One of the last of the original great soul stars has died. Apparently he was on the way to a gig in Amsterdam and died today at the airport in the Netherlands.
Solomon Burke had many soul hits through the 1960's, most notably "Cry To Me," "Goodbye Baby (Baby Goodbye)" and "Everybody Needs Somebody To Love," which has been covered by everyone from The Rolling Stones to The Blues Brothers. Burke was equally at home as a soul shouter or singing beautiful ballads, and the line between church music and soul music was especially thin for him, as he was a deeply religious man. Interestingly, he also worked as an undertaker, even after his soul stardom.
Burke experienced a surprising and welcomed career revival this last decade with the release of a series of outstanding modern soul records which were modernized in all of the right ways while keeping the warmth of classic soul intact. Burke was one of those rare artists whose vocal powers remained intact as he aged. Two highly recommended records are Don't Give Up On Me (2002) and Make Do With What You Got (2005). Forget the usual caveat of "these are great considering how old he is" or anything along those lines. These are two straight up killer soul records, regardless of time period. Of course, it helps that he had a stellar group of admiring songwriters who contributed new or unreleased tunes for him to sing (these, for the most part, are not simply covers of well known tunes), including Van Morrison, Elvis Costello, Tom Waits, Brian Wilson, Bob Dylan and Nick Lowe. But Burke puts his warm and emotional stamp on all of them. His version of The Band's "It Makes No Difference" is gorgeous.
ABOVE: Here is the video for his tune "None of Us Are Free" (performing with The Blind Boys of Alabama) from 2002's Don't Give Up On Me, a surperior modern soul record.
RIP Solomon Burke.
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