Ishmael Reed: The Godfather of Everything

Originally published in The New York Times February 20, 2005

Copyright 2005 The New York Times Company

By Ishmael Reed
Ishmael Reed's most recent book is ''Blues City: A Walk in Oakland.'' He is writing a book about Muhammad Ali.

I FEEL GOOD
A Memoir of a Life of Soul.
By James Brown.
Introduction by Marc Eliot.
Illustrated. 266 pp.
New American Library. $24.95.

JAMES BROWN was born in Macon, Ga., in 1933, and his beginnings weren't unlike those of many black entertainers and athletes who would later achieve prominence -- Joe Frazier, George Foreman, B. B. King, Eartha Kitt and Josephine Baker among them. Many were children of sharecroppers, the legacy of Andrew Johnson and Rutherford B. Hayes's capitulation to Southern insurgents, who were permitted to conduct a new form of slavery: debt slavery.

In Brown's case, it wasn't the impoverished father who left the family, but the mother -- a fact that gives new meaning to his soul classic ''Please Please Please,'' with its request to ''please don't go.'' Brown was 4. He didn't see his mother again until 1959, after his first performance at the Apollo. The reconciliation was cool. Burdened by his tasks as a Navy man, his father had left him in the care of an aunt. She ran a prostitution ring, and young James became one of her procurers. Brown, like Louis Armstrong before him, drifted into trouble and was sent to an institution where he began to develop his musical gifts.

''I Feel Good'' is Brown's second memoir; his first, ''The Godfather of Soul,'' was published in 1986. In his introduction to the new book, the rock biographer Marc Eliot provides the usual details about the cruel, often sadistic treatment of a proud black man at the hands of ''rednecks''; typically, underclass Americans, descendants of those who arrived in the United States with chips on their shoulders as a result of having been colonized and exploited by other whites.

Sometimes Brown fought back, but often he and the members of his first band, the Famous Flames, had the good sense to observe the protocols that prevented them from being harmed. Stories of lynchings are a key feature of the black oral tradition; Brown and his band might also have remembered Amede Ardoin, the black Creole singer who died after being beaten for accepting a white woman's offer to use her handkerchief to wipe his perspiration. Eliot, however, makes no mention of the bluenecks, those all-white juries who constantly honor white interpreters of black music over the black originators. I remember once seeing Chuck Berry in the San Francisco airport. The night before, during an awards show, John Denver had cited Bill Haley as the founder of rock 'n' roll. I was the only traveler who recognized Berry.

Brown attributes the celebration of white musical clones over black performers to white parents' worries: ''The great fear was that if a white man's teenage daughter saw James Brown perform onstage one night, the next night she'd be in his bed.'' He also suggests that the payola scandals of the late 50's and early 60's were a result of the same attitude. ''Payola was nothing less,'' he writes, ''than a Congressional purge meant to eliminate the growing popularity of black music from the social consciousness.''

Elvis Presley ultimately became a kind of go-between. Brown talks about how he was virtually stalked by the man who became his apprentice: ''Elvis Presley wanted everything James Brown had because, in addition to gospel, he wanted to somehow get into soul.'' Yet Brown and Elvis were friends. ''I loved the boy,'' Brown writes.

Brown traces the beginning of the civil rights movement to the crossover success of black musicians. ''In many ways,'' he observes, ''the entire civil rights movement began when a white kid in the audience stood up and cheered for a black performer.'' Attracting white paying customers to your books, theater or music, of course, meant success. The other route was to be cited by a white musician or critic as having influenced a white musician. A cultural critic on CNN recently said that the importance of Leadbelly was that without him there'd be no Eric Clapton. Can't you just see Leadbelly pounding rocks at prison, saying to himself, ''I have to somehow endure this because without me there will be no Eric Clapton''?

James Brown was one of the few who were able to draw a new audience without diluting the pungency of his ''soul'' and ''funk,'' and when he made his one attempt to soften his appeal, during an engagement at the Copacabana in the early 70's, he failed.

Though the film ''Ray'' tries to portray Ray Charles's managers as philanthropists, many black musicians have been exploited by their managers. James Brown is no exception. One of them tried to pay him off with a color television set. Like many black artists in the 60's -- writers among them -- Brown sought control over his work by establishing his own business. He even bought a radio station. With these moves, he anticipated the young hip-hop entrepreneurs, founders of a multibillion-dollar industry. One of them, the Oakland rapper Too Short, began his ascent by selling tapes out of his car.

Brown's business career has been marked by successes and failures. He agrees that his radio station was poorly operated, but he blames persecution by the government for some of his problems, even though he was embraced by politicians like Richard Nixon and Hubert Humphrey. He attributes his alienation from his white fans to the political bent of some of his 60's hits, like ''Say It Loud.'' The song's refrain, ''I'm black and I'm proud,'' struck a new chord of militancy. Some of his black fans condemned him for his support of Nixon in 1972 and his trip to Vietnam to entertain the troops.

Successes and failures also characterize his romantic life. ''I Feel Good'' even includes a section written by his current wife, who says that despite the problems in their marriage -- she once called 911 after an argument -- James Brown is wonderful man. But there is no doubt that he succumbed to the temptations that are available to entertainers and athletes. I have accompanied musicians on tours and can testify that the temptations are abundant.

Despite the ups and downs of his career and personal life, his influence has been enormous. His rhythms and theater can be found in Prince, Michael Jackson, M.C. Hammer, the Rolling Stones, the Average White Band and the rap pioneer Kwame. The Rev. Al Sharpton has said that he has his hair processed as a tribute to James Brown.

Brown acknowledges his own influences, including Little Richard, who, Brown says, discovered him. Westerns and comic books were also an influence. (Both Muhammad Ali and James Brown were influenced by the theatrics of the wrestler Gorgeous George, but no one has been able to duplicate that majestic peacock strut with which he entered the ring.) Brown traces his rediscovery to his appearance in the movie ''The Blues Brothers.''

In an attempt to be with-it, academics and performance intellectuals have flooded the market with books about hip-hop, heavy metal and emo. Most of them are written in such labored jargon that they are unreadable, while jazz criticism has become a new form of white-collar crime. Quincy Troupe's book ''Miles and Me,'' interviews with performers and essays like the one the German scholar Gunter Lenz wrote about the saxophonist Archie Shepp have shown that the best way to understand modern music is to listen to the musicians.

The most surprising news in ''I Feel Good'' might be Brown's revelation that his close friend Hubert Humphrey once mused about making Brown his running mate, a disclosure that is bound to draw snickers. Vice President Brown. But could it be any worse? After all, rock 'n' roll, the blues, soul music, funk and hip-hop have done more to foster international good will toward the United States than cluster bombs and degraded uranium.