BOARDSIES DECIDE: Best Song Ever By Black/Partly Black Music Act.

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James Brown This is a Man's Man's Man's World 4-8 Aretha Franklin I Say A Little Prayer
Bill Withers Ain't No Sunshine  8-4 Otis Redding  (Sittin' On) The Dock Of The Bay
Marvin Gaye I Heard It Through The Grapevine 8-5 The Ronettes Be My Baby

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Score

Prince When Doves Cry 7-6  Eagle Eye Cherry Save Tonight

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Fun Facts

James Brown It's A Man's Man's Man's World
This song was recorded as if it was a sermon. It lists man's life enhancing inventions, but the singer admits he would be nothing without a woman. Brown developed the impassioned ballad from some lyrics written by a woman, Betty Newsome. Her words were derived from the Bible and her observations of some of her ex-boyfriends, including the Godfather of Soul himself.

This was originally called "It's A Man's World', but James Brown added the extra words to the title as a reference to the 1963 hit comedy It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World.

Brown had been working on this song for years; the singer Tammy Montgomery (later known as Tammi Terrell, who featured earlier) recorded "I Cried" in 1963, which sounds very similar. Brown dated Terrell and was accused of beating her.

James Brown recorded 17 singles that reached number one on the Billboard R&B charts.He also holds the record for the most singles listed on the Billboard Hot 100 chart without ever reaching number one.

He ranked seventh on the music magazine Rolling Stone’s list of its 100 greatest artists of all time. Rolling Stone has also cited Brown as the most sampled artist of all time.

Otis Redding Sittin On The Dock Of The Bay
Redding died in a plane crash on December 10, 1967, a month before this song was released (January 8, 1968) and three days after he recorded it. It was by far his biggest hit and was also the first ever posthumous #1 single in the US. The plan was to use background singers on this track, possibly the Staple Singers, but when Redding died there was no time for that. Redding wrote this soon after listening to The Beatles album Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, which had just been released. Shortly before he started recording "Dock of the Bay," Redding alluded to it as an extension of the Beatles' music. In 1966 and 1967, Redding performed "A Hard Day's Night" and "Day Tripper" at some of his concerts.

Stax guitarist Steve Cropper wrote this with Redding. In a 1990 interview on NPR's Fresh Air, Cropper explained: "Otis was one of those kind of guys who had 100 ideas. Anytime he came in to record he always had 10 or 15 different intros or titles, or whatever. He had been at San Francisco playing The Fillmore, and he was staying at a boathouse (in Sausalito, across the bay from San Francisco), which is where he got the idea of the ship coming in. That's about all he had: 'I watch the ships come in and I watch them roll away again.' I took that and finished the lyrics.

If you listen to the songs I wrote with Otis, most of the lyrics are about him. He didn't usually write about himself, but I did. 'Mr. Pitiful,' 'Sad Song Fa-Fa,' they were about Otis' life. 'Dock Of The Bay' was exactly that: 'I left my home in Georgia, headed for the Frisco Bay' was all about him going out to San Francisco to perform."

Cropper explained the whistling: "If you're an Otis Redding fan you'd know that he's probably the world's greatest at ad-libbing at the end of a song. Sometimes you could go another minute or two with Otis Redding's ad-libs - they were so spontaneous and felt so great. And this particular song I think baffled Otis a little bit because of the tempo and the mood, so when we got down to the end of it he really didn't have anything to ad-lib with, and he just started whistling. That just sparked Ronnie Capone and myself off, and almost immediately we said, 'Hey man, that's great, leave that in there.' It sure is a cool melody to go out with."

During the Vietnam War, this was very popular with American troops fighting there, as the song portrayed quite the opposite of their reality. Accordingly, it was used in two 1987 films that take place during the war: Platoon and Hamburger Hill.

It won 1968 Grammy Awards for Best Rhythm & Blues Performance, plus Best Rhythm & Blues Song for writers Otis Redding and Steve Cropper.

The Ronettes Be My Baby
This was written by the songwriters Jeff Barry and Ellie Greenwich, who were married at the time.Barry and Greenwich had a remarkable run of hits in 1963 and 1964, including "Da Doo Ron Ron," "Chapel Of Love," "Do Wah Diddy Diddy" and "Leader of the Pack."

This was the first Ronettes song produced by Phil Spector and released on his label, Philles Records. It exemplified Spector's "Wall Of Sound" production technique, where he layered lots of instruments and used echo effects.Veronica Bennett was the only Ronette to sing on this. Phil Spector rehearsed her for weeks and had her do 42 takes before he got the sound he wanted.  She would practice in the ladies' room at the studio, which she said had great acoustics and let her work out the little "whoas" and "oh-oh-ohs."Spector and Bennett got married in 1968, and they divorced in 1974.

A pre-famous Cher sang backup vocals. Sonny Bono worked for Phil Spector as a promotion man; he was dating Cher and introduced her to Phil, who then used her as backup on several recordings including "Da Do Ron Ron" and "Be My Baby."

Brian Wilson Wilson says it is his favorite record, stating: "This is a special one for me. What a great sound, the Wall of Sound. Boy, first heard this on the car radio and I had to pull off the road, I couldn't believe it. The choruses blew me away; the strings are the melody of love. It has the promise to make the world better." His Beach Boys song "Don't Worry Baby" was written as an answer song to Be My Baby.