Episoed 6 - Soul Unlimited - If There's Something In This World We All Atone To

The host of the podcast shares a personal story about how his curiosity led him to explore Barry White's music. He then discusses a moment of serendipity when he heard a broadcaster talking about wanting to recreate Barry White's Love Unlimited Orchestra. The host also interviews Steve Craddock, who expresses his love for Barry White's music and praises his skills as a musician and producer. The episode ends with a mention of upcoming interviews with Lisa Stansfield and Zoe Rahman. Hello. A quick word from me. This episode is going to start a little differently. It will mostly be the same format, more insight from Barry White. We'll also hear from an altogether wider spectrum of contributors that span genres and continents. But I wanted to deliver on the promise I made to remember right at the start about that moment of serendipity which sealed the deal in me pursuing the making of this show. Way back at the very start of the podcast, I shared how my curiosity had led me to explore White's back catalogue. And not far into that, one Sunday morning, sitting at the desk, I had this really strange experience. Here's me describing to Steve Craddock what happened. I got this spark and I thought, I'm really interested in his music. I remember my parents playing his music and then my uncle was absolutely besotted with him. Into my 30s, still listen to it a bit. And it's when I started digging through some vinyls that my mum and dad had, a bit of nostalgia. And then I ended up listening to Desert Island Discs once again through lockdown. And this is where it sort of converges to the two things. Have you heard Charles Hazelwood? Um... Para Orchestra? Is that the people who sit in a circle? Yeah, I'm aware of them, yeah. So I'm listening to a couple of minutes of it and they do a little synopsis of who they are and their credentials. And then the broadcaster says, OK... What's your first disc? What are we going to hear? I've had a lifelong ambition to recreate the great Barry White's love Unlimited Orchestra. This is a songwriter, not to mention a performer, band leader, orchestra leader, almost without peer in that world. One of the best things, Lauren, about the whole process is it encouraged me to dig even deeper than all the White tunes I knew, down to some of the really deep cuts. And so the first track I've chosen is called Somebody's Gonna Off The Man and it's from a lesser-known score Barry White wrote for a blaxploitation movie from the mid-'70s called Together Brothers. And it's got the most insane hook. Somebody's gonna off the man Everybody I just don't understand What was the impact of all the sexy stuff that you were doing? I mean, women coming at you or anything like that? Jesus Christ, yeah, that was incredible. Everyone, to me, has to pick a subject to talk about in music once you're going to be a writer. Mine is love. I like the two-people concept. I like to, because I know when a man's making love, when a man's about to climax, the last thing he thinks about is war. Okay, the last thing he thinks about is how can he blow up a nation. That's the last thing from his mind. So if there is something in this world that we all atone to, lovemaking is it. Everybody's into lovemaking, Joe. Besides that, it's the most powerful element that men and women possess. Most of us don't know how to use it, but we all possess it. Did women come out of the woodwork, got a message from that at all? The women use the music to get their men to relate to them better. How did you develop that way of talking on your records? Were you more confident about talking than singing? No, I'm very relaxed either way, singing or talking. I just felt as a creative person that when I did records, I would like to not only sing them, but explain them to a great degree also so people would know exactly what I'm talking about. I always used to laugh about walking in the rain with the one you love, and I used to find that phone call at the end of it hilarious because the conversation was so cheesy and stilted. He would go, I've got something to tell you. What? And I'd just go, what? It was hilarious. But that aside, as you've observed this, the number of people that have attempted to cover his music and can't replicate it is very few and far between. Yes, yes. It's interesting that you would say that. For the greatness of the music, Barry White, as a songwriter goes, got very few covers. And I think the reason for that is because the music was so intimidating. The productions were so intimidating. They would say, we're going to do Can't Get Enough of Your Love, Baby. You know, this is what we're going to do. How the hell are you going to capture the magnificence of this track? First of all, he's got strings and all of this stuff. Even though he was always a nonchalant kind of singer, he's got this imposing voice. You'd have to agree, the Symphonic Arrangements are fearsome. But on that point, so who has been lucky enough to attempt it? A select few is the answer, and if anyone deserves some credit, it must go to Lisa Stansfield. When I started doing the research on this, oh yeah, I thought, I think I remember her doing something. And actually, Lisa has a bit more connection to Barry than I mean not to his songbook. But we'll come back to that in the next episode. It's worth it, I promise. Just like you, you make me feel for you too Never, never gonna give you up Barry White has been described as the maestro of love, the guru of love, the king of make-out music, and the high priest of boudoir soul. He recites, moans and croons about love in a deep, mellow voice. For some listeners, this is very seductive. Now that we've pulled the covers back on this symphonic rich music, which became coined as boudoir soul, it would be unthinkable not to ask, has anybody seen, seen our good friend Marvin? You see, like most soul acts that found success in the 60s, the 70s was all about reinvention. As you heard unequivocally just now, Barry White decided love was his theme. Marvin? Well, he went off point, or on point, depending on your social consciousness. He wrote and produced his seminal LP, What's Going On? Gay decided to tackle the thorny subjects of racial inequality and the environment. But moving into 73, Gay showed his seductive side with a fond and said to us all, I've tried to bring you a broad section of musical influences and opinions in this show. This time we're going to hear from Zoe Rahman, the Mercury Music Prize winning jazz pianist. Let's see the reaction when I put Zoe on the spot. And this is kind of like a side thing, really. So it's a bit cheeky, but I'm tagging this on. Is that I'm, I'm trying to, well, I am not trying to, I am writing and producing a podcast about Barry White. Oh, fantastic. Yeah. Yeah. I've got a great album of his. Yeah, very funny. Sorry, he makes me laugh in a good way. Now, there can't be anyone better connected to the word soul and music than Maggie Eyre, producer of the BBC's intoxicating podcast of the same name. Barry, Barry for me is associated with childhood, I think, when I discovered pop music. And without knowing it at the time, because I was quite young, I think I was very drawn to things like the philodendron, drawn to things like the Philadelphia sound and a lot of that black soul music. I just gravitated towards it. I really liked it. I couldn't tell you why. And I really liked the Love Unlimited orchestra. I loved all those strings and big orchestral arrangements that, you know, he started producing and putting on his tracks. And I think it's just a soundtrack to being a kid. How old would you have been then? I would have been about 10, 11. Later on, it came back as a kind of nostalgia trip, like so many of these artists that people rediscover when they get older. And there's a slight cheese factor to it as well. The fact that he was called the Walrus of Love. And so there was a kind of irony to listening to the music and it just became fun again. And I think certain elements of popular culture honed in on that as well and played Barry White's tracks on, say, TV shows and things for the same reason, in that they were tapping into the A, nostalgia, but B, kind of guilty pleasure that a lot of people were finding in listening to his music again. Guilty pleasure, that's nice. Yeah, I don't always feel it was a genuine, pure love. I always feel maybe there was a slight awkwardness about saying, well, I really loved his music because it was a wee bit cheesy for a British audience. I guess for most of us, the pandemic restricted our freedom in many ways, but it also opened up opportunities, especially if you were looking to find respected voices to appear on this podcast. This time, it's Steve Craddock, gifted solo artist and Paul Weller's mainstay collaborator. At the time, he had just released an instrumental album likened to film soundtracks. Do you have any views about his music generally? Did it chime with you? I love Barry White. Say again? I love Barry White, man. I love his tracks, I love his music, I love the way I've seen him play piano, I love the way he plays piano. I love his drums, I love his tracks, yeah, it's great. What is it about his piano that you like? I've seen clips of him playing on a grand piano, like a backstage thing or something, and he's just a great musician, he's amazing. And I love the sound of his records. He produced them, didn't he? His arrangement of strings is amazing as well. Yeah, he's great. This is so unlimited. He said nobody has a Barry White. Well, it is fascinating to me that you get this universal subject which never goes away. You talk about love, I've got Freddie Jackson who's out there singing. But they don't want to hear him in Sweden. No, they don't know. But your stuff and the way you attack it, did you ever do it in any other languages? Had a number one record in Spanish. Love making music. At CBS.