Mavis Staples “Sad and Beautiful World”

Octogenarian soul superstar releases as good an album as any in her career.

What is there left to say about Mavis Staples? A member of her family’s close harmony gospel group since the late 40s, she became lead singer as a teenager in the 50s and spent a decade or so spreading the gospel word throughout the States, sharing stages with gospel royalty such as Mahalia Jackson and The Soul Stirrers. When the Civil Rights movement erupted in the 60s, the group befriended Martin Luther King and began to sing what you might call message songs, mixing their gospel sensitivities with hard-charging soul music and delivering calls for action with songs like ‘Freedom Highway‘. A move to Stax Records saw their popularity soar with tracks like ‘I’ll Take You There’ and ‘Respect Yourself’. Staples began her solo career in 1969 with her self-titled debut album, and now, after getting on for 60 years, she has released her 14th album, the truly excellent “Sad and Beautiful Day“.

She has now become a musical icon, transcending generations and genres (her americana bona fides were established when she worked with Ry Cooder and Jeff Tweedy on albums in the 2000s into the 2010s, two of which were nominated for Grammys, one of which won). She has received Grammy Lifetime Achievement awards twice, in 2005 as part of The Staple Singers and in 2018 for her solo years. Her voice is an instrument to behold, a distinctive, unforgettable contralto that demands to be heard, and producer Brad Cook certainly achieves that on the new album by recording her voice first and then filling in the instrumentation around it. She is 86 years old, still touring, still protesting for peace, and human rights, and every other challenge that the world faces. At the University of Chicago in 2024, she described her mission as “keep fighting the good fight”, and in a newspaper interview this year, she noted, “It’s dark in the US right now. But I turn on a light, you know?”

Her album certainly turns on a light – she is not the dynamic firebrand of the protest song days, she now has a mature, more mellow voice, singing soulful blues songs in contemplation of her life and the world we live in, and trying to find some hope in our survival. As so often, she picks songs that other people have written, which this time include some well-known timeless songs and some that are relatively new. Kicking off with the only upbeat song on the album, the chug-a-lug driving rhythm and puffing horns on Tom Waits’ ‘Chicago’, her voice, in splendid form, reflects on the days when her people migrated north to Chicago in search of better times “The seeds are planted here, but they won’t grow / We won’t have to say goodbye if we all go / Maybe things will be better in Chicago / To leave all we’ve ever known for a place we’ve never seen”. One of those who migrated to Chicago was bluesman Buddy Guy, who trades licks on guitar with Derek Trucks on slide. It’s a rather short track, as if in cutting it short Staples wants to get on to the real soul of the album.

Things slow right down for Kevin Morby’s 2016 beauty ‘Beautiful Strangers’, in effect a 6-minute plea for gun control with its references to the death of Freddie Gray from police brutality, and those who died in the Bataclan attack in Paris. It’s a slow burn, drifting through its length with a slew of instruments, but the ones you remember most are the background vocals of Nathaniel Rateliff and the harmonies of Tre Burt. The funereal title track was written by Mark Linkous (Sparklehorse) in 1995, and has lovely electric guitar from MJ Lenderman and steel from Colin Croom over an organ motif. It is a very simple, lyrically sparse song that nevertheless gets across the to and fro of life – “Sometimes days go speeding past / Sometimes this one seems like the last, It’s a sad and beautiful world”.

‘Human Mind‘, the only new song on the album, written especially for Staples by Hozier and Allison Russell, is slightly more up-tempo. “I am the last, daddy”, references her being the last remaining Staples Singer. It has a slightly optimistic vibe, too “I find the good in us, sometimes”, in line with Staples’ belief in the human spirit to overcome adversity. David Rawlings and Gillian Welch’s ‘Hard Times’ has Derek Trucks stealing whatever show there is on offer with his muted, stinging slide guitar, on a song about resilience and strength to cope with life’s obstacles and challenges. Jeff Tweedy delivers a nice sombre bass line. Frank Ocean wrote ‘Godspeed’ in fairly recent times, and Staples keeps the vocal low key (yet powerful) and soul-like, whereas Ocean’s had a more gospel feel. The track signs off with a poem spoken by Kara Jackson, the US National Youth Poet Laureate in 2019, who also sings background vocals on the album.

Staples goes back several decades for the final four songs, starting with Curtis Mayfield’s anti-war anthem ‘We’ve Got to Have Peace’ from 1971, when it appeared on his album “Roots” and referenced the Vietnam War. Staples makes a powerful and timely call for action for peace. This gently rolling song has synths and electric guitars in layers but signals its americana leanings with some fine mandolin from Andrew Marlin, of Watchhouse. Leonard Cohen’s ‘Anthem’ draws a parallel between the imperfections in the world and those within ourselves: “There’s a crack, a crack in everything / That’s how the light gets in”, throwing hope for enlightenment into the ring. Then, as now, this song resonates in a time of global turbulence. On this, as on other tracks, producer Cook has drafted in the talented young guitarist Nathan Stocker (from the band Hippo Campus). MJ Lenderman, even younger, is the other electric guitarist joining forces with Staples’ main band guitarist, Rick Holstrom. Organ and piano duties throughout are by Phil Cook, while producer Cook chips in on synths, bass, and drums.

To further enhance her americana credentials (in case you thought she needed them enhancing) she tackles Jack Rhodes and Red Hayes’ 1955 classic country ballad ‘A Satisfied Mind’ (a huge hit for Porter Wagoner and recorded by more than 50 artists) and knocks it right out of the park, with a very moving and eloquent interpretation at least the equal of any previous version. In short, this song is a homily on the value of inner peace, from a life well-lived versus material wealth. In the hands of Staples, as she nears the end of her life, it is particularly poignant, made even more so by the keening steel guitar of Croom. It would have made a particularly effective end to the album, but that honour goes to the Eddie Hinton classic from 1969, ‘Everybody Needs Love’, the simple but effective affirmation of the need for love and the emptiness of life without it. The star turn on this beautiful song is the instantly recognisable Bonnie Raitt on slide, one of a very limited number of tracks on which a guest player is prominent.

Staples may not have quite the power in her voice from earlier days, but her emotional and interpretive skills make this album an absolute stunner, with a raft of well-chosen songs, lovingly produced, magnificently played, and with more than one message for our times. The exquisite timing of an album that understands and feels the challenges of our time, yet conjures up signs of hope, cannot be lost on the listener. Do not be surprised if this album is on many ‘Best of’ lists at the end of the year. It is a triumph.