Eli ´Paperboy´ Reed entre as mulheres

Arthur Dapieve – O Globo

Talvez alguém aí compartilhe comigo a impressão de que há mais mulheres do que homens cantando soul. Bem, se somos dois, estamos iludidos. Não há base estatística para isso. Basta folhear ou surfar qualquer enciclopédia dedicada a esse gênero de música negra dos EUA. Desde os anos 60, ambos os sexos se entregam por igual a temas profanos com fervor religioso. Rhythm’n’blues mais gospel. Essa confusão entre terra e céu é o soul.

Vamos pensar em Marvin Gaye. Quando ele cantava “What’s going on”, a música, o álbum, tratava do estado da sua nação circa 1971, da degradação imposta aos guetos negros, da Guerra do Vietnã e, antes de quase todo mundo, de ecologia. A interpretação se dilacerava entre a arraigada religiosidade (seu pai, que o mataria numa discussão, era pastor) e o erotismo chique (mais eficiente do que uma farmácia inteira de balinhas azuis).

Marvin Gaye “What’s Going On / What’s Happening Brother”

Se, depois de mentalizar em Gaye, fizermos uma listinha básica dos monumentos do gênero, logo também assomam à consciência Sam Cooke, James Brown e Otis Redding. Uau, que time… De mulheres, com o mesmo status, há somente Aretha Franklin (todos de joelhos à menção desse nome!) e, dependendo da cabeça, Etta James, ambas ainda vivas. No entanto, persiste aquela desconfiança de que mais e melhores mulheres cantam soul.

Bem, a hipótese de trabalho é a seguinte: as divas parecem dominar o palco porque soam mais convincentes na hora de cantar aquelas lindas letras, ou cheias de amor para dar ou tomadas pela mais lancinante dor-de-cotovelo. Mulheres se fazem — sim, se fazem — melhor de frágeis emocionais. Lembremos Cheryl Barnes cantando “Easy to be hard” na versão cinematográfica de “Hair” (1980), dirigida por Milos Forman. Cada vez que eu escuto ou vejo aquilo no YouTube, cara, eu quero casar com ela e assumir o garoto.

Claro, claro, há interpretações sentidíssimas de homens para clássicos do soul. James Carr, por exemplo, cantando “Dark end of the street”, também cantada por, entre muitos outros e outras, Aretha Franklin (todos de joelhos!) e Cat Power. Ou Otis Redding mandando ver na sua “Pain in my heart”: “A dor no meu coração não vai me deixar dormir/ Onde minha garota estará?/ Senhor, onde ela estará?” Da lavra do mesmo Redding, porém, “Respect” ganhou sua versão definitiva foi com Aretha Franklin (todos!). Respeito.

Aretha Franklin – Respect

Isso explica a perene devoção de jovens brancas da outra beira do Atlântico Norte ao soul. Desde a finada Dusty Springfield, esta é uma linguagem em que Amy Winehouse pode expressar e redimir sua existência miserável, uma levada sensual com a qual Joss Stone rebola descalça pelos palcos, uma esperança de identidade para quem até então não tinha nenhuma, como Duffy. Alguém aí sabe como a lourinha galesa chegou à contagiante “Mercy”? Seu produtor, Bernard Butler, ex-guitarrista do grupo de rock Suede, lhe deu de presente discos de Millie Jackson, Doris Duke, Bettye Swann, Candi Staton…

Nos EUA, há ainda a grande Sharon Jones. Esta negra de 50 anos emprestou, um pouco a contragosto, segundo consta, pedaços de sua banda de apoio, os Dap-Kings, para seis das dez faixas de “Back to black”, de Amy Winehouse, inclusive “Rehab”. Na verdade, os músicos não são de Sharon, e sim formam a banda residente da gravadora Daptones, de Nova York, especializada em soul e funk. Nos últimos anos, Sharon lançou três álbuns com os Dap-Kings. Dois são excelentes: “Dap dippin’ with Sharon Jones & The Dap-Kings” (2002) e “100 days, 100 night” (2007). Outro, bastante razoável: “Naturally” (2005).

E existe um soulman contemporâneo, capaz de fazer par com Sharon? Sim, existe. Chamase Eli Reed. É baixinho, branco, nascido em Boston, de ascendência judaica, criado no Mississippi e desde lá carrega, por ter usado um tipo de chapéu típico de jornaleiros da antiga, o apelido de “Paperboy”. O segundo disco do rapaz do jornal — o primeiro, de 2005, independente, é ruim de achar— foi lançado este ano nos EUA pelo selo Q Division e se chama “Roll with you”. Como Sharon, Eli “Paperboy” tem a sua banda, The True Loves.

Aos 25 anos, Reed não é um jovem rebelde do soul. Não moderniza o gênero, não faz um pastiche e nem tira onda de plantador de mandioca, aquele chato que gosta de raiz. Para ele, é como se as lendárias gravadoras Stax e Motown ainda estivessem parindo hits a todo vapor. Junto com os True Loves, ele se atira de cabeça naquele fascinante universo de mulheres dúbias e metais em brasa (ou viceversa) já na primeira das 11 faixas do CD, “Stake your claim”: “Pare de se roçar/ Em todo cara da cidade/ Se você me quiser/ Eu estarei por aí”. Lembra a situação de “Pain in my heart”, não lembra? Só que, aqui, no século XXI, o homem também se faz de gostoso, não fica aparando os cornos em casa.

Para os neófitos, “Roll with you” vale por um compêndio de soul. Reed ouviu tudo, sentiu tudo, entendeu tudo e, agora, tudo nos devolve, na pressão. Disco afora, ele soa como Redding, como Curtis Mayfield (na faixa “Am I wasting my time”), Chris Robinson (o vocalista da banda de rock sulista Black Crowes, encharcada de soul, em “It’s easier”), James Brown (“The satisfier”), Cooke (“Take my love with you”)… E, na derradeira música, a sacudida “(Doin’ the) Boom boom”, Reed se aproxima de seu par hipotético, Sharon Jones. Afinal de contas, o soul sempre foi uma história de meninos e meninas.

Eli ‘Paperboy’ Reed & The True Loves

By Michael Finger

April 1, 2008

In his final years, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. had death on his mind.

While watching news coverage of the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, he turned to his wife, Coretta, and told her, “This is what is going to happen to me.” All his adult life, this practitioner of nonviolence had been threatened, assaulted, and surrounded by people — most of them white, some of them black — who considered him their enemy. The FBI routinely released memos documenting his activities, with the heading “Martin Luther King — Communist.” Andrew Young, one of the leaders of the Atlanta-based Southern Christian Leadership Conference, observed that King had questioned “fundamental patterns of American life” and had therefore “become the enemy” to many Americans.

So as he headed to Memphis in the spring of 1968, to hold what he hoped would be a peaceful demonstration in support of the sanitation workers’ strike here, King knew his life was in grave danger. “There’s no way in the world you can keep somebody from killing you,” he told a reporter, “if they really want to kill you.”

And he knew Memphis would be a challenge. The sanitation strike had dragged on into its fifth week, and the situation seemed hopeless. Jerry Wurf, international head of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) had complained bitterly, “I spent half my time trying to keep that city from burning down, while the god-damned mayor was pouring gasoline on the situation as I ran around pulling matches out of people’s hands.”

King’s supporters had dire premonitions. On the night following the dreadful riot of March 28th, the Rev. James Jordan, pastor of historic Beale Street Baptist Church, woke up in tears. He later told friends that he’d had a nightmare: “Dr. King’s picture came before me. I saw the Lord had shown me Dr. King’s death.”

When King decided to return to Memphis on April 3rd, to salvage his reputation and show the world that he could indeed preach the gospel of nonviolence with a second march on April 8th, a bomb threat delayed his flight. Ralph Abernathy, his second-in-command at the SCLC, reassured him, “Nobody is going to kill you, Martin,” but King still seemed deeply troubled. Later that day, however, he told supporters, “I would rather be dead than afraid.”

Then came his famous speech that blustery evening of April 3, 1968, at Mason Temple. With the wind howling outside and banging the shutters around the packed auditorium, he seemed to pause and reflect for a few seconds, then said, “Like anybody, I would like to live a long life. Longevity has its place. But I’m not concerned about that now. I just want to do God’s will. And He’s allowed me to go up to the mountain. And I have seen the promised land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight, that we as a people will get to the promised land . . .”

Within 24 hours, he would be felled by an assassin’s bullet. On these pages we present the storm of events that surrounded Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in his final hours in Memphis. >>>

(mais…)

From Economist.com

Forty years after the murder of Martin Luther King, is America any closer to realising his dreams?

MARTIN LUTHER KING dreamed of a day when his children would be judged not by skin colour but by character. Black America has moved far since his murder on April 4th 1968, at least on the political front. Four decades ago racists blew up churches and beat civil-rights marchers. Today, at least at the top, black America has found its voice: a black woman, Condoleezza Rice, is secretary of state, and a black man, Barack Obama, may capture the presidency in November.

In social and economic matters across the black population as a whole, however, blacks are still much worse off than whites. They endure far greater rates of poverty, crime and other social ills. Efforts to tackle these problems have produced dismal results, as opposing groups lay claim to King’s dream of colour-blindness.

Schooling shows some of the most intractable difficulties. Last year the Supreme Court declared unconstitutional plans by two school districts to assign students, according to race, to various schools (in an effort to balance the mix of races in classrooms). The court narrowly declared that the plans were against the constitution’s promise of equality before the law.

Yet few tools exist to tackle de facto educational resegregation. Aggressive federal intervention in the 1960s got black and white pupils to mix more. But by the 1980s white parents and conservative jurists had turned against controversial programmes such as the bussing of students to distant schools. Today blacks are again increasingly concentrated, if not legally segregated, into failing schools. Some 73% of black children study where over half the students are non-white, and 38% attend “intensely segregated” schools (over 90% non-white). Those schools get less funding and have less qualified teachers than average. In turn fewer blacks finish their studies. The most hopeful estimate—a 2006 report by the Economic Policy Institute—suggests that 74% of black students graduate. That is still ten percentage points below whites.

Another difficulty on the road to King’s colour-blind America concerns higher education. In 2006, the average white student scored 1063, out of 1600 on the Scholastic Aptitude Test, which is widely used for university admissions. The average black score was just 863. A 200-point gap usually means the difference between admission to an excellent university and a decent one, or between a decent one and a mediocre one.

The traditional remedy was “affirmative action”: various measures by universities to ensure higher rates of black enrolment. Here, too, jurisprudence has pushed back, most notably in a 2003 Supreme Court ruling, Gratz v Bollinger. The court found that universities may seek “diversity” in admissions, but the mechanistic system used by the University of Michigan, which gave points to students merely for being black, was unconstitutional. A simultaneous ruling on Michigan’s law-school admissions programme provided some ambiguity, when the court said that an “individualised, holistic” review of each application could consider race as a factor. Voters in Michigan responded by approving a 2006 ballot measure that banned affirmative action. The issue may now arise in the presidential campaign. A prominent (and black) opponent of affirmative action, Ward Connerly, is trying to get an initiative on the ballots of five states that would ban public institutions from considering race, sex or ethnicity when, for example, hiring staff.

Affirmative action—and other efforts—have certainly failed to rid America of sharp inequalities. Past oppression probably counts for much of the persistence of black poverty: in 1967, according to the census, the average black person had an income that was just 54% of the average white one. By 2005 the gap had only closed to 64%. And lingering prejudice makes life harder for many black job applicants. Social experiments have repeatedly shown that employers who are offered two otherwise identical résumés prefer one that carries a typically white name to one with a typically black name. Increasingly it is poorer and less educated black Americans who use “typically black” names, according to research by Steven Levitt, an economist at the University of Chicago.

With educational and economic opportunities skewed, no wonder that health and welfare indicators are too: the Justice Department estimates that one in three black men will go to jail at some point. An astounding 68% of blacks are overweight or obese, compared with (a still high) 58% of whites. Black people get cancer slightly more often than whites (despite smoking the same amount), and are more than twice as likely to be shot dead. Overall, black lives are five years shorter than white ones.

King is widely remembered as an inspirational speaker and moral leader. But John McWhorter of the Manhattan Institute concludes that his more mundane efforts may end up mattering as much: “I wish more people thought about the long, hard work he did behind the scenes on policy and negotiation.” Rows continue over the relative merits of race-blind policies and the need to level out America’s inequalities. Four decades after King’s death much remains to be done.