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DISGRACELAND

REWIND - Ray Charles: Busted for Heroin and Busting Genres with the Best Damn R&B

DISGRACELAND

Jake Brennan

True Crime, Music, Society & Culture

4.613.1K Ratings

🗓️ 4 July 2024

⏱️ 41 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Ray Charles was hooked on heroin, arrested by federal agents, and once survived a near-death plane ride by helping the pilot - as a blind man. He invented R&B. He was powerful enough to bring black and white culture into one. He was a genre-melding musical genius. Despite being born into a literal dirt poor existence in the Jim Crow era Deep South, despite going completely blind by the age of seven, and despite his addiction, Ray Charles influenced everyone from the Beatles to Belushi. And he made some of the greatest music of all time. To see the full list of contributors, see the show notes at www.disgracelandpod.com. This episode was originally published on July 13, 2021. To listen to Disgraceland ad free and get access to a monthly exclusive episode, weekly bonus content and more, become a Disgraceland All Access member at disgracelandpod.com/membership. Sign up for our newsletter and get the inside dirt on events, merch and other awesomeness - GET THE NEWSLETTER Follow Jake and DISGRACELAND: Instagram YouTube X (formerly Twitter) Facebook Fan Group TikTok Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0

Double Elvis.

0:05.0

Disgras.

0:08.0

Disgrasland is brought to you by Disgraseland All Access.

0:11.5

Disgraseland All Access membership is your chance to support the show

0:15.2

and get ad-free listening, an exclusive scripted episode every month and

0:19.4

exclusive bonus content every week. Plus access to always-on-chat with me and your fellow

0:25.2

discos. Visit disgraceland pod.com slash membership or just click on the link in the

0:30.5

show notes for this episode.

0:33.0

Disgraysland is a production of Double Elvis. The stories about Ray Charles are insane. He was arrested numerous times for heroin, marijuana, drug paraphernalia, once by federal agents.

0:57.0

He avoided a deadly plane crash by helping pilot a plane and it's worth noting that he was blind. He used his genius to mix

1:04.8

gospel with blues and invent the genre of R&B. Then he melded that new style with

1:10.5

country and Western to become one of the biggest selling black artists of his day,

1:14.3

crossing over to enjoy mainstream success by attracting a massive white audience.

1:19.5

And Ray Charles influenced everyone from the Beatles to Belushi by making some of the

1:24.1

greatest music of all time. That music I played for you at the top of the show

1:29.0

that wasn't great music. That was a preset loop from my melotron called mini cha cha cha mk one.

1:37.0

I played you that loop because I can't afford the rights to Offerson Sweetheart by Vera Lynn.

1:44.0

And why would I play you that specific slice of Stink Floyd, cheese, could I afford it?

1:50.2

Because that was the number one song in America on September 3rd, 1952.

1:55.0

And that was the day Ray Charles signed to Atlantic Records, setting the course for him

2:01.0

to manifest the vision of himself he'd had since he was a young boy.

2:05.4

A young blind boy, a vision of becoming one of the greatest musicians of all time.

...

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