Curtis Mayfield - Superfly (Staff Pick!)

Title: Curtis Mayfield - Super Fly
Year/Genre/Sub-Genre/City: 1972, Soul, Funk Psychedelic Soul Soundtrack, Chicago, Illinois 8/26
Condition: New (BC) | Members: Curtis M (42' - 99') | Producer: Curtis Mayfield
Cultural Facts:

1. Personal Struggle: In 1990, Mayfield was preparing to perform at an outdoor concert in Brooklyn when heavy stage-lighting equipment fell on him, crushing his spine and leaving him paralyzed from the neck down at 48. He still returned to recording, sometimes lying flat on his back and singing only a line at a time because paralysis made it difficult to generate enough breath.

2. Working-Class Roots: Curtis grew up in Chicago in a family with very little money and spent part of his youth around the Cabrini-Green public housing community. Church was one of his earliest stable musical environments, and his grandmother's Traveling Soul Spiritualists' Church gave him a place to sing publicly while he was still a child.

3. Black Business Ownership: Rather than spend his career depending entirely on white-owned record companies, Mayfield founded Curtom Records in Chicago in 1968 and built his own recording operation. At a time when Black performers routinely had little ownership over their work, Curtis became not only an artist but a label owner, producer and employer who could create opportunities for other Chicago musicians.