On October 12, 1978 James Brown sang the national anthem for Murad Muhammad Boxing Proportions when James Scott fought Eddie Gregory, the No. 1-ranked contender for the light heavyweight championship in New Jerseys Rahway State Prison. I saw the James Brown biopic yesterday, and as I watched that movie I thought of the thanks I owe the likes of Murad Muhammad, Akbar Muhammad, Bahr Muhammad, Muhammad Ail, and Ruben and Ron Productions because of my having worked with these brothers in entertainment enabled me to meet James Brown on more than one occasion. Of all the R&B shows we produced, we couldn’t get James brown on stage because James was so loyal to Teddy Powell, but when Teddy Powel put James Brown on stage at Newark symphony Hall that was one show that I actually got a chance to see and on several occasions. This boxing show was the first HBO boxing event and originated from Rahway prison. Me and my generation grew up on James Brown’s “Say it Loud I’m Black and I’m Proud”. That’s why, for once in this Black movie biopics; the hardboiled black movie fantasy genre seemed to get out of the way of telling the James brown story. They could have focused on the impact of the “Say it loud I’m Black and I’m Proud” lyric on the streets of Black America because a lot of white boys got punched in the mouth that year. Even though Hollywood avoided telling the truth that that James Brown song gave sort of gave Blacks the permission to stop taking shit from white supremacist, I still think overall the movie had a good feeling. In fact, I bumped into “Bird Holms ex NFL footballer and former manager and producer of Musique (performers of the controversial Push, Push in the Bush disco anthem from 1978) on my way into the movie. We stopped and talked for a while and Bird gave the movie the nod of approval and said for once they did a brother justice. I must admit for an African American biopic this hit the spot, and most don’t. the only thing is, is that never does go un noticed the gutter that almost all of our successful Blacks crawled out of to entertain White America, and that’s part of what made James Brow so big, like Muhammad Ali James brown played t Black people and avoided kissing the cracks and crevices of the slave masters narrative. Even though America loves to celebrate the back stories of Blacks who crawled out of the degradation of the under life of slavery and Jim Crow and they love to see the results of their motivation of the nigger pimp hustler and preacher culture, if you squint your eyes and look past that Hollywood sensationalism bullshit you will enjoy how this young brother plays James Brown. Yall know they hardly ever get it right! But the James Brown biopic came off like a good try! Even though James Brown statements about Black Power were true the movie pretends he’s genius came up with his unique strategy of empowerment in a vacuum away from the Black narrative and oral traditions. Don’t think for one minute James Brown wasn’t listening to and adjusting his funk and his beats in concert with the call and response nature of Black communication as he listen and responded to voices like Malcolm X, the Muslims, Stokely Carmichael, and H. Rap Brown, cause James Brown had enough sense to hear and respond with soul. youtu.be/MBKz8pDNuto
Posted on: Sun, 03 Aug 2014 12:33:38 +0000
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