>He's moreso Folk music to me, and since not a lot of Black
>people are classified that way, he gets overlooked. Consider
>even his biggest hit and the folksy, brotherly love subject
>matter. A lot of his earlier music did have the R&B aesthetic
>of the time (likely owing to the musicians brought in to work
>on a Black man's album), but songs like Lean On Me and
>Grandma's Hands aren't imo. It's like in the 50's when
>anything sang by a Black person was classified as "R&B" even
>when it was straight up pop ("You Send Me" by Sam Cooke, for
>instance). You classified him with Al Green and Marvin Gaye,
>and it's pretty clear why he isn't classified with them.
>Mainly, they're vocalists... soulful vocalists. Withers
>isn't. His delivery is mad folksy. Al and Marvin amazed
>with that particular aesthetic. Bill didn't with any. He
>wasn't an amazing musician (he actually only started playing
>guitar right before he wrote his first song), he didn't wow
>you with vocal ability. But he wrote songs that could touch
>your heart and that you could relate to. Questo said it
>best:
>“He’s the last African-American Everyman,” says
>Questlove. “Jordan’s vertical jump has to be higher than
>everyone. Michael Jackson has to defy gravity. On the other
>side of the coin, we’re often viewed as primitive animals.
>We rarely land in the middle. Bill Withers is the closest
>thing black people have to a Bruce Springsteen.”
>
>Executive Clarence Avant said Withers' songs were unbelievable
>and **"you had to listen to the lyrics"** Avant said. That's
>another thing that makes him folksy. He's like Bob Dylan,
>but he's a Black male so he ain't elevated to God status in a
>white supremacist society where white people have pretty much
>claimed folk music... plus he didn't stick around as long
>(which is also owed to racist industry politics). I know most
>of yall are non-Black on here at this point, but Black folks
>understand what songs and lyrics of his speak directly to us
>and just how genius a lot of them were. He should be up
>there with Dylan, but.. racism changes things *shrugs*
>
>
>

Great job with this. Pretty much on point with everything you said.

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Mixcloud - www.mixcloud.com/Soultaker/