The Godfather Of Soul has died at the age of 73 this Christmas day.

Well known as an innovator and influence on music for the past 50 years, it was not until very recently that I came to understand who the true James Brown is.

He is a crazy person. A force of nature trapped inside of a man that can only be unleashed in the form of music.

Rolling Stone magazine recently published the article Being James Brown and its a shockingly hilarious look inside the world of the hardest working man in show business. Its a long read, and probably not your idea of holiday entertainment, but unhinged insanity that begins when James Brown enters a room and lingers long after he leaves… well its a good metaphor for his legacy in music as well.

From the article:

James Brown writes a lyric, to record over a long, rambling blues-funk track titled “Message to the World.” For anyone who has ever wondered how James Brown writes a song, I have a sort of answer for you. First: He borrows Mr. Bobbit’s bifocals. James Brown doesn’t have glasses of his own, or left them at home, or something. Second: He borrows a pencil. Third: He sits, and writes, for about fifteen minutes. Then he puts himself behind the microphone. The result is a cascading rant not completely unlike his spoken monologues. Impossible to paraphrase, it meanders over subjects as disparate as his four marriages, Charles Barkley, Al Jarreau, a mixture of Georgia and Carolina identities he calls “Georgia-lina,” the fact that he still knows Maceo Parker and that Fred Wesley doesn’t live very far away, either, Mr. Bobbit’s superiority to him as a checkers player, the fact that he believes himself to have both Asian and Native American ancestry, and, most crucially, his appetite for corn on the cob and its role in his health: “I like corn, that’s a regular thing with me. Gonna live a long time, live a little longer.”

Mr. James Brown will live a little longer. Here he is just a year and a half ago at the Live 8 benefit concert, in top form.

This video a compilation of fan submissions for the Barenaked Ladies Air Guitar contest.

What makes this whole project unique is that BNL went independent for the release of their newest album Barenaked Ladies Are Me. The album is currently available for download without any copy protection on the MP3s.

This is part of the mission of their new label, Nettwerk Music Group. As they say in their mission statement:

…as per Nettwerk copyrights, we have never sued anybody and all our music is open source to encourage fans to share it with others and help us promote our Artists. As per those Artists we manage on other labels (Majors), we take issue with those labels claiming that litigating our fans is in our interest, as it clearly is not.

Since we at Powet.TV are out to change the way people make and watch television, we thought it was only appropriate to spotlight companies changing the way that music fans listen to their favorite artists.

To read more about how BNL has broken away from the mainstream industry (and the success they’ve had doing so), check out this article over at The Future of Music.

Available for only a limited time at the iTunes store, you can get a new short video starring Jack Black and Kyle Gass. Its more or less a commercial for the new Tenacious D album, but its pretty funny. Apparently a much longer version will be available after the album is released.

Click here launch iTunes and download.

Tenacious D – The Pick of Destiny will be released tomorrow!

One Two Three
Mos Def and Talib Kweli
They came to rock it to the top top
Best alliance in Hip Hop

Mike Dreese is the cofounder of Newbury Comics. If you live in New England, you more than likely have heard of this small chain of stores, if you don’t already buy all your cds there regularly. They’ve been around for a long time and are a boon to the local music scene. In the weekly Newbury Comics Newsletter, Mike has written a statement on the recent events concerning the liquidation of Tower Records and the impending closure of the massive Virgin MegaStore at BackBay in Boston.

Newbury Comics has separated itself by not just offering competitively priced music, but also comic books, magazines, toys and much more. They have carved out a niche in a very competitive market that now includes the likes of Best Buy and Wal-mart.

Support your local music stores, kids.

After snagging the new in-store demo download of the America-only sequel to a well-loved Japan-only Nintendo DS rhythm game, SeanOrange and myself do a quick & dirty introduction and comparison of the franchise.

Nearly 3 years after the release of the Black Album, Jay-Z has released a new single.
“Show Me What You Got” is a classic banger from producer Just Blaze, and we could expect nothing less. A video for the song has been shot and will appear on MTV monday, and on YouTube within minutes, no doubt.

Jay-Z’s very public retirement has had him taking over Def Jam and even appearing in NBA Live 07, though few believed he would leave rapping behind, as he continued to appear on albums by the likes of Kanye West and Beyonce.

MTV reports Hova’s long rumoured comeback album, Kingdom Come will be released November 23rd.

Remember that show Friends? Remember Thundercats? Right now you’re only able to think about the memorable theme songs to those shows since in function neither was very good.
As a fitting tribute to terrible animation combined with terrible live action, here is a 90’s band’s cover of an 80’s cartoon theme song.
Apparently this gem is found on the second season dvd set for the Thundercats show. But now thanks to INTER-NET, you can see for free and not pay.
The Rembrandts do “Thundercats”