Funk Me or Mass Suicide: I remember Donny Hathaway...

I was a big fan of Dr. Dre's The Chronic shortly after it was released, and it was the first album to make a big fan of music out of me. by age of 11. Not only did Dre's and Snoop Dogg's hardcore attitude and style made an impression (toughened me up while scaring me shitless at the same time), the sampled and interpolated music hinted that there was life beyond the Thunderdome.

It was also the first time that I paid attention to an album's liner notes. It was here that I could learn of Parliament-Funkadelic's influence on the album; a group that I, regrettably, never heard of until that point. Another name that is mentioned twice is Donny Hathaway. His recording, including his vocal, was sampled on the track "Lil' Ghetto Boy", the last song Side A (I'd only had a dubbed cassette of Side A from The Chronic, so it was the last song of the album for me). The source comes from a song of the same name from 1972, but sounds as if Hathaway right there in the studio recording with Dre and Snoop and contained the most haunting vibrato I've ever heard up until in that point:

"Little ghetto boooooooooyyyy, playin' in the ghetto streeeeeeeeeet.
What you going to when you grow up, and have to face responsibilityyyyyyyyyy?"

I kinda felt like he was singing to me.

Years past, and when I finally had money to buy my own CDs (16, believe it or not) I hunted any album I could find at the Barnes and Noble at Har Mar Mall in Roseville, and found A Donny Hathaway Collection. However, this compilation was nothing like I expected. It had no photos of him, just a portrait painting of his face on the cover. There were no liner notes bio to tell me about who he really was. I didn't even find the funk or the breaks that I was hoping for, except for "The Ghetto" and "This Christmas," the best Xmas song ever. Yet, I had a completely different experience; an experience of learning what pain meant through song.

The collection opened up with his cover of Leon Russel's "A Song for You". Upbeat, it isn't, but by the he wails:

"Hiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii-I love you in a place, where there's no space or time."

I imagined having a broken heart, with a tummy ache yet all you have is your voice. It made me want to be alone while listening, for tears just might fall down my eyes. Where was this source of sorrow coming from in this man's music?

Well, after further reading about him, I learned that he was born in Chicago 1945, and went to Howard University to study music. He returned to Chicago, and released his solo debut album in 1970 , Everything is Everything, an album that contained the hit "The Ghetto" and put him in a wave of Soul singer/songwriters that included fwllow contemporaries Sly Stone, Curtis Mayfield, Isaac Hayes, Marvin Gaye, Aretha Franklin, the Isley Brothers" and Stevie Wonder who sought artistic control and direction of their music.

He was also played keyboards on Aretha Franklin's album Young Gifted and Black that teamed him up with Aretha on piano, Chuck Rainey on bass, Cornell Dupree on guitar, and Bernard Purdie on drums. This "best-lineup-ever" recorded the hits "Daydreaming" and "Rock Steady".

Hathaway slowly withdrew from the music business in the mid-70s, although recorded a hit with his long-tine duet partner Roberta Flack with "The Closer I Get to You" in 1978. Sadly Hathaway fell to his deah from a hotel window in 1979. It was not known if it was an accident, suicide, or murder, but it was know that he had been suffering from depression, and even possibly schizophrenia, for the past several years. His children which includes Lalah Hathaway, continues to carry his music legacy.

Donny, we hardly knew you.

"The Ghetto" (1970)

Donny Hathaway .The Ghetto [Live]
Uploaded by capitainfunkk

"Put Your Hand In the Hand" (1971)