The
title of Al Green’s Lay It Down truly tells it like it is. Conceived as a
collaboration between the soul legend and a handful of gifted young admirers from
the worlds of contemporary R&B and hip hop, the album is drawn from a series
of inspired sessions that yielded the most high-spirited, funky and often lushly
romantic songs of Green’s latter-day career. The album is a refreshingly
old school jam, with everyone laying down the music together, face to face, heart
to heart, soul to soul.
The
project features the sophisticated R&B voices of singer-songwriters John Legend,
Anthony Hamilton and Corinne Bailey Rae, and it was co-produced with Green by
two of hip-hop’s most innovative players, drummer Ahmir “?uestlove”
Thompson from the Roots and keyboardist James Poyser, the go-to guy for high-profile
artists ranging from Erykah Badu to Common. Add in Brooklyn’s celebrated
Dap-King Horns (Sharon Jones, Amy Winehouse), guitarist Chalmers “Spanky”
Alford (Mighty Clouds of Joy, Joss Stone) and bassist Adam Blackstone (Jill Scott,
DJ Jazzy Jeff), among others, and you’ve got a modern soul-music dream team,
fronted by the most expressive voice in the business.
“The
reason why we are doing this is because we all idolize Al Green,” declares
?uestlove. “Even today, nobody has range like him.”
Green
himself envisioned this project as a way to reach out to younger artists, particularly
in the hip hop community, to find common musical ground and help spread his healing
message of, as he likes to put it, “L-O-V-E.” He gamely plunged into
the world of the Roots and their posse, cutting tracks with them in New York City.
His youthful collaborators took this as an opportunity to get right into Al’s
head, turning the sessions into a master class about how to create that sublime
Al Green sound and keep it relevant for today.
As
Green explains: ”They didn’t want to get too far out from the foundation
that [Hi Records producer] Willie Mitchell and I built—‘Call Me,’
‘I’m Still In Love With You,’ ‘Let’s Stay Together.”
That’s all good, they said, but we want to play what we hear you being about
in 2008. We want to keep all of the aura, but we would like to have freedom enough
to spread our wings and express ourselves. The Roots, all the guys from Philly
who came up to do this stuff with us—they were incredible. I could relax
because I knew the people were capable. Everyone was coming up with ideas, everybody
was pitching in, everybody was helping.”
It
all began in 2006. ?uestlove and Poyser arranged for a get-acquainted session
at Electric Lady Studio in Manhattan’s Greenwich Village. As Green recalls,
“That was such a session. We sketched out eight songs and really started
the project. We were just spitting out songs right and left; there’s no possible
way I could write them all out. I was writing the verses to this one, the bridge
to that one. Everybody contributed and that’s why it feels so good. There
were no big ‘I’s and little ‘you’s in there. All of us dreamed
it up together.”
That
date provided basic tracks for nine out of eleven tunes. Subsequent recording
took place over the next two years to accommodate the artists with whom Al wanted
to work. Each session replicated the feel of that first one, with the players
swapping ideas, grabbing pads and pencils to furiously scribble lyrics, singing
out snatches of melodies, passing along riffs. Green himself vocalized many of
the parts that the strings and horns would later play. He admits, “That’s
the only way I know how to work, that’s what I’ve done all my life.
You just write it from here.” He taps his heart. “That’s what we
do every Sunday. We never write a sermon now. If you can’t preach out of
here”—tapping his chest again—“you have nothing to say anyway.
It’s all from the heart, this whole album, from start to finish.”
“It’s
an honor to be able to work with Al Green, who I have always loved and respected,”
says John Legend. “He has been an important part of black music history,
and pop music history for that matter. Al really is a magical singer.”
Legend
had come in to sing on one track the band had worked up, but then heard an unfinished
version of “Stay With Me (By The Sea),” a song Green had been developing
with Bailey Rae. Legend immediately knew that one was meant for him. That song
illustrates the cooperative spirit that distinguishes Lay It Down. ”John
is singing it, I’m singing it, Corinne and I are singing the background,”
Green explains. “We’re all included. It’s personal, about my own
life, but still everyone can feel what I’m talking about.”
Green
was especially impressed that Bailey Rae flew all the way from London to sing
with him. She was just honored to be there: “I was really drawn in by Al's
voice; it’s so distinct, and so fluid.” After she arrived, Green recalls,
Corinne went straight to work: “She’s a tiny little thing with a big
guitar. She’s just playing and singing and the musicians went to sit in,
the drummer, the bassist. She wrote a verse, then I wrote a verse and we both
worked on the bridge.” In fact, Green insisted that Bailey Rae start it off,
performing in her warm, intimate style the verse she’d just written.
Hamilton
and Green perform gospel-style testifying over the slow-burning groove of the
title track, and the pair engages in fierce call and response on the funky chorus
to “You’ve Got the Love I Need.” “It feels good when you listen
to him,” Hamilton says of Green, and Green returns the compliment: “On
his records, Anthony is always singing about pleasing and satisfying his lady—I
want you to be happy, I want us to be together. I’ve been preaching for 30
years and I said, that’s right, the more we need each other, the less difference
we see between us. You have to take a chance on love. I know there are some hateful
people in the world that would break your heart in an instant. But the big man
upstairs is saying you’ve got to take a chance. It’s better to love
and be heartbroken than never to have loved at all.”
Looking
back on these collaborations, Green decides: ”I couldn’t ask for any
more than what Corinne, Anthony and John put into the album, because they came
and they sung their heart. And when a person does that, I’m going to give
you the best I feel too.” But he offers us even more on the final track,
“Standing In the Rain.” The arrangement is an ebullient update of classic
Memphis soul and the words convey the sort of message that the Reverend Al would
like to leave all of us with, from the young listeners about to discover him to
the loyal fans who’ve followed him all these years.
“’Standing
in the Rain’—that don’t mean good times,” Green explains.
“I’ve got afflictions, I’ve got trials, I’ve experienced all
the things that can hold you back. But I refuse to be held back.”
Lay
It Down is surely testimony to that. Al Green may occasionally sing about his
own tribulations, but mostly he wants to offer the answer to ours: L-O-V-E is
all you need.
Source: Al Green.com.
