Gil Scott-Heron

Certain Songs #497: Gil Scott-Heron – “Me And The Devil”

April 5, 2016 by Jim Connelly

Album: I’m New Here
Year: 2010

Nearly 40 years after “The Revolution Will Not Be Televised” became an instant and forever maxim, Gil Scott-Heron walked into a recording studio for the first time in 15 years and laid down maybe the first Robert Johnson cover in years — maybe ever, really — that captured the spirit of hopelessness and dismay that permeated so many of Johnson’s recordings.

With his voice wrecked from years of abuse, Scott-Heron sounded like he had first-hand knowledge of walking side by side with the Devil, and it showed in every nook and cranny of the performance.

Certain Songs #496: Gil Scott-Heron – “The Revolution Will Not Be Televised”

April 4, 2016 by Jim Connelly

Album: Pieces of a Man
Year: 1971

The phrase “The Revolution Will Not Be Televised” not only became an instant cliche/maxim/slogan in the early 70s, it’s been used so many times in so many contexts in the subsequent decades that some people may not even realize that there is a actual song behind it.

And even more so: a song that is a key proto hip-hop song, featuring a rap that was timely in 1971 and — sadly — hasn’t gone out of date.