Episode notes
The Albums:
- Aretha Franklin: Young, Gifted, and Black (1974)
- Aretha Franklin: Jazz to Soul (1994)
- Aretha Franklin: Rare & Unreleased Recordings from the Golden Reign of the Queen of Soul (2007)
Heat Rocks had always planned to sit down with DJ Lynnée Denise, an LA-based DJ and music scholar, but when Aretha Franklin passed on August 16th, we invited her to come talk with us about the Queen’s life and legacy as part two of our series Women Behaving Boldly.
What a fantastic decision!
Admittedly, Queen Aretha’s discography is too vast and too fire to be discussed on just one show so we cherry picked our favorite heat rocks: Oliver (The Queen in Waiting – The Columbia Years), Morgan (Rare & Unreleased Recordings from the Golden Reign of the Queen of Soul) and DJ Lynnée Denise (Young, Gifted and Black).
The three of us, brought together by a shared love and reverence for the Queen talked about her incredible voice and gift of interpretation and DJ Lynnée unpacked the Aretha’s relationship with the church, with Detroit, with her instrument(s), with black folks and of course, her place in the canon of music.
Heat Rocks is thankful for an opportunity to spend an hour talking about the undisputed Queen of Soul Aretha Franklin, with DJ Lynnée Denise who dropped some nuggets of wisdom on us.
More on Lynnée Denise
Our favorite Aretha performances
- Soul Train (1973)
- Blues Brothers (1980)
- The 1998 Grammys
More on Aretha
- Aretha’s Wikipedia Entry
- “At Aretha Franklin’s Funeral, Gospel was the Heart – and Backbone” (NPR)
- “Soul Survivor: The Revival and Hidden Treasure of Aretha Franklin”
Additional Aretha Links
- Aretha Franklin in Pictures (CBS News)
- With George Michael “I Knew You Were Waiting for Me”
- Freeway of Love
Show Tracklisting (all songs by Aretha Franklin unless indicated otherwise):
- I Never Loved A Man (The Way I Love You)
- Rock Steady
- EPMD: I’m Housin’
- Rock Steady
- Young, Gifted and Black
- Soulville
- Border Song (Holy Moses)
- The Long and Winding Road
- At Last (Let Me In Your Life Outtake)
- Nina Simone: To Be Young, Gifted and Black
- Young, Gifted and Black
- Elton John: Young, Gifted and Black
- The Heptones: Young, Gifted and Black
- Bob and Marcia: To Be Young Gifted and Black
- I’ve Been Loving You Too Long
- Day Dreaming
- Just for a Thrill
- Drinking Again
- This Bitter Earth
- Jump To It
- One Step Ahead
- Mos Def: Ms. Fat Booty
- Ain’t But the One
- I Never Loved A Man (The Way I Love You) [Demo]
- At Last (Let Me In Your Life Outtake)
- So Soon
- Rock Steady (Alternate Mix)
- Are You Leaving Me [Demo]
Here is the Spotify playlist of as many songs as we can find on there.
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In this episode...
Guests
- Lynnée Denise
About the show
Hosted by Oliver Wang and Morgan Rhodes, every episode of Heat Rocks invites a special guest to talk about a heat rock – a hot album, a scorching record. These are in-depth conversations about the albums that shape our lives.
Our guests include musicians, writers, and scholars and though we don’t exclusively focus on any one genre, expect to hear about albums from the worlds of soul, hip-hop, funk, jazz, Latin, and more.
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