Femme Fridays: ‘Aretha Arrives’ in Everlasting Fashion – AdHoc

Femme Fridays: ‘Aretha Arrives’ in Everlasting Fashion

Welcome to AdHoc’s Femme Fridays, a weekly column highlighting the work of trailblazing femmes throughout music history. In this week’s edition, we’re featuring the illustrious Aretha Franklin, whose 12th studio album, Aretha Arrives, came out this week in 1967.

Aretha, mother of rhythm and blues, queen of soul and spirit—you knew what you were doing when you named your 1967 album Aretha Arrives, didn’t you?

It was as if to say, “I’m here, I’m still here,” when you already had twelve records under your belt. Or, “There’s more where that came from,” after topping the charts with songs like “I Never Loved a Man (The Way I Love You,)” and Otis Redding’s “Respect,” both released earlier that year. Aretha, it was as if you knew Aretha Arrives would mark the zenith of your success—and so it was named accordingly.

It’s often a tall order for any album of mostly covers to resonate with listeners; but, Aretha, you made even that possible. It’s that fearless tone, that deep texture in your voice. Even the album’s version of “You Are My Sunshine” sounds less like a child’s song, and more like you’ve actually found the sun on Earth itself.

Is that hyperbolic? Maybe. But Aretha dealt in hyperbole. Her bodacious spirit, sly humor, sequined dresses, elaborately coiffed hair— they were all expressions of her innate star's disposition, destined for greatness from the moment she stepped into her Baptist church as a young girl.

Years later, this was the same spirit that would bring her to a stage in Amsterdam to perform for a raucous crowd. Flowers and gifts would shower onto the stage as she sang her cover of “Satisfaction” from Aretha Arrives. In the video below (starts at 3:16), you can see Aretha Franklin belting with her unmistakably rich, booming cadence, taking a cock-rock song by the Rolling Stones and turning it into her own hefty anthem of desire.

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