Rant #2,204: I Say a Little Prayer

The Queen is gone. Long live the queen.

Aretha Franklin died yesterday after a long battle with cancer.

Franklin, 76, had been in ill health with a number of ailments over the recent years, but pancreatic cancer finally got her.

We all know about her legacy as probably the greatest female singer of her generation, and of any generation, and one of the great singers of all time, right up there with the likes of Frank Sinatra.

Her genre was soul, she defined the sound by helping to create the genre--one that mixed pop, rock, rhythm and blues and gospel into a potent musical composte--and few could compare with her pipes, which seemed to be made for this then-new musical category.

There are obituaries all around since her death, and here, I am not going to go into depth on information you either know or can learn by reading these obits.

We all know the story. Born in Memphis, but growing up in Detroit with her minister father and musical sisters--who had their own careers and sang backup on most of her hits--the family was steeped in gospel due to Rev. Franklin's affiliation with the cloth.

She was a rebel from the get go, having her first child at 12 years old, yet seeking solace in her father's church, and then being the first of the siblings to try and break away from the church with secular recordings.

She was signed to Columbia Records, who looked at her as something of a black Barbra Streisand. The label--which was anti-rock at the time--released several singles and albums of her work, but could not get that precious hit record. Singing standards, she was like a fish out of water, and while she gave it her all, her gospel roots and her voice were not being utilized correctly at Columbia.

She then moved to Atlantic, which saw what they had, and was more suited to exploit it with the perfect songs to suit her voice.

And with the move to Columbia, she had an epic run of hit singles and albums that defined what soul music was and will always be--roots music, music that explored the heart and, yes, the soul.

The rest is history. She sang for Presidents and common folk, steeped in soul but never losing her gospel roots.

She was a singer's singer, and had hits in the 1960s through the 1990s, won Emmy Awards, and won universal acclaim.

I had originally planned to do my every-once-in-a-while look back at the Billboard Hot 100 today, the week of August 17, 1968, but when it was announced that Franklin had passed, I thought about what I should do today to honor her.

I decided to continue to look at that chart--which was topped by the Rascals' "People Got To Be Free" at No. 1--but look at it a bit differently.

Normally, I go over the Top 10, look at the top debuting single of the week, and finally, look at the top moving up the chart single of the week, but this week, I wanted to focus on Franklin, and her presence on that very chart.

It just so happens that while she had no Top 10 single this week, she did have the top debuting single on the chart, with "The House That Jack Built" making its chart debut at No. 59. a song that would eventually reach a high position of No. 6 a few weeks later.

But Franklin was so popular at the time, and both A and B sides of her singles were getting airplay, not unlike what was happening with the Beatles and a select few other acts way back when.

So while "The House That Jack Built" was getting strong sales and airplay, so was the B side of the single, "I Say a Little Prayer," which debuted at No. 82.

That side of the single would eventually rise to No. 10, and with it, that single became one of many two-sided hits that the "Queen of Soul" had during this period.

On the Top 200 album chart of the week--which was topped by Cream's "Wheel of Fire"--she had the No. 3 LP of the week with "Aretha Now," the No. 15 album with "Aretha: Lady Soul," and the No. 148 album on the chart with "I Never Loved a Man the Way I Loved You."

So all told, Franklin had a total of five entries on the chart this week, demonstrating just how popular she was way back when.

But the incredible thing is that the popularity lasted 50 years into the future.

No, she wasn't having hit after hit as she had during the mid to late 1960s, but when you thought of the greatest living singer, period, well, up until yesterday, it had to be Franklin.

Hands down, no argument about it.

Speak to you again on Monday. Have a great weekend.