Valentines Day Weekend with Mavis Staples February 12, 2010

Mavis Staples Live: Hope at the Hideout

On Monday June 23, 2008 a lucky few Chicagoans were treated to an intimate performance at the Hideout by the signature voice of the civil rights movement, Mavis Staples. Accustomed to appearances at large venues, particularly in her hometown--the Windy City itself --Staples played with a stripped down, raw and swampy three-piece band and just a handful of back-up singers, providing a rare opportunity for fans to get close and sweaty with a figure who has led the musical charge towards equality and justice for the past five decades.

Fortunately, the magical set was captured on tape, and now the rest of us can experience the righteous protest and joyful inspiration Mavis imparted that evening via Mavis Staples Live: Hope at the Hideout (ANTI-). Truly great live albums are about capturing lightning in a bottle, that rare and perfect convergence of time, place and performance. That June night was undeniably such a moment and the record is a riveting, rousing musical tour de force.

The performance is packed with raw, visceral performances from Staples, and the show received rave reviews. The Chicago Sun Times proclaimed, "Anyone who was hearing this American treasure in concert for the first time learned precious lessons about where we have been and where we are today. Staples stood tall and shouted, 'My mind is made up, my heart is fixed.' And she smiled. She was not alone." Time Out Chicago said: "There are few living musicians who can lay claim to being America’s conscience, even fewer who continue to make vital music. On Monday night at The Hideout, Mavis Staples proved she’s still capable of both. Staples showed she can light a fire, agitate for change or re-energize the American songbook."

We'll Never Turn Back
Mavis began her career with her family group in 1950. Initially singing locally at churches and appearing on a weekly radio show, the Staples' scored a hit in 1956 with Uncloudy Day for the VeeJay label. When Mavis graduated high school in 1957, The Staple Singers took their music on the road. Led by family patriarch Roebuck 'Pops' Staples on guitar and including the voices of Mavis and her siblings Cleo, Yvonne, and Pervis, the Staples were called "God's Greatest Hitmakers."

With Mavis' voice and Pops' songs, singing, and guitar playing, the Staples evolved from enormously popular gospel singers (with recordings on United and Riverside as well as VeeJay) to become the most spectacular and influential spiritually-based group in America. By the mid-1960's The Staple Singers, inspired by Pops' close friendship with Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., became the spiritual and musical voices of the civil rights movement. They were the first Africam-America artists to record a Bob Dylan song, 1963's A Hard Rain's Gonna Fall and also cut a version of Stephen Stills' For What It's Worth--Mavis reprises on her Hideput set. These songs helped bring their moving and articulate music to a huge number of young people.

As Mavis put it in the liner notes to her 2007 critically-acclaimed and Ry Cooder-produced album We'll Never Turn Back (ANTI-), "When we started our family group, The Staple Singers, we started out mostly singing in churches in the south. Pops saw Dr Martin Luther King speak in 1963 and from there we started to broaden our musical vision beyond just gospel songs. Pops told us, 'I like this man. I like his message. And if he can preach it, we can sing it.' So we started to perform 'freedom songs, like Why Am I Treated So Bad, When Will We Be Paid for the Work We’ve Done, Long Walk to DC, and many others. Like many in the civil rights movement, we drew on the spirituality and the strength from the church to help gain social justice and to try to achieve equal rights."

She continues: "We became a major voice for the civil rights movement and hopefully helped to make a difference in this country. It was a difficult and dangerous time (in 1965 we spent a night in jail in West Memphis, Arkansas and I wondered if we’d ever make it out alive) but we felt we needed to stand up and be heard."

"So for us, and for many in the civil rights movement, we looked to the church for inner strength and to help make positive changes. And that seems to be missing today. Here it is, 2007, and there are still so many problems and social injustices in the world. Well, I tell you - we need a change now more than ever, and I'm turning to the church again for strength."

"With We'll Never Turn Back, I hope to get across the same feeling, the same spirit and the same message as we did with the Staple Singers - and to hopefully continue to make positive changes. We_ve got to keep pushing to make the world a better place. Things are better but we’re not where we need to be and we’ll never turn back."

Crossover success
The Staples signed to Stax Records in 1968, joining their gospel harmonies and deep faith with musical accompaniment from members of Booker T. and the MGs and the Muscle Shoals Rhythm Section. The Staple Singers hit the Top 40 eight times between 1971 and 1975, including two #1 singles, I'll Take You There and Let's Do It Again, and a #2 single Who Took the Merry Out of Christmas? Now a long ways from their early roots as a pure gospel group, The Staple Singers were bona fide pop stars.

Cultural Force
During her career Staples has appeared in many films and television shows, including The Last Waltz, Graffiti Bridge, Wattstax, New York Undercover, Soul Train, Soul to Soul and The Cosby Show. Her voice has been sampled by some of the biggest selling hip-hop artists, including Salt 'N' Pepa, Ice Cube and Ludacris. Mavis has recorded with a wide variety of musicians, from her close friend Bob Dylan (with whom she as nominated for a 2003 Grammy Award in the "Best Pop Collaboration With Vocals" category for their duet on Gotta Change My Way Of Thinking from the album Gotta Serve Somebody: The Gospel Songs of Bob Dylan) to The Band, Ray Charles, Nona Hendryx, George Jones, Patty Griffin, Natalie Merchant, Ann Peebles, Delbert McClinton and many others. She has provided vocals on albums by Los Lobos and Dr. John (with whom she was nominated for a 2004 GRAMMY), and she appears on tribute albums to Johnny Paycheck, Stephen Foster (also GRAMMY-nominated) and Bob Dylan.

Official Website: http://yoshis.com