RIP Aretha Franklin (1942 - 2018)

During my holidays "the Queen of Soul" died after having been terminally ill for some time. Glancing into an Italian news paper, mainly to find out what had happened in Bologna and how that could effect our return journey I noticed a photo of Aretha. With the few words we could determine, being non-speakers, we saw that she was dying. It reminded me of the Freddie Mercury announcement in 1991.

We were sitting in a temporary bar on a square right outside the medieval city centre of Calderola. The bar, were people were drinking all sorts of alcoholic beverages around noon time, used to be in the city centre. No more. The whole centre was a ghost town. Deserted since the earthquake of 2016. Despite the fact that the buildings in Calderola were looking more than o.k., certainly compared to what we had seen on the west side of the Monti Sibilini mountains, the conclusion had to be that it is most likely this part of Italy will never recover in the way it used to be. I had never experienced devastation on this scale before and was basically shocked. Especially as we had no idea beforehand, winding up in the Sibilini more or less at the spur of the moment. Where shall we go next?, is a question answered on the evening before packing things up.

In the final days of our holiday I noticed that I heard Aretha songs here and there. Coming home I saw a two day old newspaper with her photo all over the front page. Apparently the news had opened with her demise. Was she that big? Clearly, but also a bit surprising. Aretha Franklin never scored so many hits here. What was Aretha Franklin to me?

Foremost, a singer who scored her hits just before I consciously knew what hits were. There were songs and Aretha's were not a part of my childhood universe of U.S. and U.K. popsongs that came by in the background of my early youth. It is over the years that I got to know her biggest hits, without being able to point to a specific occasion. Soul was not my territory any way and still is not really. It also wasn't of the people who exposed me to pop music in the 60s. Soul became a more or less an acquired taste later on in life. Thinking about it now, I notice that acts like The Supremes and The Four Tops must have been so much more popular, as I do know most of their songs much longer. So Radio Veronica, my pirate station at the time, must have played their music a lot more.

So what do I have in my record collection? A greatest hits double cd bought somewhere around 2000, I guess and a live album that was played in a record store I entered and bought immediately. Only to play it two or three times since.

Her career mostly was stagnant for decades. In the 80s of course she scored a few big hits, but in the slipstream of then popular artists. The Eurythmics, George Michael, Keith Richards provided her new hits, even her only #1 hit in The Netherlands with 'I Knew You Were Waiting (For Me)'. Looking at Aretha Franklin as a chart presence, it is one song that really sticks out, the soft spoken, modest and fiery 'I Say A Little Prayer'. This is her only really big solo hit in this country. After 1971, 'Spanish Harlem', her career as a hit singer was over until the aforementioned mid 80s.

Aretha became a staple solo name for a new generation in the 1980s because of two single events. Her role in 'The Blues Brothers' where she sang 'Respect' once more and a tv commercial for 'Chocomel' were a young girl mimed 'Think'. This fairly unknown 1968 hit became a dance party staple for years after that commercial. The song is so strong. It perks me up every time I hear it. Impossible to sit still.

Whatever else Aretha may or may not have been in the mid 60s, she is not to me. I have no recollections to share of Martin Luther King. It all passed me by as I was too young. To me Aretha Franklin is a great voice, with some songs I like and a few I truly like, in a genre which is not mine. Like with Otis Redding, dead for over 50 years now and other soul stars of the 60s. So yes, Taking it all in, I am a bit surprised how huge she apparently is perceived to be.

Wo.

Listen to our Spotify Playlist to find out what we are writing about:

https://open.spotify.com/user/glazu53/playlist/6R9FgPd2btrMuMaIrYeCh6?si=KI6LzLaAS5K-wsez5oSO2g

and that commercial (and no we are not sponsored):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ynwrWnu8YNA