aretha franklin
The 50 Best Albums of 1972
Last year, when helping assemble SPIN‘s 50 Best Albums of 1971, I wondered if that year could have been popular music’s absolute peak. Now I’m asking myself that same question all over again. As I built a spreadsheet for 1972, gathering our writers’ votes alongside my own weird choices, I was once again struck by how many bronze-cast classics came out that year: LPs from David Bowie, Al Green, Aretha Franklin, The Allman Brothers Band, Yes, Stevie Wonder, Roxy Music, and on and on. Run down basically every genre – glam, soul, prog, art rock, Southern rock, metal, folk, MPB — and you’ll find the very best shit, whether eternally famous or sadly obscure. (My poor spreadsheet, swelling each day, originally had hundreds of worthy records. But you have to start chopping eventually.) Here’s wher...
The 100 Greatest Rock Stars Since That Was A Thing
Three of the 100 are in this picture! The Rolling Stones, in 1964, from left to right: Bill Wyman, Mick Jagger, Keith Richards, Charlie Watts and Brian Jones. The problem with lists like this is they are invariably bullshit. So our prime objective was to make sure we didn’t do a bullshit list. I’m not saying we did a scientific one either. Because that isn’t possible — actually, it is, if you wanted some compilation of who sold the most records/concert tickets/has the most fans/got the most death threats, etc., and someone could come up with a bunch of very empirical metrics and create a “heat index” or something, and could deliver an actual scientific ranking! But we, um, didn’t do that. In fact we didn’t even, technically, do the “we...
The 50 Best Live Albums of the 1970s
The concert industry exploded in the 1970s, and the live album, a stopgap project once reserved for only the biggest artists, became a compulsory ritual and a pivotal moment for many artists. Live albums captured legendarily loud bands like The Who and The Ramones in their natural element. Once obscure regional acts like Bob Seger, KISS and Cheap Trick exploded into the mainstream with live albums. The Band, The Stooges, and Velvet Underground put their final gigs on vinyl. Jimi Hendrix, Neil Young (as his ongoing archive series shows), and Jackson Browne recorded entire sets of new songs onstage. The Grateful Dead released several official live albums (and continue to do so) that only made fans want to bootleg shows on their own more. With the 50th anniversary of a landmark live album, Th...
The 25 Best Soundtrack Albums of the 1990s
In the 1980s, music and film collided for cross-promotional blockbusters both transcendent (Purple Rain) and transcendently cheesy (Footloose). In the ‘90s, soundtracks continued to sell in the millions, capturing cultural moments like the Seattle grunge of Singles or the Britpop and electronica of Trainspotting. Auteurs like Quentin Tarantino and Wes Anderson reached deep into their record collections to set the mood while movies like Above the Rim and Menace II Society pioneered the concept of soundtracks as hip-hop mixtapes. A great soundtrack can propel an unsuccessful single, like Seal’s “Kiss From A Rose,” to the top of the charts, or revive a decades-old hit, like Queen’s “Bohemian Rhapsody.” It can also push a cult singer-songwriter like Elliott Smith or Aimee Mann to an Oscar perf...
Jennifer Hudson Stars as Aretha Franklin in First Respect Teaser Trailer
Over two years ago, Jennifer Hudson was tapped by none other than Aretha Franklin herself to star in a biopic about the Queen of Soul. Now, the much-anticipated Respect received its first teaser trailer, which dropped during the BET Awards. In it, there’s footage of Hudson performing, getting advice, standing up for herself (Marc Maron plays famed music exec Jerry Wexler who she tells to call her Ms. Franklin) all in the 75-second teaser trailer. Respect is directed by Tony-nominated Liesl Tommy and in addition to Hudson, it stars Marlon Wayans (as her first husband), Audra McDonald (as her mother), Forest Whitaker, Queen Latifah, Mary J. Blige and Maron. Hudson’s film debut was, of course, for portraying Effie White in Dreamgirls back in 2006, which she won t...
Jennifer Hudson Stars as Aretha Franklin in First Respect Teaser Trailer
Over two years ago, Jennifer Hudson was tapped by none other than Aretha Franklin herself to star in a biopic about the Queen of Soul. Now, the much-anticipated Respect received its first teaser trailer, which dropped during the BET Awards. In it, there’s footage of Hudson performing, getting advice, standing up for herself (Marc Maron plays famed music exec Jerry Wexler who she tells to call her Ms. Franklin) all in the 75-second teaser trailer. Respect is directed by Tony-nominated Liesl Tommy and in addition to Hudson, it stars Marlon Wayans (as her first husband), Audra McDonald (as her mother), Forest Whitaker, Queen Latifah, Mary J. Blige and Maron. Hudson’s film debut was, of course, for portraying Effie White in Dreamgirls back in 2006, which she won t...
