Living in America was composed by Dan Hartman and Charlie Midnight and performed by James Brown; it was released as a single in 1985 and reached no. 4 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart. The song entered the Billboard Top 40 on January 11, 1986, and remained on the chart for 11 weeks. It also became a top five hit in the UK, peaking at no. 5 on the UK Singles Chart; his only top 10 single in the UK. It was his first Top 40 hit in ten years in the US, and it would also be his last. In 1986, it was nominated for a Grammy Award for Best R&B Song and won Brown a Grammy Award for Best Male R&B Vocal Performance.
The song was of course prominently featured in the film Rocky IV. In the film, Brown sings the song before Apollo Creed enters the boxing ring, in reference to the character's patriotism. The single version appeared on the Rocky IV soundtrack album, with the full 5 minute 58 second version of the song being included on Brown's 1986 album, Gravity, and on various compilations throughout the 1990s. Live performances of the song appear on the albums Soul Session Live and Live at the Apollo1995.
Between 1966 and 1970, James Brown released three Christmas-themed albums; Christmas Songs, ASoulful Christmas and Hey America.
The records are a mix of Christmas standards (The Christmas Song, Charles Brown's Merry ChristmasBaby), Christmas-themed throwaways ("Santa Claus Go Straight to the Ghetto, Go Power at ChristmasTime), obvious filler ("hey, let's do a blues vamp, throw snatches of vibraphone that quote Rudoloph theRed-Nosed Reindeer" and title it something seasonal like, uh, I don't know, maybe Believers Shall Enjoy (Non-Believers Shall Suffer)) and stuff that has no obvious reason for being on a Christmas album (Say ItLoud (I'm Black & I'm Proud)).
In some ways, they represent James's songwriting at its worst-- the lyrics usually sound like they were entirely ad-libbed-- but his gifts as a singer, a star and a bandleader are such that the records are pretty enjoyable. I was planning to post a bunch of rips, but I discovered that all of the tracks I wanted to post except one are currently available, including a gang that had been left off Rhino's classic James Brown Xmas reissue. So instead, I'll post the one omission and run down some other faves:
This is one of my favorite James Brown songs; when I listen to it, I feel transported. I can't explain why I find it so affecting, but for a few minutes I feel flush with benevolence and optimism like, hey, maybe we all can get along. Really.
I'm Your Christmas Friend, Don't Be Hungry
James's tendency towards maudlin sentimentality on these Christmas records can get really silly, especially when a song also includes lines like "I do the monkey, the mashed potato/Whenever I'm blue", but he infuses the "I'm your friend/I'm your friend" refrain with so much soul that it really moves me.
This song probably contains more WTF? moments than any other James Brown song, and that is saying something. James begins with a shout to those who've come to see him in concert in the past year, riffing about having seen "a million peace signs", before briefly slipping into some Christian fare ("God gave his son, let us celebrate") and then launching a hail of multi-cultural catchphrases, shouting "as salaam aleikum" and "danke schön" (which he pronounces "donkey Sean") and then singing snatches of ethnic-themed supper-club fare (Hava Nagila and Volare).
Mother Popcorn (You Got to Have a Mother for Me) is a song recorded by James Brown and released as a two-part single in 1969. It was featured on the album It's A Mother and was recorded at the legendary King studios in Cincinnati. If you think it sounds familiar, it owes a lot to Cold Sweat and I Don't Want Nobody To Give Me Nothing; the man Brown loved to recycle his grooves. A no.1 R&B and no.11 Pop hit in the U.S., it was the highest-charting of a series of recordings inspired by the popular dance the Popcorn which Brown made that year, including The Popcorn, Lowdown Popcorn, and Let a Man Come In and Do the Popcorn.
Vicki Anderson recorded an answer song, catchily titled Answer to Mother Popcorn (I Got a Mother for You), also in 1969.
Incidentally The "Mother" part of the song's title was, in the words of The One: The Life and Music of James Brown author RJ Smith: "[Brown's] honorific for a big butt".
