Gil Scott-Heron and music that matters

So, I'm sure we've all heard the news today about Gil Scott-Heron passing away. Of all the times for it to happen. He spent years abusing drugs and alcohol and spent over a year in prison and when he finally cleans up, starts making incredible music again, starts touring the world and restarting his career, he gets sick and he dies. I'm sure the tragedy for us is nothing compared to that for his friends and family and my thoughts go out to them, but we are all going to be missing out on a world that includes an artist that really meant something.

His critiques of discrimination, poverty and all of society's ills were open, honest and revolutionary. He told it how it was and didn't need to sugar coat a single word. He was a poet and musician and social commentator. That didn't change with age and his album I'm New Here from last year continued the trend. He also had an appreciation for the importance of music and verse as communicatory tools. He respected them. If you look at the sleeve notes to I'm New Here, he gives instructions on how to listen to the album, not in a condescending or patronising preachy way, but as a reminder that music is more than just something to have on in the background and neither is it just a quick fix, it should be savoured when it's good. That album was good.

I feel priviledged that I got to see Gil Scott-Heron perform last year in Brooklyn, NYC. I feel even luckier that it was a small, intimate show at Littlefields as part of the final night of entertainment for the National Black Writers' Conference that had been taking place all week and had been chaired by the incomparable Toni Morrison. Some might argue that Gil Scott-Heron deserved a nobel prize for literature just as much as she did. On the line-up alongside him was another poet of our age, Talib Kweli, who gave shoutouts to his parents in the audience and came up on stage for a couple of songs with Gil Scott-Heron too.

It was a gig that mattered with people that made music that mattered and it feels like that might be becoming a rarer commodity these days. This is clearly a very niave statement from me as there has always been a mountain of chaff to sort through till you get to the wheat, but history has performed a filtering process for us and (for the most part) only the cream has risen to the top of our memories. However, it can be easy to lose sight of that fact when you are hit from all sides by endless waves of meaningless drivel puporting to be the 'next big thing'. I hope history forgets Justin Beiber, I really really do.

Even though he has passed, the lessons and inspiration he gave out should not be forgotten. His music will rise to the top and last for generations and our children will listen to Winter In America and understand just what it means, they will relate their own struggles to those of the past.

"Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it." - George Santayana

Thanks to people like Gil, we will not forget the past and nor will our children, if we teach them how to learn and grow, and just perhaps that will lead us to a brighter future.

RIP Gil Scott-Heron

April 1, 1949 – May 27, 2011