Mavis Staples has again joined forces with songwriter-producer Jeff Tweedy for a new album entitled If All I Was Was Black.
The history Mavis recalls from her early years touring with her family as The
Staple Singers, the prejudice, ugliness and danger, well it’s all still here.
In response, the singer has delivered If All I Was Was Black, ten songs about
contemporary America today, a present day filled with
ghosts of the past. “Nothing has changed,” Mavis remarked in early August,
just days before neo-Nazis marched with swastika flags in Charlottesville,
Virginia, as a young woman was murdered. "We are still in it.”
If All I Was Was Black is Mavis' third collaboration with songwriter and
producer (and Wilco frontman) Jeff Tweedy. Their first partnership in 2010, You
Are Not Alone, won a Grammy Award for Best Americana album. Their second effort
together, One True Vine, was a Grammy
nominee. But If All I Was Was Black marks the first time Tweedy has composed an
entire album of original songs for Mavis' legendary voice and a nation
she's uniquely poised to address.