i’ll be there beside you to dry your weeping eye
Gil Scott-Heron (see: 1971’s ”The Revolution Will Not Be Televised”) is absolutely everywhere right now. Last year, the poet/soul musician/author released I’m New Here — his first album in sixteen years following struggles with drug addiction — to critical acclaim. At the end of 2010, Kanye West sampled Heron’s “Comment No. 1,” a spoken word piece “about the African-American experience and the fated idealism of the American dream,” for the closing track of My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy (“Who Will Survive in America”). Now, almost exactly a year after the original album’s release, Jamie Smith, the 22 year-old genius (yeah, I said it) behind The xx has daringly reworked I’m New Here in its entirety. The result is the aptly titled We’re New Here, and I’ll be damned if I can’t stop listening to it over and over, particularly this hella smooth track. It’s pretty much perfect.
mp3: Gil Scott-Heron / Jamie Smith - I’ll Take Care of You from We’re New Here
mp3: Kanye West feat. Gil Scott-Heron - Who Will Survive in America from My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy
