₦airaland Forum

Quincy Jones, music titan who worked with Michael Jackson and Frank Sinatra, has died.

Jones, whose career spanned seven decades, is known for producing Jackson's historic Thriller album.

Quincy Jones, the music producer and composer, has died at the age of 91.

Jones worked with Michael Jackson, Frank Sinatra, Ray Charles and many other artists.

Among his best-known credits was as the producer of Jackson's historic Thriller album.

Jones oversaw the all-star recording of the 1985 charity record We Are The World.

He also composed the soundtrack to the hit 1969 British film The Italian Job, starring Michael Caine.


His publicist, Arnold Robinson, confirmed Jones died at his Los Angeles home on Sunday surrounded by his family.

In a statement, his family said: "Tonight, with full but broken hearts, we must share the news of our father and brother Quincy Jones's passing.

"And although this is an incredible loss for our family, we celebrate the great life that he lived and know there will never be another like him."

His family added Jones was "truly one of a kind" who they would "miss dearly".

"We take comfort and immense pride in knowing that the love and joy, that were the essence of his being, was shared with the world through all that he created," they added.

"Through his music and his boundless love, Quincy Jones's heart will beat for eternity."

His career, which spans more than 75 years, saw him achieve 28 Grammy award wins out of 80 nominations.

He was named one of the most influential jazz musicians of the 20th century by Time magazine.

Lionel Richie, who co-wrote We Are The World and was among the charity single's featured singers, called Jones "the master

naptu2:
I've got a confession to make. I didn't know the lyrics of this wonderful song when it was released in 1980, so what I used to sing was

I know Farridah.



Then I graduated to "I know Korea", before I eventually got the lyrics.

This was one of those watch night songs.

You see, although there were power cuts back then, it was quite rare for them to last more than 5 hours. The power was usually back after one or two hours. So, if there's a power cut that has gone on for more than 5 hours (especially if they don't bring back the electricity before nightfall) then we'll know that there's a major fault.

Old Man would bring out his battery powered radio and you'll hear this kind of songs. Then they'll announce that there's a fault and tell us exactly when electricity would be restored. And they always restored it when they said that they would.


I can't find the album version, but this is the closest to it.


Quincy Jones - Ai No Corrida (1980)




https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kIuc-wBOa8Y

naptu2:
YES!

YES!

YES!

I'VE FOUND THE ORIGINAL ALBUM VERSION!


Quincy Jones - Ai No Corrida (1981).


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NVTVheyDY4s?si=smCo5q7kYpyPrm67

naptu2:
AT LAST! AT LAST!

This is the album version!

Quincy Jones - Ai No Corrida (1981)



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NVTVheyDY4s?si=smCo5q7kYpyPrm67

This brings back so many memories.


Everybody

♪Back
Back on the block
Back
Back on the block

Back, on the block, so we can rock
With the soul, rhythm, blues, be bop and hip hop
Back on the block
Back on the block

Ice-T

Ice-T, let me kick my credentials
A young player, bred in South Central
L.A., home of the body bag
You wanna die, wear the wrong color rag

I used to walk in stores and yell, "Lay down"
You flinch an inch AK spray down
But I was lucky 'cause I never caught the hard time
I was blessed with the skill to bust a dope rhyme

All my homies died or caught the penzo
Lost their diamonds, cops towed their Benzos
Livin' that life that we thought was it
Fast lanin', but the car flipped

I'm not gonna lie to ya, 'cause I don't lie
I just kick thick game, some people say why?
'Cause I'm back on the block, I got my life back
So I school the fools about the fast track

I get static from the style of my technique
Profanity, the blatant way in which I speak
But the Dude knows the streets ain't no kiddie game
You don't know the Dude? Quincy's his first name

He told me, Ice, keep doin' what you're doin', man
Don't give a damn if the squares don't understand
You let 'em tell you what to say and what to write
Your whole career'll be over by tomorrow night

Rap from your heart, and your heart's with the street
Rap on my record, man, Kimiko, send Ice the beat
The Dude is def no doubt, what can I say?
The man can roll with Ice-T or Michael J

Chorus

Back
Back on the block
Back
Back on the block

Back, on the block, so we can rock
With the soul, rhythm, blues, be bop and hip hop
Back on the block
Back on the block

Melle Mel

I'm back, on the block, on the screen
I'm on the wax, I'm on the stage, I'm on the scene
I'm on the case, just like an attorney
The Dude took me on a magic journey

To dance in France, alone in Rome
On the farmlands of Nebraska, the cold of Alaska
The heat of the motherland to be with my brother man
On top of a snowcapped mountain I'm scoutin'

What another man saw in a race of people
To see him give his life for the price of equal
The highest wisdoms, the richest kingdoms
The song of songs we heard David sing them

He showed me me when I was young and hung out
He showed me makin' love, even showed me strung out
He showed me poppin' nines, standin' on a rock
But tears came to my eyes when he showed me my block

Chorus

Ba-ba-back on the
Ba-back on
Ba-ba-back on the block
Ba-ba-back on
Ba-ba-back on the block

Tevin Campbell (and the Andrea Crouch Choir)

Stokie's just Stokie, mama
(Stokie's Stokie)
And one by one each woman he kiss
(He kiss her and she gon' fall in love)
Stokie's just Stokie, you know?
(Stokie's Stokie)
Till someone shows that they care enough
(Ain't nothin' gonna bother Stokie much)

Some say they can't take it no more
(Comin' here, comin' here startin' stuff)
But Dude is back on duty fo' sho'
(Back on the block to stay)
They say he ain't gonna be with it
(Comin' back, comin' back to the street)
But Dude he know you'll never forget it
(Back on the block to stay)

Big Daddy Kane

Back up and give the brother room
To let poetry bloom to whom it may concern or consume
As I reminisce before this the bliss that exist
But now we brought about a twist

'Cause I remember reading of my people bleedin'
Put through slavery and killed for bravery
We shoulda got our freedom much sooner
You never seen a Blackman on The Honeymooners

But now somehow we've learned to earn, to grow, to show
The elevation of a people built is so

Jesse Jackson, Miss America a black one
No more livin' for just a small fraction

I was once told by the Dude that knowledge is a food
To nourish, so to conclude
This from an Asiatic descendant, Big Daddy is shocked
Yo Q, we back on the block

Chorus

Back
Back on the block
Back
Back on the block

Back, on the block, so we can rock
With the soul, rhythm, blues, be bop and hip hop
Back on the block
Back on the block

Kool Moe Dee

An everlasting omnipresence is my present
State of being, seeing the unpleasant
Sight of righteous souls live like peasants
The mind stunts growth in adolescence

My insight enables me to enlight
The weakest of minds, and I put 'em in flight
As I transcend, a-scend or de-scend
Re-create, re-incarnate and re-send

The powerful spirits of our ancestors
For those that don't know how God blessed us
Because man messed up, the media dressed up
Lies perpetrated as truth, and it left us

Confused, but I've seen it all before
From Babylon to the Third World War
I'm more than a man, I'm more like an entity
Back on the block, and this time my identity is the Dude

Chorus

Ba-ba-back on the
Ba-back on
Ba-ba-back on the block
Ba-ba-back on
Ba-ba-back on the block

Tevin Campbell (and the Andrea Crouch Choir)

Stoki, ke Stoki, mai-bo
(Stoki, Stoki)
Wam babma, wam bamb'u mandisa
(Wahm bamba wahm bamboo mandisa)
Stoki, ke Stoki, mai-bo
(Stoki, Stoki)
Wam babma, wam bamb'u mandisa
(Wahm bamba wahm bamboo mandisa)

M'yeke, yeke, yeke, wena
(Kha'mye, kha'myeke wena)
Yo khala, khala, khala, u mama
(Yo khal'u mama khe)

M'yeke, yeke, yeke, wena
(Kha'mye, kha'myeke, wena)
Yo khala, kha, 'yok 'shaya u baba
(Yok shaya u baba khe)

(Ooh wow ooh wow ah, ooh yeah e yeah e ah)

Back on the block
Ba-ba-back on the
Ba-ba-back on the block
Ba-ba-back on
Ba-ba-back on the block
Ba-ba-back on the
Ba-ba-back on the block
Ba-ba-back on the block

Quincy Jones

Now I would, I would contend that ah
The rappers rap is here to stay♫

Quincy Jones ft Ice T, Big Daddy Kane, Kool Moe Dee and Melle Mel - Back on The Block (1989).

Album version

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5LayBnihUGo

Video version

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vsTgD1OEeic

naptu2:
It's from a VHS tape that has been watched too many times, so the audio is almost gone, but it is sure worth watching it again.

The only thing that I don't like about this performance is the way Melle Mel cut off Tevin Campbell at the end.

Melle Mel and Quincy Jones did the intro and then the main song began.


Quincy Jones featuring Ice T, The Andrae Crouch Choir, Tevin Campbell, Melle Mel and Big Daddy Kane - Back on The Block live on the Arsenio Hall Show.



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GmBOR1n247g

naptu2:
This. Is. Perfection!

If you didn't hear me before, I said, THIS IS PERFECTION!


This was my introduction to Michael Jackson (the solo artiste) and it left me wowed. The video was perfect (to my 1980 mind), the tuxedo was perfect, the dance steps were perfect, then just listen to the music!

I play music and I have noticed something that happens in my head. I separate songs into each musical instrument and I study what each instrument does line by line. I once made money off a friend of mine because I told him that a certain song contains a certain line (on the keyboard) and he didn't believe me so we had a bet. That line was quite obscure, but he heard it when I played the song to him and I won my money.


The arrangement of this song is excellent. Every instrument is excellent. The percussion is unbelievable.

This (and the video in the last post) is how videos were before Thriller.

Do you know that there is a Nigerian version of this song? I'll post a video of the Nigerian version one day.


Michael Jackson - Don't Stop Till You Get Enough (1979)

naptu2:
This song is absolutely perfect. The video is perfect, the arrangement is perfect, the dancing is perfect and the singing is perfect. Everything is just perfect.

This was my inteoduction to Michael Jackson (as a solo artiste). The Nigerian version of this song will be in my next post.


Michael Jackson - Don't Stop Till You Get Enough (1979).


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yURRmWtbTbo

naptu2:
These are the super legends, but did you hear the name of the conductor of one of the orchestras? It was a certain Quincy Jones.


I didn't know that Johnny Carson could sing. He sang with the super legends!

Frank Sinatra, Sammy Davis Junior, Dean Martin and Johnny Carson - The Birth of The Blues (1965).



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PvY8o1UYw6s

naptu2:
Quincy Jones featuring Ray Charles and Chaka Khan - I'll Be Good To You (1989).


Original video


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LLys45McU8g


Audio


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m3qo3sZZyps

naptu2:
Images of starving Ethiopian kids, some of them too weak swat away flies from their face, circulated widely in 1984. The BBC was very instrumental in spreading these images. They produced several news clips about the civil war, separatist movement, drought, famine and devastation in Ethiopia. Those clips left me with the impression that Ethiopia was a desert country that was perpetually at war.

These news items about poverty, starvation and suffering moved an Irish musician named Bob Geldoff to want to do something about it. He mobilised the most famous British and Irish musicians to record an album to raise funds to provide food, drugs and other aid to suffering people in Ethiopia.

This led to the creation of the super group called Band Aid and a humongously popular song that was number 1 at Christmas in 1984. The song was produced by Midge Ure and Band Aid were:

•Robert "Kool" Bell (Kool & the Gang)
•Bono (U2)
•Pete Briquette (The Boomtown Rats)
•Adam Clayton (U2)
•Phil Collins (Genesis and solo artist)
•Chris Cross (Ultravox)
•Simon Crowe (The Boomtown Rats)
•Sarah Dallin (Bananarama)
•Siobhan Fahey (Bananarama)
•Johnny Fingers (The Boomtown Rats)
•Bob Geldof (The Boomtown Rats)
•Boy George (Culture Club)
•Glenn Gregory (Heaven 17)
•Tony Hadley (Spandau Ballet)
•John Keeble (Spandau Ballet)
•Gary Kemp (Spandau Ballet)
•Martin Kemp (Spandau Ballet)
•Simon Le Bon (Duran Duran)
•Marilyn
•George Michael (Wham!)
•Jon Moss (Culture Club)
•Steve Norman (Spandau Ballet)
•Rick Parfitt (Status Quo)
•Nick Rhodes (Duran Duran)
•Francis Rossi (Status Quo)
•Sting (The Police)
•Andy Taylor (Duran Duran)
•James "J.T." Taylor (Kool & the Gang)
•John Taylor (Duran Duran)
•Roger Taylor (Duran Duran)
•Dennis Thomas (Kool & the Gang)
•Midge Ure (Ultravox)
•Martyn Ware (Heaven 17)
•Jody Watley
•Paul Weller (The Style Council)
•Keren Woodward (Bananarama)
•Paul Young

And shoutouts from
•Stuart Adamson, Mark Brzezicki, Tony Butler, Bruce Watson (Big Country)
•David Bowie
•Holly Johnson (Frankie Goes to Hollywood)
•Paul McCartney

Many other famous artistes contributed other songs to the album.

This is the original video.

Band Aid – Do They Know It's Christmas? (1984)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zc8TYsYb5i0

---

Band Aid inspired the American singer, Harry Belafonte to do something similar in the US. Belafonte has always been involved in African-American civil rights issues in America and in the fight against apartheid and poverty in Africa (Belafonte is of Jamaican descent).

Belafonte was able to get many famous American singers to form the super group United Support Artistes For Africa (USA For Africa). They got Quincy Jones to produce the song and Michael Jackson and Lionel Richie to write it.

(Many other famous artistes, e.g. Prince, contributed songs to the album).

USA For Africa were:


• Lionel Richie
• Stevie Wonder
• Paul Simon
• Kenny Rogers
• James Ingram
• Tina Turner
• Billy Joel
• Michael Jackson
• Diana Ross
• Dionne Warwick
• Willie Nelson
• Al Jarreau
• Bruce Springsteen
• Kenny Loggins
• Steve Perry
• Daryl Hall
• Huey Lewis
• Cyndi Lauper
• Kim Carnes
• Bob Dylan
• Ray Charles


• Dan Aykroyd
• Harry Belafonte
• Lindsey Buckingham
• Mario Cipollina
• Johnny Colla
• Sheila E.
• Bob Geldof
• Bill Gibson
• Chris Hayes
• Sean Hopper
• Jackie Jackson
• La Toya Jackson
• Marlon Jackson
• Randy Jackson
• Tito Jackson
• Waylon Jennings
• Bette Midler
• John Oates
• Jeffrey Osborne
• The Pointer Sisters
• Smokey Robinson

This is the original video.

USA For Africa – We Are The World (1985)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0YShXibdWYk

---

The Canadians (Bryan Adams, etc.) also got together and produced this wonderful song (Gosh! I LOVE the chorus of this song).

Northern Lights are:

•Bryan Adams
•John Candy
•Joni Mitchell
•Burton Cummings
•Anne Murray
•Gordon Lightfoot
•Mike Reno (Loverboy) with Liberty Silver
•Carroll Baker, Ronnie Hawkins and Murray McLauchlan
•Véronique Béliveau, Robert Charlebois and Claude Dubois (in French)
•Bryan Adams with Donny Gerrard (Skylark)
•Alfie Zappacosta with Lisa Dal Bello
•Carole Pope (Rough Trade) and Paul Hyde (The Payola$)
•Salome Bey, Mark Holmes (Platinum Blonde) and Lorraine Segato (The Parachute Club)
•Tom Cochrane (Red Rider)
•Tommy Hunter
•Martha Johnson
•Eugene Levy
•Frank Mills
•Kim Mitchell
•Paul Shaffer
•Graham Shaw
•Jane Siberry
•Sylvia Tyson
•Barry Harris
•Catherine O'Hara
•Wayne St. John

Northern Lights – Tears Are Not Enough (1985)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VJN3u1wAWIk?si=kyliZenoGbeOGR5R

naptu2:
It's past 6pm on a Friday. If this was any time between 1982 and 1985, you'd hear this song on TV.

naptu2:
Lagos Weekend Television - all night

Ernie Watts - Chariots of Fire (Qwest Records. 1982).


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UMIKJG3uUWQ

GavelSlam:
https://news.sky.com/story/quincy-jones-music-titan-who-worked-with-michael-jackson-and-frank-sinatra-has-died-13248095

GavelSlam:
https://news.sky.com/story/quincy-jones-music-titan-who-worked-with-michael-jackson-and-frank-sinatra-has-died-13248095