Al Green - Talk to Me

With increasing middle class prosperity, the 1920s saw a rise in consumer oriented culture. As buying on credit became the norm, families purchased new, or newly affordable, technologies such as cars, washing machines, refrigerators, radios, and toasters. Women, both black and white, enjoyed new means of self expression during the decade that started with being granted the right to vote. Some paid more attention to clothing and cosmetics, wore scandalously short dresses, men’s hats, and smoked cigarettes. Women, and men, enjoyed the new freedoms afforded by developments in birth control and its gradual acceptance in society.

The blues queens embodied these changes in society. They were glamorous pop stars who performed and appeared in photographs wearing glitzy dresses and jewelry. They headlined large shows that included dancers, comedians, and other entertainers... No longer beholden to the tropes of minstrelsy, blues queens presented themselves as sophisticated professionals. Race records advertisements sometimes included minstrel imagery, but many featured realistic portraits of the artists.

Before the advent of race records, companies marketed all different music styles in one catalog, separating only classical music. They made and sold records aligned with their perception of the tastes of the urban middle class, primarily vaudeville, Tin Pan Alley, brass bands, classical, opera, and Broadway. The new race records applied the principles of ethnic niche markets on a much grander scale.

Source: Blues Queens and Race Records in the 1920s by Matthew Sabatella

Al Green - Talk to Me

• Written by: Joe Seneca
• Released on: Green Is Blues qlbum
• Released on: April 1969

"Al Green was known as both a hitmaker and an artist who released consistently engaging, frequently excellent, critically acclaimed albums. His hits continued uninterrupted through the next two years, all becoming Top Ten gold singles."

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