In honor of Black History Month, Pollstar is spotlighting seminal live performances by black artists every day throughout February. With a deep, rich tradition of transcendent and powerful performers across genres and the ages, we are well aware that we can only scratch the surface of so many thousands, if not hundreds of thousands, brilliant Black performances. In fact, any one genre by itself, be it Jazz, Soul, R&B, Hip-Hop, Blues, Rock, Classical, House, Techno, Country, Reggae and more, could easily fill this one list. Therefore, in this series, we aim to hit on a variety of music from different periods and sounds to help put into perspective the depth and range of so much incredible Black music performances that have infinitely enriched our culture and lives.
On an already incredible night of music that saw James Brown performing with the blues legend B.B. King at L.A.'s Beverly Theater, The Godfather of Soul brought out two unexpected surprise superstar guests to make the night legendary. It came towards the end of the night during an extended jam of “It's A Man’s Man’s Man’s World” when Brown, much to the audience's shock and awe, called Michael Jackson up to the stage from the audience.
Michael Jackson, in his Thriller prime, took the stage, sang a couple of pitch perfect “I love yous" and then pow! The JB’s amped up the tempo and lit into “Hustle!!! (Dead On It).” as The King of Pop exploded into several of his classic dance moves: the quadruple spin, the Thriller knee band and gravity-defying moon walk. On his way off stage Jackson whispered something into Brown’s ear.
“He just insisted that I introduce Prince!" Brown says calling Prince Rogers Nelson to the stage. Of course, if you’re Prince, you make your stage entrance riding piggyback on a large bearded man while pulling off your spangled gloves with your teeth. Prince then straps on a guitar, tosses off a couple of mostly rhythmic licks before squatting down, placing the guitar between his legs and thrusting. Seemingly caught up in the moment, Prince removes his guitar, then his shirt and does a couple of mic stand kicks before leaving exiting and knocking over a prop lamp. It's a shame the two guests didn’t perform longer, with each other and/or with Brown., but perhaps no stage could handle that much star power at once.
https://www.pollstar.com/article/hon...-prince-147270