In January 1963, energized by a recent tour of Europe with former labelmate Little Richard, Sam Cooke took the stage at the Harlem Square Club in Miami to turn in an electric, electrifying set of sweaty, sanctified, manic and masterful soul music. The night was recorded for a live album called One Night Stand!: Sam Cooke Live at the Harlem Square Club which sat on the shelf for twenty years until it was released in 1985. Sony Legacy has remastered the album for a new reissue this year, and it is now obvious that One Night Stand is capable of completely overturning what everybody thinks they know about the inventor of sweet soul music.
Along with Ray Charles, Sam Cooke did arguably invent soul music with his great crossover hits of the late 1950s and early 1960s. Everything that came after owes in some measure to his songwriting, an alchemic blending of gospel, R&B, pop and standards, and his bravura vocal performances that split the difference between agape and eros. In his brand-new and excellent biography of Sam Cooke, Peter Guralnick lovingly details the singer's evolution from a young (and nationally-known) gospel artist to the urbane, good-looking, articulate, laid back and genial pop inferno that he became. Along the way, various personages from Atlantic Records' Jerry Wexler to singing peers like Harry Belafonte, Bobby "Blue" Bland, and Elvis Presley check in to attest to their admiration for Cooke's unbelievably facile voice.
And what a voice it was! Sam Cooke was blessed with a remarkable instrument, clear as a bell except when he wanted to make it gritty, high and proud and stunningly beautiful. His ability to project stark and affecting emotional content onto the most banal lyrics made him great, and once he figured out how to draw out the simplest words, "No-no-no-no-no-no," "I-i-i-i-i-i," in Coltranesque cascades of pure anguish and joy, nothing could stop him from killing an audience cold.
Live at the Harlem Square Club captures an amazing moment in Sam Cooke's career. Riding high off a nearly unbroken string of chart successes, he was yet to enter the great and terrible eighteen month period which would see his infant son die, see the recording of possibly his finest music, and end in his death. All that was in the future.
When Sam Cooke took the stage at the Harlem Square Club, it was with Little Richard's dirty groove in mind, the future spread out bright before him, and a songbook of pop, standards and what we now call "soul." Imagine the scene: the big room sweating in the humid Florida night. An early and a late show, at 10 PM and 1 AM respectively. Sam Cooke, fresh off his European tour, with rowdy Atlantic recording artist King Curtis on sax beside him and Curtis' band of crack players behind him, energized, inspired, and ready to take the crowd as high as they want to go. The crowd, packed to the rafters, happy and eager. Sam Cooke had come to town, and they were waiting for the party to get started.
It is a little strange how dated some of Sam Cooke's songs sound today. With such strong roots in the pop of the 1950s, the I-vi-IV-V "ice cream" changes (think "Duke of Earl") and uptempo R&B swing of his most famous songs tie him more securely to Frankie Valli and doo-wop than to his musical children like Al Green and Otis Redding. And surely, his clean-cut image was an artifact of his ambition, his intention to appeal to as many people as possible, white or black, rich or poor. Today, seen through the filter of the intervening half-century, through civil rights and black power and Isaac Hayes and Shaft and Ice-T, Sam Cooke comes off like a square. Even then, he was the safe choice of suburban parents everywhere. But that night at the Harlem Square Club, Cooke strained against the urbane pop sheen that had made him famous and brought a roughness to his voice and a grit to his performance that surely few in the audience had ever heard from him before. Perhaps he approached these heights in his gospel years; Guralnick's book suggests as much. But rarely in his pop years did he let it loose like he did that night.
In his biography, Guralnick dwells at length on the contradictions embodied in Sam Cooke. He was the American dream, a good-looking and well-mannered young black man singing music that transcended racial boundaries: he was "safe." He was the preternaturally talented, even arrogant architect of his own career, ruthlessly moving from one opportunity to another as he saw fit, leaving behind him a wake of disappointed compatriots and business partners. He was the most charismatic guy in the room, the casually cruel ladykiller who made every one of them feel special, leaving behind him a wake of single mothers and dashed hopes. That same charisma came through loud and clear on stage, on vinyl, and on camera, drawing audiences into the vortex of his personality through the sheer power and swing of his musical genius, making every single person his closest confidant. He was the generous friend. He was the big spender. He was, from time to time, the source of towering rage and terrifying fury when his trademark savoire-faire was exhausted.
Article comments
1 - Al Barger
John Owen, this right here is some good writing. Dare I say, this is one of the better pieces of music writing I've read this millenium.
""Twistin' The Night Away" becomes somehow more serious, like the last party before Judgement Day." Yeah. Maybe it's partly tinged by us knowing his fate fairly soon to come, but now that you mention it he does sound a bit as if he's partying like it's 1999.
Again John, outstanding work.
2 - John Owen
Thanks, Senator!
3 - Eric Berlin
This is great stuff, John -- you really set the scene and then take us there.
4 - Nukapai
Wow, I think I'll just give up trying to write music reviews. ;)
Ehh, what I mean to say: this could have been an article in the newspaper I read (Guardian). Professional, informative, interesting.
5 - Jaime Nichols
VERY nice.