Legendary soul figure Bobby Womack has passed away at the age of 70, and that’s kind of a shock. A lot of music fans were anticipating a longer goodbye, since Womack had just recently announced that he had been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s. Womack would already be an important musical figure just for writing “It’s All Over Now,” which became the band’s first #1 hit as a cover of a tune by the Womack Brothers. The songwriter himself would continue to thrive in the ’60s, though, and wrote legenday cuts like “If You Think You’re Lonely Now” and “Across 110th Street.”
The latter is best known as a ’70s blaxploitation theme (later lifted by Quentin Tarantino for Jackie Brown), but Bobby Womack was bigger than any hipster nods. He ended his career on a surprising high note, too, as he hooked up with Damon Albarn for 2012’s The Bravest Man in the Universe.
The album wasn’t any kind of faddish affair. Womack wasn’t propped up to intone over modern electro beats. Instead, Albarn applied some offbeat production to the classic Womack sound. The voice was also holding up good enough to wow the crowd at the Bonnaroo Music Festival. Check out this tune from The Bravest Man in the Universe, and think of a few recently-deceased legends who would’ve loved to have gone out on something like this…
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2WA7uH4kLQQ]
Bobby Womack, RIP: Watch Him Go Out On A High Note [VIDEO]
