I am listening to this album as I am typing this. Anyone else here (besides me) a fan of George Benson???
———-

National Endowment of the Arts Jazz Master and 10X Grammy-winning, legendary musician George Benson will release his new album on August 25th entitled Songs and Stories, his second for Concord Records / Monster Music. The album is a collection of tunes penned by some of the most prolific and enduring songwriters of the last half-century. Some
were written specifically for this new recording, such as Bill Withers’ (who came out of retirement to write “A Telephone Call Away” for George), Rod Temperton’s “Family Reunion” and Lamont Dozier’s “Living in High Definition”; while others, including James Taylor’s “Don’t Let Me Be Lonely Tonight”, Donny Hathaway’s “Someday We’ll All Be Free” and Tony Joe White’s “Rainy Night in Georgia” were hand-picked by Benson for their ability to convey simple but universal truths about the human experience.

Songs and Stories was produced by Concord’s Grammy winning, creative head John Burk and renowned bassist /composer / producer Marcus Miller. Benson, Miller, keyboardist Greg Phillinganes, guitarist Jubu and drummer John Robinson make up the core unit for the project. They were joined by special guests: guitarists Lee Ritenour, Steve Lukather, Wah Wah Watson and Norman Brown, vocalists Lalah Hathaway and Patti Austin, keyboardist David Paich, saxophonists Tom Scott and Gerald Albright along with several others. “Brother, with that team, you can do just about anything,” said Benson. “We recorded in the studio for three days straight, and everything we touched had something on it that made us all glad we were there. It was just the right mix of people and material.”

And yet, for all of the high-caliber musicians on hand, the most important guests are the songwriters, says co-producer Miller. “Smokey Robinson doesn’t perform on this record, but he’s still a guest,” he says. “Lamont Dozier is a guest. Bill Withers, Rod Temperton and James Taylor are guests. If you take great songs from writers like these, and you put them in the hands of George Benson and a great band, you’d better just get out of the way and let things happen, because the result is going to be something great.”

Indeed, the record captures the somewhat underappreciated essential brilliance of his storied career; the ability to simply touch people through authentic lyrics and beautiful melody. On Songs and Stories, George Benson’s musical artistry has perhaps never been on sharper display.

To celebrate the release of Songs And Stories, fans can visit the official Benson website, georgebenson.com and receive a free mp3
download of “Living In High Definition”, the new song written by legendary composer Lamont Dozier. Additionally on the website, fans can view “The George Benson Sessions: The Making Of Songs And Stories”, a rare, behind-the-scenes look at the making of the new record. The series will be updated with a new video each week leading up to and through the August 25 release.

Concord Records is proud to once again partner with Monster Music on presenting the newest George Benson album Songs and Stories on High Definition Surround Sound SuperDisc. The Monster version, also available August 25th, is a specially priced two-disc package that consists of Songs and Stories on compact disc mixed in traditional stereo and a bonus DVD, containing Monster’s High Definition Stereo and Surround mixes. In addition, the bonus DVD features behind-the-scenes video footage of the making of the record including an in-depth interview with George Benson. With its innovative High Definition Surround technology Monster Music is revolutionizing the listening experience. Mastered in the highest resolution possible, HDS SuperDiscs are specially engineered to capture the true harmonic depth and tonal richness of the music. THX certified HDS SuperDiscs deliver the music through a 5.1 speaker system just the way the artist heard it in the studio when it was recorded, the way they intended you to hear it.

1. Starfleet’s charts for 7/16-31/09

Top-50 Crossover Chart 7/16-31/09

Top-50 Urban/Hip Hop Chart 7/16-31/09

Top-50 Dance Chart 7/16-31/09

Top-40 Indie Urban/Hip Hop/Latin Chart 7/16-31/09

2. New music reviews and more

Urban/Hip Hop Music

E Dubb – Whooty

Flo-Rida feat. Nelly Furtado – Jump (Disco Fries Remix)

Will Vill feat. Cherine Anderson – Confuzed

Moe.Diamondz – Yumi Yumi

Talia Coles feat. Elephant Man – Nikki Wine

Black Kadafi – Bending Corners (Klubjumpers Club Mix)

Crossover Music

Jada – American Cowboy (Remixes)

Kristinia DeBarge – Sabotage

Shakira – She Wolf (English Version) /span>

Britney Spears – Radar (Remixes)

Jordin Sparks – SOS (Let The Music Play)

Danielle Bollinger – The Place For My Heart (Remixes)

Wonder Girls – Nobody

Dance Music

Jessie James – Wanted (Remixes)

Jenn Cuneta – I Want That Man (Remixes)

F2G – Beverly Hills Bop (Remixes)

TR feat. Frenchie Davis – Give Me Tonight (Remixes)

Kandystand – OYH (Open Your Heart)

Rupaul – Jealous Of My Boogie (The RuMixes)

Jaylin Ducati – Long Run (Klubjumpers Extended Mix)

These are just a few of the latest reviews listed on the site.

3. Featured artist

Feature YOUR artist here

Featured Crossover Artist – Sonny Long

Featured Urban Artist – Joni – Lisa’s Man

Featured Urban Artist – Jason Little ft. Ebony
Eyez

Featured Urban Group – Remedy, Alyric, Los, Ms. Neicey

Featured Crossover Group – Anything But Monday – Schools Out Forever

Featured Crossover Artist – Yolanda Ruiz

Please contact Starfleet Record Pool to check out the details for having your artist as a featured artist on the Starfleet website.

4. Guidelines for submitting digital music to Starfleet

Digital Music –
Guidelines for submitting to
Starfleet Music Pool

Who would ever have predicted that Walter Cronkite would have outlived Michael Jackson?

Last night when I came in from the Chico DeBarge & Joe show @ the Keswick (Chico Debarge was off the chain btw, serious hard core combo Marvin Gaye/D’Angelo ultra phunky neo soul action), I flipped on CNN. And it was wall to wall Walter Cronkite as I sat & watched, I thought about several things…

1. How many people under the age of 40 even know who/ what/why Walter Cronkite?

2. The time I met Walter Cronkite (at the Ed Bradley Memorial Service) and how he seemed like such a tiny person.

3. Telling the “truth”

I also thought about a research paper that I had done for my High School AP Amerikan History class. We were studying the Army McCarthy Hearings. We did it “Our Town” style where we were given roles and had to act out each person. In order to be able to accuratly “act out each person,” we were also required to write a 10 page research paper on the person.

I was assigned to do Edward R. Murrow and I was pretty happy about that, since Edward R. Murrow was kinda the “darling of the liberal media,” since he was a journalist who was seen as a crusader because he did things like take on the evil Senator McCarthy and fight for humanitarian treatment for migrant farm workers and more. Murrow was a dashing figure who could also just as easily be seen on TV doing a fluff interview with Marilyn Monroe as challenging the evil Senator McCarthy.

In the course of my extensive research on Edward R. Murrow, I learned that Walter Cronkite was none of these things. Although Walter Cronkite had been a contemporary/colleague of Edward R. Murrow at CBS News he was the complete and total antithesis. Walter Cronkite gave you the news straight, he seemingly had no opinions on anything. I had no idea if Cronkite was a Democrat, Republican, Liberal, Conservative, Straight, Gay, Anti this or Pro that. The only thing that I can remember Walter Cronkite being in favor of was the Space Program.

I mean, with Cronkite you just didn’t know what he thought about anything. But you could pretty much be assured that he was giving you the “truth.” And therein was the power that Walter Cronkite wielded on our society.

People want the “truth,” to help them to shape their own “opinions.”

That is far different from today’s world where it doesn’t seem to matter what news outlet or who the reporter is, you will always get the news, but it is always filtered thru the “opinion” of the reporter. Which means that “the truth’ is always elusive. All of the TV news reporters of today are more like descendants of Edward R. Murrow, because we know what their opinions are about most everything. None are like Walter Cronkite, whose opinions we never knew. BTW….I have no problem with news people giving their opinions on things, just as long as I don’t think that their opinions aren’t “brought & paid” for by some corporation. In other words, I even want their opinions to be the “truth” (i.e.; what they really think)

People want the “truth,” to help them to shape their own “opinions.”

And once they become convinced that you are potentially a source for the “truth,” that is trust that will remain forever, as long as you ever become perceived as being a “sell out.”

And that was & is the perception of Cronkite, whatever he said was the “truth.”

That point was driven home to me last night during the Chico DeBarge/Joe concert @ the Keswick. At the concert, a dozen or more people came up to me @ the Soul-Patrol table, many of them brand new subscribers to the Soul-Patrol Newsletter who said to me; “Mr. Davis I just wanted to let you know just how much I appreciated you telling the truth in your review of last week’s concert. Dwele wasn’t worth sh*t and you told it like it was. I agreed with every word that you said.”

Earlier this week there were a number of people who were in “mourning” because of the announcement that VIBE magazine was going to be shut down.

I wasn’t one of those people. Personally I wondered how VIBE could have possibly lasted this long? I had long ago stopped reading VIBE, in any form (with the exception of Mark Anthony Neal’s blog), simply because as far as I was concerned, VIBE had long ago stopped “telling the truth.” In my opinion they had “sold out” to the very same people who had destroyed Black culture and had in fact become “part of the problem,” not “part of the solution.” Their financial support was coming from the very same people that we as
readers were looking to VIBE to provide honest commentary about. As a result even their opinions couldn’t be trusted.

When I attended the memorial service for Ed Bradley at Riverside Church a few years ago, someone introduced me to CBS newsman Randall Pinkston and he in turn introduced me to NBC newsman Lester Holt. They introduced me to CBS newsman Steve Kroft, who in turn introduced me to Walter Cronkite.

I am only 5’9″ so you can imagine my surprise when Walter Cronkite
extended his hand to me and I saw that he was several inches shorter than me. We shook hands and all I could think of was how it doesn’t matter how tall you are if you are a badd mf and tell the truth, you are a giant!!

I don’t think that there are many folks under the age of 40 who know or care about Walter Cronkite. If someone is 40 years old today, then they were about ten years old in 1980 when Walter Cronkite retired from the CBS Evening News. I wonder if they think that “AndersonCooper BillO’ReileyChrisMatthews” are telling them the “truth?” Can their “opinions even be trusted, not to be “brought & paid” for by some corporation?

Anyhow….

….both Joe and Chico DeBarge gave very good perfomances at the Keswick last night. Chico DeBarge in a “black bohemian, I just got outta jail but don’t worry cuz I still got it kinda way & btw I got a new CD” and Joe in a “vegas/ghetto ya may not like it but I’m just about as good as it gets for mainstream R&B in 2009.”

(& dat’s the TRUTH)

RIP Walter Cronkite…

1. Starfleet’s charts for 7/1-15/09

Top-50 Crossover Chart 7/1-15/09

Top-50 Urban/Hip Hop Chart 7/1-15/09

Top-50 Dance Chart 7/1-15/09

Top-40 Indie Urban/Hip Hop/Latin Chart 7/1-15/09

2. New music reviews & more

Urban/Hip Hop Music

Jay Sean feat. Lil Wayne – Down

Jason Mraz feat Jah Cure and Lil Wayne – I’m
Yours

Mookie Black – Rockie Balboa

Strizzo feat. Tom G. – Lower

Sonny Long – Feel The Heat

Tinchy Stryder feat. Taio Cruiz – Take Me Back

Crossover Music

Jordin Sparks – Battlefield (Remixes)

Beyonce – Sweet Dreams (Remixes)

Livvi Franc feat. Pitbull – Now I’m That Chick

Anything But Monday – Neda You’re Still Standing

Felix Da Housecat – We All Wanna Be Prince
(Remixes)

Alyson – Sticky Sticky (Remixes)

Dance Music

Sebastien Gazaille – FAME (Remixes)

La Roux – Bulletproof (Remixes)

Linda O – Rescue Me (Remixes)

Offer Nissim feat. Maya – Hook Up (Remixes)

Oscar P – Sexo (Remixes)

FreQuency M feat. Minimal – Drop Of Rain

3. Featured Artist

Featured Crossover Artist – Sonny Long

Featured Urban Artist – Joni – Lisa’s
Man

Featured Urban Artist – Jason Little ft. Ebony
Eyez

Featured Crossover Group – Anything But Monday – Schools Out
Forever

Featured Crossover Artist – Yolanda Ruiz

As I sit here this morning watching the CNN of Michael Jackson I am swelling with pride in the accomplishments of “mah people.” These folks directed themselves towards excellence and were able to demonstrate that excellence on the world stage

–Michael Jordan (did it with a frown)

–Magic Johnson (did it with a smile)

–Colin Powell (did it with a uniform)

–Oprah Winfrey (did it with information)

–Michael Jackson (i’m not really sure how he did it)

–Barrack Obama (i’m not really sure how he did it)

These people of course (and others) achieved something that I will call “universal mainstream acceptance.” These great individual achievements of course did not occur in a vacuum, they were achieved on the back of those who came before them.

For example, Obama’s candidacy could not have happened, had it not been for Jessie Jackson’s candidacy 25 years earlier. Colin Powell’s success in the military and in government could not have happened had it not been for the careers of men like Gen. Benjamin O. Davis & Ralph Bunche. Magic Johnson & Michael Jordan’s “universal mainstream acceptance” wouldn’t have happened without the careers of Julius Erving, Earl Monroe & others.

My point is that these achievements happened because of the blood, sweat & tears of other people that created opportunity for talented/hard working people to use as a springboard for their own unique success.

I was discussing this concept with someone here yesterday and he reminded me that although this is quite true of Black American’s who are in the public eye, it’s also quite true of Black American achievement in general over the last 20 years.

The one thing that all of these success stories have in common is that these achievements all come from individuals who are born of something that I will refer to as “the civil rights generation.” That is people who were brought up in a manner and thus have a mentality that suggests that they have a role to play in the overall struggle. That somehow their success can quite literally be traced back to other people who sacrificed in order for them to have a chance to achieve excellence. These people are driven towards excellence and when you tell them that what they want to do can’t be done, they then proceed to accomplish the impossible.

I too am a member of this “the civil rights generation” and as a kid growing up in Brooklyn, the achievements and sacrifice of “local heroes” people like Jackie Robinson, Louis Armstrong, Elston Howard, Adam Clayton Powell, Spider Lockhart, Constance Baker Motley, Lew Alcindor, Bob Teauge, Willie Mays, Lena Horne, Gil Noble and others were certainly “rammed down my throat.”

In addition to those local folks, there were many others that my family made sure that I met and whose “secrets for success”, I internalized. Successful Black Americans who were teachers, artists, doctors, engineers, policeman, and more. These are people whose names would be unknown to the general pubic, but who all sought and achieved “excellence” within the scope that they were permitted to do so.

All of these people (famous and not famous) had an influence on me and my behavior as I moved forward in the world and tried to establish my own mark within it.

On a day like today I am reminded of that and I remember those people and their struggle.

But I am also reminded of just how much things seem to have changed.

It seems to me that over the past 10-15 years, we have moved from “the civil rights generation” and the pursuit of excellence to an era where we are in the “pursuit of mediocrity.”

And it seems that we are perfectly content to “pursue mediocrity” with a vengeance. In fact we aren’t just content with “mediocrity”, but we are overjoyed when we achieve “mediocrity.” It makes me sick when I start to dwell on it for more than a few moments, just how far we have fallen. Some folks love to dwell on the “self-mutilation” that Michael Jackson did to himself. I think that the “self-mutilation” that Black Americans have done to themselves over the past 10-15 years is far worse than anything that Michael Jackson did to himself.

In the work of Michael Jackson we saw the attempt and very often the achievement of excellence. That was a part of his make up, even when he was a little boy, it was there for everyone to see and of course we could all see it. And we can certainly see it in the work of others from his generation, both famous and not famous.

It’s clear to me that we went wrong someplace. It’s even more clear just when and how we went wrong.

“We have met the enemy and it’s us…”
–Pogo

This review also appears on my RadioIO.com Blog at the following link:http://www.radioio.com/genres/hiphop-soul/

This was a straight up spiritual experience today at the Apollo Theatre. It was the ‘Church of Michael Jackson” up in there today and it was something that I was quite unprepared for. You see I had been to the Apollo a few years ago for what was essentially the “wake” of James Brown. I had expected this event, less than a week after the passing of Michael Jackson to be much the same. I couldn’t have been more wrong.

There was no dead body on the stage, as there was at the James Brown wake.. Instead there was a lone barstool, with a familiar looking black fedora, a familiar pair of black shades and a single familiar white sequined glove resting on top of the seat cushion of the barstool. The spotlight shined on the barstool and the items resting on the seat cushion of the barstool glowed.

The crowd entered the lower level of the Apollo in an orderly fashion. They all seemingly had on Michael Jackson T-Shirts, Michael Jackson Baseball caps. Some carried handmade/store brought Michael Jackson banners and posters.

Jonelle Procope CEO and President of the Apollo then came out to speak. She talked about how folks came to the Apollo as soon as they heard about the news of Michael’s passing. Rev Al came out and talked about how the Jackson’s started here at the Apollo and he made the world recognize OUR CULTURE. Congressman Charlie Rangel came on and gave greetings from the Congressional Black Caucus. All of what they had to say was important and most fitting to the occasion. However what they had to say was nearly meaningless after what came next.

And what came next was an EXPLOSION. It was sheer joy.
It made me smile from ear to ear. And it made me understand perhaps for the first time, just why Michael Jackson is/was as big as he is/was.

What came next was indescribable using text. You really had to be there..

If I say something like..

“For the next 30 minutes the packed Apollo crowd was treated to a Michael Jackson MASTER MIX + VIDEO SHOW with legendary rapper CHUBB ROCK leading the crowd”

Then most of you will say “big deal.”

..and you would be correct.

IT WAS A BIG DEAL

In fact it was something pretty damn close to: ::::MAGIC:::::

It can’t be compared to being at any musical event I have ever been to. It was something like being at an amusement park and just watching the joy & happiness on the faces of the people. It was as though it didn’t matter that he had died. People singing.
People dancing. People screaming his name in unison.
The packed Apollo was turned into a house party, for sure.
People “freaking.”
People “moonwalking.”
Young people.
Old people.
Black
White
Hispanic
It was as though there was a “rebirth” right there inside of the Apollo.

NOBODY WAS CRYING

The vibe was incredible. The entire Apollo bonded together as one. I’ve been a Michael Jackson fan since 1969. But after today THE SONGS mean more than they ever did to me before.

When I took the subway back to Penn Station, I encountered two young white girls. They had on Michael Jackson paraphernalia, so I decided to interview them. One was 22 and the other was 23. Neither had been born yet when the “Thriller” album was released.

Later as I added up the sum total of the day, what I had seen, what I had heard, the people I talked with, the people I didn’t, plus the general glow surrounding the Apollo today, I finally came up with a person from the past to compare Michel Jackson to.

It’s not a musical artist. It’s Walt Disney. It occurred to me that Walt Disney was a visionary, who was all about the same kinds of things that Michael Jackson was about. I think that it’s fair to say that Walt Disney had a world view with respect to technology, culture, education and more was similar to that of Michael Jackson.

Except for one difference.

Unlike Walt Disney, Michael Jackson really did figure out a way to place himself into a state of “suspended animation.”

WE HAVE HIS SONGS, WHICH WILL BE HERE FOREVER.

…..And every single time someone spins a record.
Or

….Loads in a CD

Or

…..Clicks a mouse.

Or

….perhaps in the future, summons up a hologram

Over some object, physical or meta physical with the name

::::JACKSON::::

He is going to reappear, and it will be just as if he had never left.

And we are going to smile just as soon as we hear his voice.

Even Walt Disney can’t do that, from the great beyond….

Update: The music of Micheal Jackson live from the Apollo on 6/31/2009 emceed by Chubb Rock, Remarks from Rev Al Sharpton, Apollo President/CEO Jonelle Procope and Congressman Charles Rangel, On site interviews with Queen Mother/Mayor of Harlem, Devena + Two Funky White Chicks. Additional music by Norman Connors and Mellisa Forbes. Broadcast introduced by Joe Jackson, and hosted by Bob Davis

http://www.soul-patrol.net/mj_apollo.ram

Check it out and let me know what cha think?

RIP – Mike