen of soul.


bubinga5

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8 hours ago, bubinga5 said:

If I asked 10 people randomly in the high street who they knew as a singer. Aretha Franklin or Anita Baker.? We know the answer to that.

If you asked that question to 10 people in Somerset, yes, we would know the answer to that. "Did they both sing with the Wurzels?"  

:D

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10 hours ago, bubinga5 said:

I always thought if I put" of course this is only my opinion"😀 it  would take the controversy out of the post. its an open discussion. 

Surely all opinions on forums are just that, its a given. There are many artists on music who I believe to be average at best, but thats just my opinion and I try to keep " I dont agree with" posts to a minimum. She can be called the queen of soul because she made it popular and was lauded by her peers. You prefer someone else and that is your choice, the fact you are into soul music still dousnt make your opinion more relevant.

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I'm not big on labels. They just cause endless hair splitting, as we are doing in this thread, but Soul in the 60's was a thing. With many influences and a level of creativity seldom seen since. Aretha was the best in that genre and for many since.

I've seen Anita Baker described as R&B and Urban Soul. Not labels I know very well but I guess that's not the same thing.

In reality both singers deserve as many superlatives as we can come up with.

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13 hours ago, bubinga5 said:

 I doubt a hullabaloo is going to sprout from this.. I could be very wrong

I think you underestimate the BC Massive...😃😃

11 hours ago, lowdown said:

Yeah, she is a terrific singer and certainly one of my favourite vocalists/musicians. But she certainly isn’t/wasn’t  overlooked/unheard of. ‘The Rapture Album’ sold over 8 million copies, with two tracks receiving a Grammy each. There are over 30 of America’s finest session musicians and singers on that Album and it was a pretty big deal back in the 80’s.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rapture_(Anita_Baker_album)

I had this on tape (remember that?) - I probably need to get it again in some other medium.

4 hours ago, AndyTravis said:

I went to a James Brown gig once, it was bloody hard work.

I can believe that. I've seen snippets of JB Live - always felt like a chore watching.

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16 minutes ago, TheGreek said:

I can believe that. I've seen snippets of JB Live - always felt like a chore watching.

It was 45 minutes of introduction, he came on and intermittently squawked “HEY!” And “YEAH!” for about 20 minutes. The band and backing singers did all the Work.

luckily I didn’t pay to see him.

”THE HARDEST WORKING MAN IN SOUL”

how? He seemed to be on a good screw for doing nowt...

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Why don't folk who disagree  with the OP just nominate their fave soul singers? That way I might discover someone I'd  previously not  known then this would be an extremely useful thread, which would in turn placate those who think it worth contributing to what they see as a pointless thread.

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I think that it is important to look at the question with reference to the situation in America at the time she was first referred to as "the queen of soul";

Was this a label she was given by the black community in celebration of her undeniable talent,

or was it a label promoted by the white establishment who couldn't sweep her under the carpet in a time of racial segregation in society, the music charts and radio stations, but still tried to diminish her greatness by emphasising her blackness and implying inferiority - I suspect that the mainstream US media wanted Dusty Springfield to be the queen of soul, much like Elvis was the king of rock and roll (despite being not a patch on Little Richard and Chuch Berry IMHO)

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1 minute ago, stewblack said:

Why don't folk who disagree  with the OP just nominate their fave soul singers? That way I might discover someone I'd  previously not  known then this would be an extremely useful thread, which would in turn placate those who think it worth contributing to what they see as a pointless thread.

I love Randy Crawford and would dearly like to nominate her for this title but recognise that this would really be based on 1 album (Secret Combination) plus "One Day I'll Fly Away". 

Still a great voice.

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1 hour ago, stewblack said:

Why don't folk who disagree  with the OP just nominate their fave soul singers? That way I might discover someone I'd  previously not  known then this would be an extremely useful thread, which would in turn placate those who think it worth contributing to what they see as a pointless thread.

I think there’s an awful lot of crossover with singers anyway, what one person would class as soul someone else would describe as pop. To me at least soul is heavily blues influenced, I’d have described most of the singers mentioned as alternatives to the role as ‘queen of soul’ as being pop singers, for me at least they don’t fulfil the remit for being soul singers. Is Motown soul? I’d argue no, it’s pop; it doesn’t have the earthiness of soul.

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Aretha's place as one of the all time greats is assured, and some certainly think of her as the greatest female vocalist of all time (within popular music of the last 50 or 60 years)..

There are other female singers out there who mean more to me, but in the end that's only my personal taste.

And in the end, that's what it comes down to - which singer, songwriter, band etc, etc, connects with us the most.

Bit out of context and a tad sexist maybe, but that Arsene Wenger quote from a few years ago sums it up...

'Everyone thinks they have the prettiest wife at home..'

We're just lucky to have / had so many to choose from.. ☺

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15 minutes ago, Misowaki said:

Uhh...

Just... wait, it's gonna take me a long time to get my head around this one...

I would say that Motown derived from soul, Motown itself isn’t soul. Soul itself derived from gospel, jazz and blues.

I am of course probably totally wrong, I personally dislike most popular music, my posting is just based on what I picked up in the musicology module at uni, when I could stay awake 😊.

Edited by ambient
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But Motown's a record label that put out loads of some, if not most of the most widely recognised Soul music regardless of whichever exceedingly specific boxes people like to use...

You know what, to paraphrase you, horses for courses.  I'm gonna leave it there.

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2 minutes ago, bubinga5 said:

Was Motown a genre or a record company.? Im sure it was the latter, but I'm open to be educated

But what they produced, was it pop or soul?

i did say I’m probably completely wrong,  anything like this is anathema to me.

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8 minutes ago, bubinga5 said:

Was Motown a genre or a record company.? Im sure it was the latter, but I'm open to be educated

It was about a dozen labels operated by one company. Tamla was the originial label, Motown as a label came second. Other labels included Soul, Gordy, etc.

 

I think, in the UK the label was issued initially as Oriole, then as $tateside (an EMI label), then as Tamla-Motown (also EMI).

 

I just checked and before Oriole, the UK issues were London American (a Decca label) and then Fontana (a Phillips label)

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