Sam Cooke : "A Change Is Gonna Come" classic or classic?

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Classic.

― Velveteen Bingo (Chris V), Friday, 27 August 2004 11:37 (twenty-one years ago)

There's been some classic covers too.

― dickvandyke (dickvandyke), Friday, 27 August 2004 11:44 (twenty-one years ago)

Not least,

http://www.detroitsrvfanclub.com/Images/Johnny%20Watson%20poster.jpg

― Alba (Alba), Friday, 27 August 2004 11:53 (twenty-one years ago)

did you photograph that yourself?

― dickvandyke (dickvandyke), Friday, 27 August 2004 11:58 (twenty-one years ago)

No.

When I was 13, I was on a bus listening to Sam Cooke's 'A Change Is Gonna Come' on my walkman. I closed my eyes and really got into it, maybe shaking my head and mouthing along to the odd lyric. It finished, I opened my eyes, and all the other kids burst into laughter.

― Alba (Alba), Friday, 27 August 2004 12:10 (twenty-one years ago)

my sister does things like that all the time. at shows, at home, in public, on the train. i still laugh at her regularly.

― dickvandyke (dickvandyke), Friday, 27 August 2004 12:13 (twenty-one years ago)

Anybody got the words to " A CHANGE IS GONNA COME " ??
Either the Sam Cooke version or The Baby Huey version on the
" Living Legend " album
Actually the Baby Huey version is what this young lady is after with monologue and all.
Anybody that can help , please can they post it in the messages section of the group.

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/jamesrameybabyhuey

She's been asking for a while.

Thanks

― Leo, Friday, 27 August 2004 12:21 (twenty-one years ago)

ive got the album at home, ill try and find it to see if it comes with lyrics.

― dickvandyke (dickvandyke), Friday, 27 August 2004 12:22 (twenty-one years ago)

I was born by the river in a little tent
And just like that river I've been running ever since
It's been a long time coming
But I know a change is gonna come, oh yes it will

It's been too hard living, but I'm afraid to die
Cos I don't know what's out there beyond the sky
It's been a long, a long time coming
But I know a change is gonna come, oh yes it will

BRIDGE:

And then I go to see my brother
And I ask him to help me please
And he just winds up knockin' me
Back down on my knees

There were times when I thought I couldn't last for long
But now I think I'm able to carry on
It's been a long, been a long time coming
But I know a change is gonna come, oh yes it will

― Velveteen Bingo (Chris V), Friday, 27 August 2004 12:25 (twenty-one years ago)

nevermind, im an idiot.

― Velveteen Bingo (Chris V), Friday, 27 August 2004 12:28 (twenty-one years ago)

its great baby huey has his own yahoo group.

― dickvandyke (dickvandyke), Friday, 27 August 2004 12:31 (twenty-one years ago)

Couldn't find the other Baby Huey thread , so I link it here as it didn't show up .

Here
Free Baby Huey

― Leo, Friday, 27 August 2004 13:11 (twenty-one years ago)

Otis Redding's souped up ott version - classic or dud?

― Bumfluff, Friday, 27 August 2004 13:15 (twenty-one years ago)

maybe not classic but its still good. i dont like the beginning of arethas version. she overdoes it when he hits that first note.

― dickvandyke (dickvandyke), Friday, 27 August 2004 13:16 (twenty-one years ago)

sams is damn near perfect.

― Velveteen Bingo (Chris V), Friday, 27 August 2004 13:17 (twenty-one years ago)

I've grown to like Otis's version more over the years, it's like the sequel to a classic film, it goes into all the things which motivate the original but it isn't as concisely or classically expressed. It also feels like one man's personal anguish more, rather than Sam's widescreen universal vision.

― Bumfluff, Friday, 27 August 2004 13:23 (twenty-one years ago)

im sure people will laugh but terence trent darby sung his version really well.

― dickvandyke (dickvandyke), Friday, 27 August 2004 13:23 (twenty-one years ago)

I heard that Cooke originally seriously intended for the lyrics to read:

"but he keeps knockin' me
back down on my motherfuckin' knees."

Any truth to that?

― Forksclovetofu (Forksclovetofu), Friday, 27 August 2004 13:25 (twenty-one years ago)

that would have been brilliant if that was the original version.

― Velveteen Bingo (Chris V), Friday, 27 August 2004 13:46 (twenty-one years ago)

All bout Otis

― lukey (Lukey G), Friday, 27 August 2004 14:50 (twenty-one years ago)

sosososososososososo classic.

I actually have the record cover hanging in my office.

Sam's version cannot be touched.

― Scott CE (Scott CE), Friday, 27 August 2004 15:02 (twenty-one years ago)

As far as I recall, Otis has little idea how to sing the song and just goes 'ooh' and 'uh' a lot. I haven't listened to it for a while though.

― Alba (Alba), Friday, 27 August 2004 15:09 (twenty-one years ago)

otis always does that. his uhs and stammering-in-the-name-of-soulfulness can get a bit much.

― dickvandyke (dickvandyke), Friday, 27 August 2004 15:34 (twenty-one years ago)

jerry wexler called it "oversouling"

― amateur!!st, Friday, 27 August 2004 15:36 (twenty-one years ago)

wow, coincidence! I was listening to the 5th Dimension version only just now. The original's one of the top 3 records of its era, for sure.

― zebedee (zebedee), Friday, 27 August 2004 15:37 (twenty-one years ago)

I heard that Cooke originally seriously intended for the lyrics to read:
"but he keeps knockin' me
back down on my motherfuckin' knees."

Any truth to that?

-- Forksclovetofu (forksclovetof...), August 27th, 2004.

what do you mean by this? obv cooke and his record company would have had no intention of actually releasing a record with such a word in it.

if cooke was anything like his close friends who have been interviewed in recent years, he definitely would have used the word "motherfucker" a lot.

― amateur!!st, Friday, 27 August 2004 15:37 (twenty-one years ago)

'A Change is Coming Like A Motherfucker"

― dickvandyke (dickvandyke), Friday, 27 August 2004 15:53 (twenty-one years ago)

"Motherfucker, you shot me!"

― Myonga Von Bontee (Myonga Von Bontee), Friday, 27 August 2004 18:30 (twenty-one years ago)

for some reason i just decided i need more richard pryor records

― amateur!!st, Friday, 27 August 2004 18:32 (twenty-one years ago)

'I'll come running back to you' is among the best songs ever written. 'undignified and brilliant.'

― cºzen (Cozen), Friday, 27 August 2004 18:36 (twenty-one years ago)

why is that in quotes? did someone else say that?

this won't sound quite right (not least, to me) but i think cooke's virtues are mostly formal, with some big exceptions (like the song in this thread's title). it's mostly about the absolutely amazing fluency of his singing and the right-ness of his productions. i don't really get a raw emotional kick from most of his stuff, at least not insofar as it doesn't arise from the sheer pleasure of hearing someone so skilled at his craft do his thing.

― amateur!!st, Friday, 27 August 2004 18:45 (twenty-one years ago)

yeah, alba, who supplied me with my copy of the song, said it the first time I told him I love it.

― cºzen (Cozen), Friday, 27 August 2004 18:46 (twenty-one years ago)

even his gospel performances--which i think track-for-track and kind of superior to his pop sides overall--have a kind of detached formalist quality to them. he doesn't seem as invested in the themes as some other major gospel singers. that doesn't mean he isn't awesome.

― amateur!!st, Friday, 27 August 2004 18:48 (twenty-one years ago)

Amateur: I dunno exactly, I'm just relating what I had read. I found this track in a musicblog (can't for the life of me remember which, but I thought "soul sides") and that comment accompanied. Maybe he meant it to be sung live as such?

― Forksclovetofu (Forksclovetofu), Friday, 27 August 2004 19:35 (twenty-one years ago)

'A Mu'fucking Change Gon' Come'

― dickvandyke (dickvandyke), Friday, 27 August 2004 20:48 (twenty-one years ago)

Oh, and amateur to jump back to the NYPL: I got the nine disc "And it's deep too!" Pryor set from the library recently. holla atchaboy for some cuts.

― Forksclovetofu (Forksclovetofu), Friday, 27 August 2004 21:45 (twenty-one years ago)

seven months pass...

Revive. And my god, what a perfect song right now!

― Remy (x Jeremy), Thursday, 14 April 2005 00:57 (twenty years ago)

eight years pass...

http://www.npr.org/2014/02/01/268995033/sam-cooke-and-the-song-that-almost-scared-him

― curmudgeon, Sunday, 2 February 2014 21:18 (eleven years ago)

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