mighty mavis

compared to the past few weekends, there doesn't seem to be that much going on in the city this weekend...besides the holmes brothers out in berwyn, the ponys & the waco brothers at west fest, & the old 97's at taylor street festa italiana, the biggest recommendation i can make is going to see the incredible mavis staples close out the great performers festival at millenium park sunday night...seriously, it's free, it's downtown, just do it...here's the staple singers from 1984 covering talking heads "slippery people"...i love both these bands, so i completely flipped when i first heard this...supposedly, pops staples went to david byrne to see if they could do it, & byrne, obviously influenced by 70's r&b, said only if he could play on it with them...i'm guessing that collaboration is what led byrne to cast pops in true stories two years later...whatever, it's funky as hell.
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download: the staple singers - slippery people (reposted 11/08/07)
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related: i can't believe i missed the pbs documentary respect yourself: the stax records story, which featured performances by the staple singers, among others...especially after reading the most recent issue of stop smiling cover to cover, which must have mentioned the documentary air date over half a dozen times...as of now, there's no sign of it being replayed any time soon...so i'm pissed...anyways, marathonpacks had a nice little write up on it & sticking with the music doc thing, an aquairium drunkard has a preview of vh1's upcoming nyc77: the coolest year in hell, which i hopefully won't miss.

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www.mavisstaples.com