Filed under: Editor Picks | Tags: Black Panther Party, Chris Rock, Civil Rights, Colin Powell, Condoleeza Rice, Editor's Picks, Elaine Brown, George Jackson, Henry Louis Gates Jr., Huey P. Newton, Jonathan Jackson, Kanye West, Seize the Time, Until We're Free
Elaine Brown's music is the Civil Rights era's underappreciated Molotov cocktail
PREVIEW: DOWNLOAD Elaine Brown’s “Seize the Time” MP3
“Yet, I see they’ve taken liberties / With your souls and your lives.” Elaine Brown led the Black Panther Party from 1974 to 1977, while party leader Huey P. Newton was in Cuba on the run. These lines from the title track of her 1969 album Seize the Time effectively map out Brown’s party, life and activism.
Brown’s music is explicitly African American. In “The Panther” she describes her “hero” clearly: “His name is man / His face is black.” On her second full-length release, 1973’s Until We’re Free, she sings love ballads to dedicated revolutionaries (criminals in the American political structure) George Jackson and his brother Jonathan. Continue reading
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