One powerful takeaway from James Brown: Say It Loud, the extraordinary two-night, four-hour documentary premiering at 8 p.m. Monday Feb. 19 on A&E, is the tragically fleeting nature of fame and legacy.
As the subtitle of Hour Two suggests, there was a time when James Brown was arguably “The Most Powerful Black Man in America.” He virtually invented the ferocious blend of jazz and gospel that became known as funk. His Live at the Apollo album expanded the horizons of the recording industry, and his songs became a soundtrack for the civil rights movement. As Essence magazine editor-at-large Mikki Taylor observes, “He gave you sex and protest at the same time.”
A multimillionaire music mogul and entrepreneur decades before Jay-Z, his Deep South holdings included a private jet and three radio stations, one of which he shined shoes next to as a child. He had an open-door invitation to the White House, and you do remember the phrase that follows “Say it Loud” in Brown’s revolutionary R&B anthem, don’t you? “I’m Black… and I’m proud,” Rev. Al Sharpton reflects in the doc, slowly caressing each word. “He changed the self-image of Negro to Black overnight, with the addendum of being proud. He changed how white America looked at us when we stick our chests out.”
But think about it: despite influencing the dance moves of artists from Michael and Prince to Beyoncé and Usher’s halftime show; despite performing relentlessly into his 70s and recording 17 No. 1 R&B hits; despite being possibly the most sampled artist of all time, especially in the hip-hop era; despite being one of the first artists inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame… how often do you hear James Brown’s name mentioned in the public discourse today? How often do you hear his records played, even on Black radio stations or SiriusXM oldies channels?
Super bad.
It was well past time for this richly detailed, warts-and-all history lesson, directed by Deborah Riley Draper and executive produced by Ahmir “Questlove” Thompson and Mick Jagger who both appear frequently onscreen. (Hey, you don’t suppose Mick “borrowed” a few moves from James over the years? Jagger also produced the biopic Mr. Dynamite: The Rise of James Brown 10 years ago, but this may be the big payback.) It was scheduled to premiere in 2023, to coincide with what would have been Brown’s 90th birthday, but delays pushed it to Black History Month.
Its length — two hours Monday, another two hours beginning at 8 p.m. Tuesday — allows Say It Loud to be impressively comprehensive, and it pulls no punches. Neither did Brown. The third installment opens with a viewer discretion warning, and it’s merited: the hour goes into disturbing detail about Brown’s appalling physical abuse of the women in his life, including his three wives and his dancers on tour. The documentary also reminds us of his image-damaging endorsement of President Richard Nixon, his levying fines on band members in mid-concert for the slightest errors, his drug use and prison sentence on gun charges, and his career resurgences after appearing in the films The Blues Brothers and Rocky 4. Like anyone considered a genius in his or her field, James Brown was a morass of conflicts and contradictions.
Besides the aforementioned contributors, Say It Loud weaves insights and memories from a wide range of music and pop culture authorities, as well as fellow recording legends like LL Cool and Bootsy Collins, and contemporaries who knew him well. (One of them, longtime entertainment reporter Don Rhodes of the Augusta Chronicle, died last year before seeing the finished product.) The fact the documentary prominently features three of Brown’s children — Dr. Yamma (as in Mt. Fujiyama), Deanna, and Larry Brown — gives it an aura of legitimacy, but the fact Brown had at least seven children that he knew of can’t be ignored.
However, the most prominent voice relating the story of James Brown: Say It Loud is… James Brown. Through a masterful weaving of video clips, audio recordings, and some never-before-seen archival footage, “Soul Brother No. 1” largely tells his story in his own words. If you didn’t know he died of congestive heart failure and pneumonia on Christmas Day 2006, you could be convinced the Godfather of Soul is still putting out hits.
You’ll be reminded that JB was born into a situation so bleak that poverty would have been an upgrade and was sent to prison at 15 for stealing a car battery… that he took a lot of his style from Little Richard, and occasionally performed as Richard when the latter was double booked… and overcame all obstacles to eventually headline a music festival in Zaire in connection with the Ali-Foreman fight and sing duets with Luciano Pavarotti in Italy. And Detroit figures notably in James Brown: Say It Loud, too.
The Motown sound, as carefully curated by Berry Gordy, is seen as stark contrast to the rhythmic shrieks and grunts that defined Brown’s music. Largely because of Motown’s presence, the Fox Theatre is depicted as one of the few places in America, along with such as the Apollo in Harlem and the Regal in Chicago, where Black artists could perform for auditorium-sized crowds. Brown is shown guesting on Detroit Black Journal and with Dr. Sonya Friedman, the metro Detroit psychologist and former national talk-show host. And don’t blink or you might miss our dark Dick Clark, host Nat Morris, chatting up Brown in brief clips from our legendary dance show The Scene.
The last hour is painful to watch. It shows Brown’s body and skills deteriorating in his last years and spends much time detailing his memorial services at the James Brown Arena in Georgia and the Apollo. Be advised. But it ends in a blaze of glory with his 1966 appearance singing “Please, Please, Please” on The Ed Sullivan Show, so it may be worth the hurt.
Either way, James Brown: Say It Loud is bursting with mighty, memorable music throughout and dance moves no one has yet been able to duplicate. If ever this was a man’s world, James Brown was the man. And this outstanding biography proves it.
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