Celebrating a Truth Teller
Jessica Edward's joy-filled documentary (HBO on-demand) is a welcome respite during Covid-19's unsettling times.
There exists in the pantheon of popular music that rare handful of songs that define their era while not being defined by it… their sound defying race, genre and generations. The Staple Singers’ “I’ll Take You There” is one of them. Click “Play,” and I guarantee you’ll see a whole room moved to smile… if not instinctively moving to its infectious, feel-good, Muscle Shoals sound.
Top: The Staples Singers’ #1 hit has been sampled or covered by everyone from Salt-N-Pepa to Bebe & Cece Winans; Bottom: The Staple Singers performing in the early 70s.
In the HBO documentary “MAVIS!” we get the story behind the song—from the legend behind the mic. While pivotal to the group’s pioneering straddling of genres, it’s one of many markers in Mavis Staple’s almost mythic catalog and career.
As a teenager in the 70’s, “I’ll Take You There,” “Let’s Do It Again,” and “Respect Yourself” were in regular rotation on my radio. But it took Prince’s resurrection of Mavis in the early 90s to make me a full-fledged acolyte . Her 1993 album, “The Voice” (on Prince’s Paisley-Park label) found her owning yet another genre with ease. And as Melony Cool performing her self-titled song in Prince’s 1990 film, “Graffiti Bridge,” Mavis didn’t just out-funk Morris Day and the Time, she wiped the floor with them.
When Mavis marked her 80th birthday this time last year with concerts in New York City, Nashville and Los Angeles (all benefiting the Newport Folk Festival Foundation's educational efforts), it seemed everyone in entertainment wanted to show her some love. Listen to her live performance of “Will the Circle Be Unbroken” with Bonnie Raitt, Gregg Allman and Aaron Neville; or her conversation with Marc Maron on his “WTF” podcast. While all undoubtably revere the singer, they’re having too much fun (as is she) for their meetings to be stiffly reverential. Their shared joy is tangible… and a testament to who Mavis Staples is.
With a down-to-earth demeanor that belies her storied career, Grammys and Kennedy Center Honors, Mavis Staples remains grateful. Collaborative. Devoted to faith and family, above all. Her claim to be “just everyday people“ is driven home when Mavis asks producer, Jeff Tweedy, to finish an album of unreleased “Pops” Staples tracks she has held onto for years. Watching her tearfully listen to her father’s voice 15 years after his passing is a profoundly heartbreaking AND happy moment—and so intimate, that to watch it again seems invasive somehow.
‘I’ll never be able to sing like that” said a tearful Janis Joplin backstage at a performance of Mavis’s (shown here with Bonnie Raitt).
Whether singing Gospel, Folk, Blues or R&B, Mavis calls herself a “truth teller”—and the film is a beautiful study in authenticity. But it also—most satisfyingly—shows us a woman with the wink and wonder of a teenager—of which there are many in her audience. At last year’s Bonnaroo festival, she closed "Freedom Highway" (a staple of every concert) by declaring, “I was there. And I’m still here.”
“God is not through with me yet,” declares Mavis. And thank God for that.