"Living for the City" | ||||
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Single by Stevie Wonder | ||||
from the album Innervisions | ||||
B-side | "Visions" | |||
Released | November 1973 | |||
Genre | ||||
Length |
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Label | Tamla | |||
Songwriter(s) | Stevie Wonder | |||
Producer(s) | Stevie Wonder | |||
Stevie Wonder singles chronology | ||||
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"Living for the City" is a 1973 single by Stevie Wonder from his Innervisions album. It reached number 8 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart and number 1 on the R&B chart. [3]: 635 Rolling Stone ranked the song number 104 on their 2004 list of the " 500 Greatest Songs of All Time". [4]
Born into a poor family in Mississippi, a young black man experiences discrimination in looking for work and eventually seeks to escape to New York City (alluding to the Second Great Migration) in hopes of finding a new life. Through a series of background noises and spoken dialogue, the man reaches New York by bus, but is then promptly framed for a crime, arrested, convicted and sentenced to ten years in prison. [5]: 236 [6]: 62
Wonder played all the instruments on the song and was assisted by Malcolm Cecil and Robert Margouleff for recording engineering and synthesizer programming. [7] Tenley Williams, writing in Stevie Wonder (2002), feels it was "one of the first soul hits to include both a political message and ... sampling ... of the sounds of the streets - voices, buses, traffic, and sirens - mixed with the music recorded in the studio." [1]: 44
Billboard described "Living for the City" as a "spectacular production of a country boy whose parents sacrifice themselves for him," and also praised the vocals and horn playing. [8]
The song has won two Grammy Awards: one at the 1974 Grammy Awards for Best Rhythm & Blues Song, and the second for Best Male R&B Vocal Performance at the 1975 Grammy Awards for Ray Charles' recording on his album Renaissance. [9]
It reached number 8 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart and number 1 on the R&B chart. [3]: 635 Rolling Stone ranked the song number 104 on their 2004 list of the " 500 Greatest Songs of All Time". [10]
Public Enemy sampled the "get in that cell, nigger" in their song ' Black Steel in the Hour of Chaos.'
Usher Raymond--or at least his producer Polow da Don--sampled this song for the hook of ' Lil' Freak.'
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Year-end charts
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Dance music artist Sylvester covered the song on his 11th studio album, Mutual Attraction (1986), his major label debut album. Sylvester's "Living for the City" was released as the album's lead single and peaked at #2 on Billboard's Dance Club Play Chart.[ citation needed]
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The song explores modern urban realities through a narrative of a small-town migrant who arrives in New York City with bright hopes, is duped into drug running, and ends up sentenced to ten years in prison (much of the narrative is done through a dramatic playlet incorporated into the song.)
Along with his frequent creative partners, the engineering/synth programming duo of Malcolm Cecil and Robert Margouleff, Wonder crafted a tantalizing track that is enthralling, vividly drawn, and deeply poignant. Cecil's film business experience played a big part in the "wide screen" feel of "Living for the City," which tells a story in a way that few songs do. Margouleff's father was the mayor of Great Neck, NY, while some of the song's "scenes" were shot (actually recorded by a portable Nagra tape recorder). Though Wonder plays all of the instruments, "Living for the City" wasn't a one man show. The singer recruited his brother Calvin, road manager Ira Tucker Jr., a New York police officer, and attorney Jonathan Vigoda. Cecil and Margouleff acted in a role as semi-directors who were trained in "the method."
Stevie's "Innervisions" LP produces this spectacular production of a country boy whose parents sacrifice themselves for him. Stevie's voice soards and glides with a gutsy reality. Lots of catchy horn, background voices and cymbals in the picture also.
BEST RHYTHM & BLUES SONG: Living For The City