Today's Meditation: Happy-loo-yah for the People!!
"Keep what’cha got till ya git what’cha need yall!
You got to give a lot jus’ta get what’cha need, sometimes yall!!
Gimme the bridge now!
Bustin’ loose in the evening, bustin’ loose can be pleasing;
Talkin’ `bout bustin’ loose yall!!
Bustin’ `loose in the meantime, bustin’ loose make you feel fine!
Talkin’ `bout bustin loose girl;
Bustin’ loose to my Lovejones/ bustin’ loose to each his own!!
Talkin’ `bout bustin’ loose yall!
Gimme the bridge yall!!
Git-git-git-git-git-git on Up yawwl!!
Git-git-git-git-git-git on Down!!
Free! Freaky deek! Free! Freaky deek!
Free! Freaky deek! Free! Freaky deek! (Ah! Freak yawwl!)
What’s that new dance yall doin´?!?“
From The Everlasting Book of Soul, The Gospel of Chuck Brown and the Soul Searchers, Chapter 3, verses 13-21, New Stanktified Version; Reverend Boogaloo photographed by Sebastian Rosenberg
Aman and Aman-d! Do you know what, believer? I’ve been bustin loose for as long as I can remember. I mean, for as long as I can recall, I have really tried to bust as-loose-as-a-goose!! Good googly-woogly! I can remember when I was a just an it-sy-bit-sy, teeny-weeny, pre-school, Star-child-kiddy, as soon as I realized that I could feel balance in my body and discern a diddy-wah-diddy in a Ray Charles riff (Blessed be his Holy Name), from that first sublime moment I caught-a-holt-to-the Groove, heard a hook and felt a funktafied beat, I started moving and groovin’, you know, really gettin’ into it man, you know, and countin’ it off and doin’ the Do, along with the Shingaling, the Jerk, the Frog, the Swim, the Turtle, the Shimmy-Shimmy Coco Bop, the Hully-Gully, the Twist and most importantly, The James Brown. Of course, I was not the only one. Far from it. In the beginning, there were many of us because everybody around was doing exactly the same. "Shake that thang! And don’t be ashamed! Shake that thang! Cause your Mama did the same!“
I remember imitating all the dance moves I saw my Aunt Ree-Ree do at home. At the time, she was practicing to be a ballerina and was a freshman at Norfolk State College. During her practice time (which was all the time), I would watch her and try to match her step-for-step. She encouraged me to express myself through gesture, mime and movement and we would dance together every day. Plus, my grandfather was a funktafized drummer. By the time I knew him, he had already played in Harlem in the 1920’s. Could make those drums talk and shake and rattle and roll. Louis Armstrong was his idol. He taught me how to tighten-up the skins with the key and let me sit and watch and listen after he set up his kit to play. I remember many sunny, 96 degrees-in-the-shade hot, summer afternoons when he would set it off in our backyard and begin to wail. All the children in our neighborhood would hear that Sound, stop what they were doing, run full speed for 4 or 5 blocks to ring our backyard fence and for a few, precious moments, we had an instant, on-the-One, Stanknasity, funky-good-time party, right then and there. Didn’t need no music. All we needed was a beat. Happy-loo-yah!! You can say Aman!! So by the time I entered first grade at 5-and-three-quarters, I had already been reading for almost 2 years, had begun to think critically about the oral history of the Harlem Renaissance, had already perused „Crisis“ magazine, entertained my Granny with my trial sermons, started my own record collection (which included Booker T. and the MG’s "Green Onions“, The Orlons "Not Me“, LP’s by Jackie "Moms“ Mabley, and mastered the riffs on Brother Ray’s "What I Say" and Sam the Sham and the Pharaoh’s "Woolly Bully" on an ancient, upright piano in my Granny’s house that everybody could play, possessing the verbal audacity to say pretty much anything I felt to any good-looking woman (or anybody else) in the street where the people would meet! Good golly Miss Molly!!! It was mighty good to know the Stanktity then!! Therefore, during my first weeks of elementary school, this cumulative preparation of body, mind, and soul revealed itself unto the People in my world, in a marvelous and magnificent way. You see beloved, I had the Mark or the Stanktity on me even then! Happy-loo-yah!! Because I didn’t have to catch the bus to school! Or have to walk...or use public transportation of any kind... Those modes of transportation, you can imagine, would not be fitting for a budding funk prophet!!
Instead, I was elegantly chauffeured each and every morning to Mrs. Cuffee’s accelerated, first grade class at Crestwood Elementary School on Outlaw Street by three, gorgeous, sophisticated, older women in a huge, luxurious, shiny, bright Cadillac: by the elegant Mrs. Ruby Dupree and her two exquisite high school daughters, Gwendolyn and Saundra. It was the year 1963 and aside from Kennedy getting himself killed, the truly-est memorable event of that year for me was the anticipation of the biggest-car-I’d-ever-seen-in-my-life pulling up to the curb every morning, packed with beautiful women, coming to pick me up!! Aww sooky-sooky now!! On those crisp, fall mornings, as I dressed myself with extra care, I looked forward to getting into that pretty car with those pretty women and going to that school: a treat, that made me feel so sweet, I just couldn’t be beat!! Aman!! I would wait patiently on the sidewalk, just outside my door, for that car to pull up, knowing that no matter how cold it might be on the outside, the insides of that car would be clean and toasty warm, filled with my special friends, waiting there, all for me! Great Day in the mornin’!! I get a little happy right now just thinking about it!! Of course, we would chat and exchange general pleasantries and I always had the impression that we were taking a very long, luxurious, leisurely ride; in fact, the school was in another city where I did not live and I imagine that in those days, before the interstate highways systems were completed, the trip may have taken at least 35-45 minutes, one way. Now at this point, I do feel compelled to explain in greater detail about this transportation agreement, so that anyone reading this won’t get the wrong idea about my social status at that time. I got the ride with Mrs. Dupree because I happened to live on her way to work. And she happened to be one of the school teachers at that elementary school, and the high school - the fabled, Crestwood Senior High - which her daughters attended, was only a block away. The other important thing I should mention is, I had to really bust loose to get in school that year: in other words, I entered that elementary school, on Outlaw Street, illegally. Believer, if you've ever had to go to school on the Outlaw Streets of Life, you would know that sometimes you don’t really have a choice: you gotta bust loose every chance you get. For you see, I was already ready, reading on a second or third grade level. And though I didn’t actually live in the city of the said location, my folk had bought property - essentially marshland that nobody else wanted – on which they were paying taxes. But alas, I was underage, at 5-and-three-quarters years old and The Law plainly stated that I would have to wait out another year before I could attend school. And it didn’t matter that my birthday was in September; the official rule of the segregated school system was I must be 6, or stay my tail at home. So, I imagine My People decided that it would be better to take the risk and let me bust a move. They talked to the teachers (yes, they all knew each other), and did a deal. And since Mrs. Dupree was tight with her boss, the Principal, she smuggled me in on the down low, into Outlaw St., every morning. After all, the school was separate-and-unequal and nobody in Virginia really gave a hoot. Still don’t. So by the time I arrived early every morning, in that big car, I knew I was a made man. And oh, how we would ride and laugh all the way to school everyday. Lots and lots of time to laugh and tell jokes and talk about all the teachers and classmates. I do remember the morning when I first felt the Calling to Tell It Like It T-Eye-Is, the urge to do the do, something spontaneous, a lil' something extra, something unexpected, to shock them with delight. Give them a moment to remember me by. I picked just the right moment in our conversation, when we were feeling all-good-like-in-the Cadillac Club and comfortable and cozy with each another, like family. One of the lovely young ladies in the car asked me if I could dance. I don’t remember who, but I do remember that I my response was sincere. In fact, as still is my habit, I may have exaggerated slightly, just for the effect, just to test the waters. But the conversation did go something like this: Her: "Little B, can you dance man?“ Me: (looking at her incredulously) "Oh yeah! Of course I can!“ Her: (smiling inquisitively) "No! Really? I mean can you REALLY dance?“ Me: (confidently) "Girlfrien’, don’t you know that sometimes I get to Twistin’ so hard...my little penix jumps right outta my pants!!“ Just like that.
It was the only day I remember Mrs. Dupree having to pull the car over, stopping to sit by the side of the road until she could get herself together. Laughed so hard until tears flew and stomachs hurt. And it was said that many ran to the bathroom to find relief after hearing that exchange, for by the end of the day, my name had been spread far and wide, like a virus, and all the teachers in my school as well as all the teachers and students in the high school heard my name and REPEATED what I had said, hollering, screaming and laughing about it, all the live long day. Verily, verily it was the beginning of my fame and fortune. But more importantly, the experience taught me my first lesson about what the Stanktity is and isn’t; and that is: Always trust the People, because the People always decide. The People decide whether what you do or say is funky, or if it’s not. Not the advertising guys, lawyers, bookkeepers or salesmen. The People decide whether what you do is worth paying attention to or looking at or not. The People decide whether your work is flimsy or full, juicy or dry, useful or a waste of time: interesting enough to experience more than once or a complete waste of valuable electricity. It taught me that at the end of the day, you have to trust the judgment of the People to determine whether what you do is worth doing. Not Billboard, Soundscan, the RIAA or ICANN. Or the FCC or MTV or Time/Warner/Sony/Universal/Vivendi music or any other intergalactic media company. The People always decide. It doesn’t matter how many head fakes you think you can throw or how big your propaganda budget is, or how many elections you think you can steal. In the end, like an arrow shot into the sky which inevitably returns to the ground, the People always have the final say. This is what I appreciate most about the blogsphere and why I decided, finally, to throw my skank into the ring. Because at the end of the day, it doesn’t matter so much what I think about what I upload: I’ve learned to trust the People’s Judgment - and I can live happily with that. Ohh Happy-loo-yah!!! Also, this is why I chose the artists that I chose, in those miraculous, musical moments that we shared in our first Happy Time Tabernacle Broadcast: Billy Paul, Ronald Isley and Sly Stone are more than musical icons - they are like three, bustin’ loose, wise men, who learned to trust the People a long time ago. Take Billy Paul for example. I love me some Billy Paul. My uncle Robert turned me on to Billy Paul many years ago. One day we were talking about soul music singers and I was talking about the singers I knew and he mentioned Billy Paul. At the time, I confessed that all I knew about his work was "Me and Mrs. Jones“ and Uncle Robert, cocking his head to the side with a grimace of disbelief, said "Boy, you don’t know nuthin’ `bout Billy Paul!?! If you don’t know `bout Billy Paul, you don’t know NOTHIN’ `bout soul music OR sangin’!!!“ and proceeded to go to the turntable to put on "Feelin’ Good at the Cadillac Club“. My jaw dropped down through the floor all the way to the basement, hearing one of the greatest live albums of all time. Changed! My! Life! And helped me to re-imagine the wondrous possibilities of what one powerful singer can do with a microphone, with no special equipment and no special effects: that it is indeed possible to convey a genuine sense of urgency, hunger, longing, passion and zest for life, all inside the first 30 seconds of a song! Good-googly woogly!! The man has been sangin’ his heart out all over the world for longer than I’ve been alive. And as far as I know, he has absolutely no intention of stopping. Not only has he "sang“ about People Power, he has actually lived it: many, many moons ago, long before Prince decided to use the independent artist bidness model, Billy Paul had been touring as an independent artist, on the strength of his recorded work, for years. As the infinitely knowlegeable peeps on the Soul Patrol mailing list once schooled me, when the American radio industry began to censor Billy Paul for being what they felt was "too pro-black and too militant“ (see War of the Gods), they attempted to stigmatize him. It was then that he decided to take matters into his own hands and ever since, has been a soul singer’s singer, performing live on stages all over the world, from London to Paris to Rio and all points in between. You can see the proof-in-the-pictures on the beautiful website that he and his lovely wife, Ms. Blanche, have put together. And needless to say, if he comes to perform anywhere near where you live anytime soon, you ought to make it your bid-ness to see him live: tens of thousands of people all over the world already have; they know that he is the real deal and one of, as Greg Tate might put it, the last, genuine soul men standing.
Which brings me to Ronald Isley.
For the love-of-Pete I don’t really understand why the I.R.S. is trying to pimp bruva Ronald for some money now. They ought to be paying Him!! I mean, if they were really smart they would INVEST about 3 million risk-capital dollars into his company right now, making him solvent, so that he could generate perhaps 30 million, which in turn, they could collect taxes on at-a-profit, over the next ten-to-twenty-five years.
They could create their very own Ronald Isley Savings Bond program.
And sell stock market options like David Bowie. Hell, even automakers, liike the people at Infinity, know black artists are stock market worthy.
Making that kind of investment in Ronald Isley could help revive the American economy, which we are told, needs all the help it can get right-about-now.
Or maybe I should say it this way: if it weren’t for Ronald Isley and his brothers, there would never have been the creation of a multi-billion dollar "Blues Brothers“ industry, which is up-and-still-running all over the world right this minute.
Sometimes, it makes me wanna Shout!!
Its pathetic: they wait until the guy gets older and hampered by physical illness and then threaten him with a life sentence, when they could have done a deal; I mean: who in the hell made that judgment call?
But on second-line thought, I can continue to believe that some black multi-millionaire athlete, or Hollywood rapper, who’s Mama probably conceived him in a back seat, while „Don’t Say Goodnight“ was playin’-in-the-8-track tape player, will cough up the bank and hook the brother up.
After all, I have seen all the Player’s Cribs.
Snoop’s crib, Ice T’s crib, Shaq’s crib, P-Diddy’s crib and the opulent, mindless, excess bling that quite a few brothers in `merica brag about on eMpTyV reruns, damn near every week of the year.
Therefore, if Will Smith makes 20 million-a-picture, he can easily afford 3.
Better yet, perhaps some of the role models of mercy, kindness, compassion and charity should intercede in this case.
That's why I believe Bishop T.D.Jakes should step in and cough up the 3 million. After all, he’s a personal friend of the President, does a lot of charity work all over the planet, has a lot of influence in the world of Bishophood and can easily afford it.
Same could be said of Kirbyjohn Caldwell. He could be compassionate and hook the brother up. After all, he's credible (he prayed at two Presidential Inaugurations back to back), he’s a finanacial wizard and plus, he’s slept in the Lincoln Room at the White House as the President's personal guest.
Or perhaps Creflow Dollar could be compassionate and step up to the plate right now. He’s passed it around often enough, got a good name and the money to go with it. Bunches of it.
I figure since these guys have benefitted hugely from post-911-world-buzz-words AND the „Faith Based“ government cheese that their buddy in the White House has made readily available for their industry, they could start re-cycling some of those government tax dollars to help that brother out. They could rationalize it as charity begining at home.
I think it's a brilliant idea, because anything less than upper-class black folk in `merica (Tom Joyner are you listening?) rallying around Ronald Isley right now, in the winter of his life, is unacceptable.
He is a national treasure and it makes no sense to wait until the brother is dead and cooling to start talking about how great he was when he was alive. I’m tired of that Sugar-Honey-Ice-Tea.
And if by chance someone has already come forward to do all this, by the time this post is published, please, please, please forgive my insolence.
If not, I don’t want nobody to ever raise the topic of black pride, black unity or black history month in my presence, ever, ever again...cause I will ignore it. Period.
Besides, Sly did show up at the Grammy Awards this year and as always, invited us all to bathe in the Everlasting Fount of Stanktity!!
And you know He didn’t have to, 'cause he ain’t got nothin’ to prove.
He coulda stayed at home, in his comfortable house. Or gone on a nice vacation to Brazil or Venezuela or Cuba. They woulda rolled out the red carpet for him in any of those places and treated him with great respect. Or he could have taken his sweet-as-you-please-time, riding around town on his phat motorcycle in that fly-azz outfit, his beautiful, shinning-star-bright, golden Mohawk flowin’ in the wind. Plenty of other things he could have done with his valuable time.
But he came. He really didn’t have to, but he came.
And for a minute, he broke us off a lil’ Piece-o-Stankishness: for all the people who still love him for what-he-done.
For all the People who have been talking and mumbling and wondering aloud about Sly all these years on the telephone, in e-mail conversations, chat rooms, mailing lists, newsletters and in clubs, basement bars, juke joints and backyard bar-be-ques the world over, just wishin’...
Jus’-a-wishin’ he would jus’ show up jus’ one mo’ time and take us higher.
Come back to us and give us a moment of delight, to make us smile, make us grin, make us laugh, make us look and wonder and Stand and Dance to the Music so we can Sing a Simple Song.
I’m talking about all the People who know what it means to be the Underdog. The Everyday People. The Somebody’s Watching You while they ringin’ up cash registers for you, washing dishes in expensive cafes and cleaning up bathrooms behind you, still believin’ that You Can Make It If You Try. The Brave and Strong ones who realize Everybody is a Star. Even when they feel like Runnin’ Away sometimes, just to do the Loose Booty.
Ahhh Shadrach-Meschach-Abedego!! All praises be to the Stanknasity of Ages past; Our Funk for years to come!!
Boom-shacka-lacka-lacka-lacka-boom-lacka-boom-boom!!!
To every musician out there who might be reading this, who said that Sly should have stayed his tail at home, I defy you to create an ensemble that pushes the envelope as high, as wide, as deep and as long as Sly did at the height of his powers, in the midst of a socio-political season of American xenophobia, paranoia and cultural aggression.
And you bettah make damn sure that that in-vel-up is multi-racial, multicultural and that the women are just as much an integral part of the package as the men. Be sure to record at least one jammy confronting cross cultural communication conflict.
Don’t forget to create your very own global audience in the process.
And invent something Fresh that has enough funk-tification in it that people all over the world will wanna dance and sweat-till-they-get-wet for at least 35 years after you’ve left the studio.
I defy you.
Cause if you comin’ up short-a-that, you can keep it to yourself.
And I’m qualified to preach this because I am the one and only Reverend/Brother/Bishop Boogaloo, Pastor and General Overseer of the Happy Time Tabernacle, Temple Number 2.
Accept no substitutes. For verily, verily I’ve never met personally any of the artists that I’ve just mentioned, but I’ve spent enough time with their music in my lifetime to measure them just right.
I’ve listened carefully to their voices, their instrumentation, their compositions and performances, probably thousands of times.
Sometimes I’ve listened to them everyday. I’ve owned just about all their records. And it never mattered to me if I had to make that extra effort to catch a glimpse of them on stage, or what it cost me.
Beloved, know that the privilege, of seeing an Artist at work onstage, has always been worth it to me. And the Great Work that they do has always hit me with enough inspiration to carry on!!
Even now, when I have a chance to see truly gifted artists onstage, bustin’ loose, it always gives me Victory. For me, it’s like experiencing the Sound of Struggle: the sound of something someone has made great sacrifices to create. Something honestly worked for, something hard won...
Perhaps something sacred!! Oh Happy-loo-yah!!
Oh Beloved, don’t you know these are the people who always make a way out of no way to bring us a billion beats? Don’t you know that it is the artist that brings us great and gigantical grooves?!? That which fills up the gut-bucket with Stanknasity, which doth hump and bump and grind?? The hook to the Hip and Hop and the Be and Bop?!?
Oh yes they do! And I know you can see it!!
These brilliant artists, these spiritual ancestors of mine, have always made a way for me – Rev. Boogaloo - to pass along the true Sacrament of Soul, the true Salvation of the Sacrafism and the true Freedom of Funk, right straight to you!!
Oh Glory Be!! I feel like callin’-the-roll right now!!! You can call it with me:
Muddy Waters, Solomon Linda, Fela Kuti, Hound Dog Taylor, Albert Collins, Howlin’ Wolf, Little Richard, Chuck Berry, Charles Brown, Screamin’ Jay Hawkins, Jimmy Reed, Ray Charles, James Brown, Aretha Franklin, Gil Scott-Heron, Curtis Mayfield, Sam and Dave, Wilson Pickett, Joe Tex, Allen Toussaint, Etta James, Bobby Byrd, Ruth Brown, Margie Day Walker, Sam Cooke, The Neville Brothers, Stevie Wonder, Dinah Washington, Manu Dibango, Hugh Masekela, Bob Marley, Peter Tosh, The Mighty Sparrow, The Mighty, Mighty Dells, The Temptations, The Supremes, Smokey Robinson and the Miracles, Gladys Knight and the Pips, The Staple Singers, Millie Jackson, Betty Wright, Lyn Collins, Martha High, Lord Kitchner, Blood Hollins, Bobby Womack, Shuggie Otis, Toots and The Maytals, James Marshall Hendrix, Salif Keita, Larry Graham, Bob Marley, George Clinton, Bootsy Collins, Angelo Moore and Fishbone, Miriam Makeba, Al Green, Isaac Hayes, Patti Labelle, Rick James, King Floyd, Chuck Brown and the Soul Searchers, Clarence “Blowfly” Reid, Sonny “Sun Ra” Blount,
and many, many, many millions more.
Each year of my life, I’ve been inspired by the life’s work of these People. And the fact that they chose to bust loose so hard for so long - revealing so much of themselves to audiences - makes them more than musical icons: they are Saints of Stanktidy, forever cannonized in my soul and in the souls of millions of soul, jazz, blues, funk lovers – in sum - Stank Believers all around the world!
If I were to dilly-dally around a bit, I could say that these culture producers, workers and innovators are the people who actually built what we know as the modern record industry! Without the songs they made and performed, there would never have been a record industry or radio industry or frankly, media industry as we know it today!!
As a matter of fact, I would go so far as to say that in the past century, the culture products these people created – through the songs they made - have generated billions, probably trillions of dollars in profits, in businesses-within-ecomomies of countries the world over: everywhere there’s a karoke bar, in places where people sell tickets to get in a basement club or concert hall, in publishing companies, in record and sheet music sales that piano students use to study by, in the soundtracks of million dollar Hollywood movies and television commercials trying to sell soap to somebody.
Come on somebody! And say Aman!!
THIS is why I encourage YOU, believer, to bust loose every chance YOU get! You can make friends for life that way; friends that will stick with you for years to come!!
In fact, you ought to bust loose today! Right now! Right where you are!!
That’s right: if you’re on your job, or at home or on your way somewhere, you ought to take just a minute to bust-as-loose as you can, right this minute!!!
You don’t have to be afraid! You don’t have to be ashamed!
Just trust the People and the Stanktity won’t lead you astray! Aman!!
You can put on a Sly and the Family Stone record or a James Brown tape or whatever cooks your goose and bust loose right there where you are!! Just do it, do it! Do it, in the words of BT Express, till you’re satisfied!!
You ought to do it...till you’re Sassy-fied! Aman!!
And you’ll be mighty glad you did!
BTW, the next radio show will be ready soon and very soon, so please do stay tuned!!
