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Sweet Sweetback Baadass Song

Don´t Play Us Cheap

Music by Melvin Van Peebles

"Dedicated to all the Brothers

and sisters who had enough of the Man"

Watershed and driver to the Black Power film, Sweet Sweetback Baadasss Song (1971) was a independent landmark by contesting the production, distribution and advertise instituted on the movie industry.

Almost as a rule in the independent film, Van Peebles, wrote, produced, directed, starred and composed its soundtrack. And the music, very present in Sweetback, is also a constituent part of its structure. Dissonances, opposed music lines, dialogues and sound effects (sirens constantly chasing Sweetback) among many numbers of gospel speeches, make up the track in chaotic overlays. The basis of the score is a powerful bass sustaining several passages. Sometimes randomly, others with more musical consistency (as Hoppin 'John), but Van Peebles avoids the conventional, as the protagonist runs from police.

"Come on feet, of your thing. We know the whities game"

The group Earth Wind and Fire participates in the dynamic instrumentals with emphasis on the jazz-pop sympathy of Sweetback's Theme, Mojo Woman and Come on Feet Do Your Thing. With its distressing urgency the score never meant to please but to integrate Van Peebles "film manifest" with the vigor needed for the occasion.

Living in France in the late 60s, Van Peebles made translations of MAD magazine for the French. He remembers the session "Scenes We´d Like to See" when commenting on Sweetback. "I made a film with scenes that I would like to see and never had a chance"

The double CD edition in the Fantasy label entitled The Melvin Van Peebles Collection also features the soundtrack for the musical comedy Don´t Play Us Cheap (1972). Exploring many musical styles it includes doo-woop vocal numbers, instrumental blues, traditional jazz, gospel, rhythm'n'blues, electric soul-jazz, and great satirical moments in a rich and incredibly comprehensive display of the North American black music.