Naomi Shelton & The Gospel Queens-What Have You Done My Brother

Goddamn man just check out the fine ladies in this picture and the soul leaking out of their pores. The truth and honesty in their smiles, the pain and heart contained within those ample bodies, toothy smiles and heart-fucking-breaking voices that harmonize with reckless abandon. If you were to channel Otis Redding, Sam Cooke, Melvin Seals, Bobby Womack, Bootsy Collins, James Brown, Jackie LaBranch, Gloria Jones and Gladys Knight, squeeze them all together in a French Press, add pure soul concentrate and have a child with Van Morrison the offspring would be this band.

It is impossible to just pick out one song from this album. I would say that "He Knows My Heart" belongs in some dark scene of a Scorsese movie just as it does being sung in a Baptist Church in Memphis along the muddy rivers by a congregation soaked with sweat. "By Your Side"...if there's a woman who can sing that to me or even give me that feeling then there's a five carat ring in the picture and a life of selfless devotion waiting for her while I cry on my knees. I never knew there could be a song that would make me bust out in dance outside of a few Smokey Robinson and Sam Cooke numbers until "I Need You to Hold My Hand" came through the speakers in an orgasm of ecstasy. They are all testifying, they all bring me down genuflecting in humble piety while my consciousness climbs to the stratos.

You can sing it in the car when no one is looking, you can sing it to someone in the moonlight with the sand between your toes, salt caked on dark skin after a midnight swim and a warm six pack stashed on the dunes. You can sing it in a low roofed club up in the 120's in Harlem with a zoot suit and feather in your cap. In truth you can sing it every and anywhere because good vibe tunes such as these contained in this album should be sung as much as possible. But you have to have the heart, the groove and the spirit to do it right. If you don't and you don't get this album then there's no hope; go back to your life and loveless cubicle. Go back to shades of grey and leave the rest of the spectrum for the enlightened, I want every band of it, I want to house it and have it explode out of my door every morning when I arise and take on the new day touched by my sisters, stick my chest out greet it all with a smile.

"Shave 'Em Dry II" Lucille Bogan-The Best of Lucille Bogan

In the late years of the 20th century there were a bunch of people who decided that we all weren't responsible enough to police ourselves and our children. I won't digress into a political rant but just to let you know I am a pure Libertarian. I should be able to listen to what I want, drink what I want no matter of the age, smoke what I want no matter what it is and say what I want no matter how derogatory.

But that is another matter. What I am speaking of is the Parental Advisory label affixed to records deemed offensive by those in power. I still don't know how Tipper Gore and her friends at the Parents Music Resource Center are qualified to state what is obscene. When the label became popular some of the first albums with the honor of having said label were from: Guns and Roses, 2 Live Crew, Danzing and Soundgarden, all of which pale in comparison to this song. I'm not saying that they are great bands and albums but what I find funny is the fact that the world thought that this was a new thing; as if this was a recent movement in music.

It has been around for a long time. Blues music used carefully coded slang to hide the sexual content of lyrics. "Jellyroll" is slang for Vagina, hell it occurs in too many songs to list. When B.B. King sings "I have a sweet little angel, man you ought to see the way she spreads her wings..." just what do you think he is speaking about? Or in the classic "Come into my Kitchen", hmmmm. I am pretty sure they ain't speaking of cooking. There were artist more blunt and rough around the edges in the past, without a doubt. Songs that were sung in juke joints in the south where prostitutes danced for a dime and then took you upstairs in the muggy heat to squeeze a few extra cents out of the deal.

One of them was Lucille Bogan who was born in 1897 and started recording in 1923 in New York City, a far cry from her Alabama roots. What this woman spoke of was impossible of being mistaken. Here's the lyrics:

I got nipples on my titties, big as the end of my thumb,
I got somethin' between my legs'll make a dead man come,
Oh daddy, baby won't you shave 'em dry?

Want you to grind me baby, grind me until I cry.
Say I fucked all night, and all the night before baby,
And I feel just like I wanna, fuck some more,
Oh great God daddy,
Grind me honey and shave me dry,
And when you hear me holler baby, want you to shave it dry.

I got nipples on my titties, big as the end of my thumb,
Daddy you say that's the kind of 'em you want, and you can make 'em come,
Oh, daddy shave me dry,

And I'll give you somethin' baby, swear it'll make you cry.
I'm gon' turn back my mattress, and let you oil my springs,
I want you to grind me daddy, 'til the bell do ring,
Oh daddy, want you to shave 'em dry,
Oh great God daddy, if you can't shave 'em baby won't you try?

Now if fuckin' was the thing, that would take me to heaven,
I'd be fuckin' in the studio, till the clock strike eleven,
Oh daddy, daddy shave 'em dry,

I would fuck you baby, honey I'd make you cry.
Now your nuts hang down like a damn bell sapper,
And your dick stands up like a steeple,
Your goddam ass-hole stands open like a church door,
And the crabs walks in like people.

A big sow gets fat from eatin' corn,
And a pig gets fat from suckin',
Reason you see this whore, fat like I am,
Great God, I got fat from fuckin'.

My back is made of whalebone,
And my cock is made of brass,
And my fuckin' is made for workin' men's two dollars,
Great God, round to kiss my ass.


I'm not trying to shock people or be rude. I just figured that in keeping with the title of this blog I would be remiss to not include this song that I first learned from Keith Richards. The man is a wealth of knowledge. Also, whenever we think of ourselves as a collective species living in a specific time; that we came up with kink and whatever perverted and however perverted we think our society has become, well someone else has been there before and they were probably much worse than ourselves. From what I've seen we still came out all right.