Nina by Langston, 1965

I have had this Nina Simone EP (thats an Extended Play, 4 track 45rpm record, 2 tracks each side, for any new kids who never know vinyl records) since I was a teenager in 1965. 
We loved Nina back then, particularly her "I Put A Spell On You" which hit the charts, and this title track: "Don't Let Me Be Misunderstood") as per my recent post on her, see label. The other tracks are "The Laziest Gal In Town" (a Marlene Dietrich classic), "Don't Take All Night" and "Nobody". 

Looking at it now, the sleeve notes by Langston Hughes capture it all perfectly, even now, 50 years later.....

"She is strange. So are the plays of Brendan Behan, Jean Genet, LeRoi Jones, and Bertholt Brecht.

She is far-out, and at the same time common. So are raw eggs in Worcestershire and The Connection.

She is different. So was Billie Holiday, St Francis, and John Donne. So in Mort Sahl. She is a club member, a coloured girl, an Afro-American, a homey from Down Home. She has hit the Big Town, the big towns, the LP discs and the TV shows – and she is still from down home. She did it mostly all by herself. Her name is Nina Simone.

She has a flair, but no air, she has class but does not wear it on her shoulders. Only chips. She is unique. You either like her or you don’t. If you don’t, you won’t. If you do – whee-ouuu-eu!  You do!

Why should one like Nina Simone because she sings a song differently? Plenty of singers sing songs differently. But many singers strain so hard to be different, pay arrangers so much money to make their songs sound different, but have no convictions themselves about what they are singing, and so seem hollow, artificial, fake, and wrong when they sing a song. Nina Simone is as different as beer is from champagne, crackers from crepes suzettes, Eastland from Adam Powell, Houston from Paris – each real in their way, but oh! how different – and how fake it is if it is not Houston you want, but the “city of light”.

The letters l-i-v-e that spell LIVE mean exactly the same as the letters N-i-n-a that spell NINA. As for that word SIMONE, be cool Jack, be cool! And listen to this record." 

Hughes (1902-1967) was a well known  poet, activist, novelist and playwright, who ticked all the boxes: black and gay (like James Baldwin or Billy Strayhorn, also popular at that time). He died aged 65 in 1967, 

Nina puts a spell on you ...

My pal Martin has been raving (and raving) about that new Nina Simone (1933-2003) documentary WHAT HAPPENED, MISS SIMONE? so its got me compiling some favourite Nina tracks - we have liked her since the 1960s, I first had an EP (ask your grand-dad) of hers circa 1965, with those great tracks "I Put A Spell On You" and "Don't Let Me Be Misunderstood", and I think "I Loves You Porgy". I loved that early live album of hers NINA AT TOWN HALL, and of course now there are endless compilations. 

We also got her late sixties stuff like "Ain't Got No, I Got Life" when she was wooing the hippie HAIR crowd, but I really preferred her recordings from a decade earlier. We saw one of her last concerts too, one of the most bizarre I have been to, where she stomped on, played some, ignored the audience, and then stomped off, complete with plastic carrier bag. A difficult life and a difficult woman, obviously, with lots of demons, but she when was on form she was dynamic - that voice ... and that piano playing too (like Aretha Franklin, also able to play with soul). Here's a top dozen Nina's, and seek out the documentary:

• I Put A Spell On You
• Don’t Let Me Be Misunderstood
• Be My Husband
• Sinnerman
• Fine and Mellow
• The Other Woman
• Seeline Woman
• Four Women
• My Baby Just Cares For Me
• Feeling Good
• Wild Is The Wind
• I Want More and More and Then Some