Emergency Ward (Nina Simone)

Full Disclosure with a Touch of Warning: I will fight a b*tch. Tell me that Nina Simone wasn't one of the finest musicians to ever walk this earth and I will fight a b*tch. Try to tell me that Nina Simone's rendition of, oh I don't know, pick any song... any old song at all, tell me it doesn't rival the likes of a Bach suite or a mother-clucking Barbra Streisand ballad and I will f*ght a bitch.

Don't get me wrong. I mean, I love Bach (listening to Philippe Perlot's Soli Deo Gloria is like listening to a chorus of baby angels with wings) and I do love the Barbs (I mean, respect must be given to "Guilty" with Barry Gibb) – But Nina! Ninaninaninaninanina... Nina singing Here Comes the Sun, Sinnerman, Little Girl Blue, Feeling Good, Young Gifted & Black, or friggin Mississippi Goddam, and on and on and on... pick a song... any song and it's like listening to a soul transcending.

Too much? I. Will. Fight. A. B*tch.

The hubs and I have, oh I'd say about 20 or so Nina Simone albums with one on the way as I write this rec.

No. We're not hipsters. We're just sentimental and there's something about vinyl records that makes me feel like I did when I was just a kid sitting at the kids table every single holiday while longingly staring at the adult table and desperately wanting to just grow up already so I could join them. My beautiful mother would hold court while they all had their cocktails and cigarettes eating and laughing and passing around platters of "grown-folks" conversations while something was playing on the record player (usually The O Jays or The Isley Brothers).

Look at my mother. Don't you wanna know what's going on in that brain beneath that wig? And look at those cheekbones!!!!

But back to Nina. It's hard to pick a favorite Nina Simone album to recommend. Maybe it's even foolish to try. So I will pick one of my favorite openings of a Nina Simone album... and it's this one: Nina Simone in Concert. Emergency Ward released in 1972.

It opens with the audience chanting "We want Nina! We want Nina! We want Nina! We want Nina!" And I don't know. Something about all those people chanting for this unconventional woman who was so unconventional in so many ways that to say she's unconventional trivializes the meaning of this woman. But shit... she was. I can't think of another woman like her. Oh wait... I can. My mother except my mother couldn't sing.

Nina could sing. I think somewhere in the cosmos she's still singing. As the chanting dies down, she enters the stage, sits at the piano and launches right into George Harrison's My Sweet Lord with the Bethany Baptist Church Junior Choir of South Jamaica, NY singing backup like baby angels with wings – and suddenly the song no longer belongs to George Harrison. It's Nina's now! At least on this stage and on this album.

And then as she fades from this helluva opener and sinks into Poppies and I tell you, you will feel your soul transcend as she sings and sings and sings and sings...

Now a little history that I'd like to correct. I found this photo of a promo of this album that I'm assuming was put out by the label. It goes on and on about everything about Nina that they felt was "unconventional." You know: God and drugs and pain and Nina. What the actual f*ck? They go on to say things like "Beautiful Nina and "something" about her blackness (little "b" which I know was of the time but Blackness is capital B - especially hers) and her "soul-rock-jazz" and "Thanks for her voice". What is this shit? I will fight a b*tch – because this album... hell, Nina herself is not any of these clichéd, misogynoir (look it up, kids) things. Also, "And a damn good new album" ????? What!!!! They think this album is merely "good"? No... no... no ... this simply won't do.

It should have read like this:

HONESTY AND LOVE AND TRUTH AND NINA.

Brilliant Nina Simone, wrapped in vulnerability. Bravo for her genius. We don't deserve her but once again, she's given all of herself to us.

A Transcendent Album for the Ages.

Period.

Anyway... you can stream this on any music app. But if you're a bit sentimental, get yourself a record player and buy the album. Buy all the albums!