Fifty songs that were part of rhythm and blues heritage but which didn’t fully find a mainstream audience until they were remade.
In the way its music was presented and the universal themes its artists sang of, Motown broke racial barriers to move everyone, no matter their skin colour.
Hip-hop has always been politically charged, but with racial and social divisions becoming ever more fractured, conscious hip-hop is making a return.
Robert Glasper talks about R+R=NOW’s debut album, ‘Collagically Speaking’, and why it’s rare to be “so good at what you do but with no ego”.
With ‘Sweet Sweetback’s Baadasssss Song’, Melvin Van Peebles kick-started the Blaxploitation genre with a gritty movie and an equally baadasssss soundtrack.
From a tiny $800 loan, Berry Gordy turned Motown into the biggest African-American business of its era, paving the way for black-owned labels that followed.
