Tracy Chapman doesn't want to be bothered . . .
and that's why I'm crying quietly.
I want to make this 100% clear. I don’t know Tracy Chapman. I don’t even know people who know Tracy Chapman… at least as far as I know. I mean, I do know people who have been around Tracy Chapman, but they don’t claim to know her, if you know what I mean. I mean it is possible that I do know people who really know her, but maybe being Tracy Chapman’s friend is about knowing that you don’t go around talking about being Tracy Chapman’s friend. Like Fight Club, but for Black feminists who don’t want to be bothered. One time, I actually heard about the area of the country that she allegedly lives in, but I feel like I don’t want to type it out loud in fear of risking my ability to one day maybe get an application to be Tracy Chapman’s friend. I assume it is an application process with at least three referrals and some sort of written test.
All that is to say that it was great to see Tracy Chapman onstage at The Grammys this past Sunday night. And in part it was great because it was like seeing an old friend who I hadn't run into for a long time. A friend who I heard was doing well, but I still was happy to see her doing well with my own eyes. And it is a little strange that I (and many others… probably including you, reading this now) feel so close to Tracy Chapman, because in a world where we feel like we know everything about our favorite celebrities, we have never known that much about Tracy Chapman. Her unspoken challenge is for us to be okay with that. She seems to be saying, “I gave you my music, but you don't get to keep me along with it.”
Tracy Chapman was at The Grammys to sing her now two-time hit song “Fast Car” with country superstar Luke Combs. Luke covered “Fast Car" on his latest album, and his version shot the song up the charts again. This made Tracy Chapman the first Black woman solo songwriter to have a number one hit on the country charts. Which is a shocking statistic because as far as I can tell there have been Black women in country music as long as there has been country music.
Luke’s cover has been called “country-fied." I think that just means that it has a pedal steel guitar on it. I don't know Luke Combs either, but he seems like a nice guy. Although, I base that more on what he hasn’t done than what he has done.
Luke Combs hasn’t acted like “Fast Car” is some forgotten hit that he re-discovered, even though it is over 35 years old. Every time I see him talk about the song, he mentions Tracy Chapman and how much the song means to him.
Onstage at The Grammys, he didn’t look like he thought he was Tracy Chapman’s equal. He didn’t even have his guitar. This was her moment and more importantly her song. He actually looked a little nervous. He even looked like he was cherishing the moment. Like he knew Tracy Chapman doesn’t leave her house for bullshit, so he’d better make this worth her while. It was kind of adorable. As Tracy Chapman sang, you could even see Luke mouthing the words along with her, just like every fan in the audience.
He didn’t switch the gender in “Fast Car” to match his. And let me be clear, a singer switching a song's gender to match theirs is not a big deal. Singers have done that since singers started singing other people’s songs. But hearing big ole, bearded, dad-bodied Luke Combs call himself a “checkout girl” without blinking feels like a big deal in 2023-24 Amurica. And Luke is doing that in a genre — country music — that is not known for a stellar record of inclusion. For more on that see Kid Rock vs. Bud Light cans and Hank Williams Jr.’s thoughts on President Obama. In this day and age of people getting mad about pronouns in social media bios, a male country singer not sweating over that lyric is a breath of the freshest fresh air.
While those few actions certainly put him in the top five percentile of “America’s Best White Guys Ever” (along with Abraham Lincoln, John Brown, and Pat Riley), this isn’t about Luke Combs. This is about Tracy Chapman.
Watching Tracy Chapman beam onstage while she sang her song with Luke, she seemed happy, like she wanted to be there. Currently, a big part of the legend of Tracy Chapman is that she generally doesn’t show up at these Hollywood events. I like to think that I wouldn’t either if I was her or if I was anybody who had accomplished as much as she has. But the truth is, even if I was on the top of career mountain, I would still probably feel pressure to show up to things. But that ain’t Tracy Chapman. In November, she became the first Black woman to win a Country Music Association award, which again is an amazing thing considering Black women’s history as country music pioneers. But Tracy Chapman wasn’t at the ceremony to accept her award. She did, however, send a gracious note.
We all know how the music industry works. Many times when popular musicians stop showing up for their fancy occasions it means something is wrong. Often it means that they are in trouble, or they are struggling with something. But with Tracy Chapman, it just feels like she has had enough of the fancy occasions.
I can’t imagine what it was like to be Tracy Chapman in 1988 right before her debut album came out. The pop music of 1988 was as ‘80s as could be with George Michael, Whitney Houston, Taylor Dayne, Richard Marx, Debbie Gibson, Gloria Estefan, Natalie Cole, and RICK ASTLEY(!). Hair metal had big hair and bigger choruses with Def Leppard, Whitesnake, Poison, Guns N’ Roses, and Van Halen in its Van Hagar era. A whole bunch of rock & rollers had turned into rock & soulers - like Phil Collins, Elton John, Peter Cetera, Robert Palmer, and Huey Lewis. And while rap was definitely in the conversation, R&B was still dominating mainstream Black radio - New Edition, Al B. Sure, Pebbles, Billy Ocean, Jody Whatley, and oh yeah… MICHAEL JACKSON. And there were definitely Black musicians on the charts, dancing and singing to the beats of their own drummer - proto-Blerds like Terence Trent D’Arby, Bobby McFerrin, and Living Colour. But there was no one like Tracy Chapman. And maybe this was one of the rare times when not being like everybody else was just perfect. As much as we tell every kid to be themselves, so often in life you get rewarded for blending in. And you get shunned for being different. But “blending in” did not seem to be of interest to Tracy Chapman. Hearing “Fast Car” on the radio and seeing her in the video on MTV was revelatory and clarifying. It was like pop music cleared its collective throat of the usual synthesizers, drum machines, distorted guitars, overproduced vocals, and simple lyrics. For four minutes and twenty-six seconds you just heard a singer with something to say. It is a song that somehow captured the devastation of Reagan’s America and was also an ear worm. And she did it without using any of the MTV / pop music DayGlo tropes of the ‘80s. The level of difficulty is as high as can be.
Not only was “Fast Car" a huge hit, but the album itself was nominated for seven Grammys. Tracy won three. The album has sold over 20 million copies. Most of those were sold when you actually had to walk down to the record store to get your own copy. You had to really want an album back then. And as much as we’re talking about “Fast Car,” Tracy Chapman is not a one-hit-wonder. “Give Me One Reason” is a perfect break-up song. And with the election coming up, “Talkin’ ‘bout a Revolution” is definitely due for a modern artist to do a cover to bring it back to relevance. Maybe a Tay Tay and Queen Bey duet? We could use that kind of team-up right now. (Who do you think should cover it? Tell me in the comments.)
We certainly can’t count on Tracy Chapman’s stellar Grammy performance leading to a world tour. And we shouldn’t.
I have heard more than one person talk about how Tracy Chapman’s performance on the Grammys made them emotional, brought them to tears even. I was one of those people. And I’m not even sure why. It certainly wasn’t because she seemed sad in any way. Tracy Chapman was beaming the whole time. In fact, I might even call her grin mischievous. She seemed like she was having fun. She also looked like she was soaking it in, because she knew she wasn’t going to do it again any time soon. Her last album came out in 2008. And her public appearances have been sparse since. She played one of David Letterman’s last CBS shows in 2015. And she played “Talkin’ ‘bout a Revolution'' on Seth Meyers’ show on the eve of the 2020 election. She is apparently so disinterested in attention (and money) that she refuses to let her songs be sampled. She even sued Nicki Minaj over Nicki using a song without permission. (Tracy’s not even bothered by The Barbs.) But Tracy Chapman’s vibe isn’t that of a Hollywood recluse. Her vibe is more, “I do what I want, and I don’t do what I don’t want.” She has earned that. And I think that is why the applause for her was so loud and so sustained at The Grammys. Knowing what we do know about her and knowing how little we have seen her in the last 15+ years, we felt lucky she wanted to spend a few minutes with us.
Here’s the video of Tracy Chapman and Luke Combs at The Grammys.
When I was writing this and I shared a version with my producing partner, Kelly Rafferty, who also helps me with this Substack, she had some thoughts on Tracy Chapman, too. She said it was okay for me to share some of them:
As a white queer person, I was moved by the image of a 59-year-old Black woman with a guitar and dapper-as-hell custom Prada on that stage. And I was moved by the memory of being in middle school and junior high and seeing someone climb the charts who wasn’t hyper-feminine, who had a more androgynous look. Male musicians had a good deal of freedom to play with androgyny back then, but women didn’t. And certainly not Black women. Tracy Chapman represents so much – in addition to being so good at her craft – that it’s overwhelming to take it all in.
You’re With Me!
Here are this week’s updates from our corner of the internet:
In my last newsletter, I shared a Donors Choose fundraiser from Ms. Atkins. She’s raising money to build a STEM lab for her students. This one’s a big fundraiser, and now she’s two thirds of the way to her goal! I’m not going to say that we did that, but I know we helped make a dent. Let’s see if we can get this one across the finish line. As of this writing, Ms. Atkins only needs $366 to get her students a STEM lab.
Once we get Ms. Atkins’s project funded, let’s tackle another one. It’s Black history month AND we’re celebrating the work of a groundbreaking Black musician, so help Ms. Vazquez in Gary, IN get her students headphones. She explains, “In our second grade class, we would love a class set of headphones so each child can enjoy the famous African Americans who made music what it is today.” She only needs $139. We can do this.
The trailer for the new season of “What Would You Do?” just arrived! The season premieres on Sunday 2/18 at 10/9c on ABC and Hulu.
As you might already know, we lost Carl Weathers this week. Even though he was the “villain” of the stories in Rocky I and Rocky II, I loved Apollo Creed even as a kid. If you watch Rocky II, there are very subtle acting choices and a recognition that a Black champ beaten by a white guy is not a good look for him. The racial politics of that movie were ahead of what they could have been. Apollo Creed could have just been a loud mouth, but in the hands of Carl Weathers, he was not. Apollo Creed is one of the greatest characters in Hollywood history. Thank you, Mr. Weathers! That’s nothing to say of all the other great work Carl Weathers put in: Predator, Action Jackson, Happy Gilmore, Arrested Development, Toy Story 4, and more. And it wasn’t until today that I realized he had briefly played for the Oakland Raiders. (!!!) Rest in power, Carl Weathers. What’s your favorite Carl Weathers performance?
I've watched that performance at least a dozen times now -- it still makes me tear up! I'm from Washington DC, but when I was a kid, we moved down to Dallas, GA (now Marjorie Taylor Green country) for a couple years. My best friends down there belonged to the group of humans so many affectionately call "white trash" and everyone listened to country music. I had a big crush on Billy Ray Cyrus but I digress.
As an adult, I've maintained a lot of those friendships but also run in vastly different circles as a liberal college grad who hangs out with a bunch of lawyers.
I think what's so emotional for me personally -- the debate over Luke's cover, that fell along identity politics lines on the internet, broke my heart. Obviously there's a lot to be said re: country music's history of inclusion and appropriation, but some commentators, at the heat of the argument, seemed to imply that a straight white man and his brand of listeners couldn't possibly relate to this song, that those groups are too different. But so many of us are fighting our own battles and living under similar forms of oppression and can relate to the hope and desperation in those lyrics. So many of us are united by the inherent struggle of trying to make it in this country. Isn't that how systems of slavery and racial oppression were upheld for so long, by pushing narratives that kept poor white folk and black folk apart?
I still remember my first day of second grade. The teacher told us we could all bring our own snacks for snack time, but there were certain rules -- not too much sugar or junk, etc. She had us raise our hands and give examples of what we liked to eat and what an appropriate snack might be. The white boy next to me, in dirty clothes, raised his hand and said he couldn't bring anything this week but his mama was saving up for a jar of peanut butter. I have no idea where he's at now. Maybe working at the convenience store.
Anyway, seeing Chapman and Combs together on that stage... lord, both their smiles, their pure happiness. I liked this line in the NYT Op-Ed: "The song, during Chapman and Combs’s five-minute performance, felt incredibly spacious — larger than the limitations of genre, welcoming and expansive enough to hold every single person it had ever touched, regardless of the markers of identity that so often divide us."
Watching that performance Sunday night healed me in ways I didn't even realize I needed it. Like Kelly, this song had such an impact on me as a young confused queer woman - seeing Tracy at peace and smiling like that made me see we all made it to the other side and got there.