Soul Is Suffering Already.

If Soul is undying, how can its Godfather pass away?

Now that Soul is no longer protected by the firm hand and strong, yet flexible legs of Mr. James Brown, we need to be careful we don't accidentally sell it. Soul Brother No. 1 won't be around to keep sleazy boys from hitting on your sexy, but too-trusting soul. Mr. Dynamite can't blow the back of your soul open with the forceful demand to, "Hit me!" The hardest working man in show business has retired and left you with the keys to the store.

James Brown was born in a one-room shack in South Carolina and brought up in his aunt's brothel. At one point, his clothes were so tattered and old that his school told him not to come back. It was when he first went to prison that he started singing in a gospel group and from then on, he helped to raise soul music, all of our souls and Soul with encouragement, precision, freedom, discipline and love. If we're gonna get out of our own one-room shacks, away from the brothels and the prisons of our own experience, we have to treat our soul with as much attention and care our Godfather did. As one reader wished for Chistmas, we have to "stop being scared, stop making excuses, and stop taking the easy way out." (thanks, jf.)