Not only that but he’s also English. I first saw his name in the liner notes to Michael Jackson’s Off the Wall album. MJ, Quincy Jones, Rod Temperton? I just assumed he was black. Not that white people ain’t got no soul(Hall&Oates, Teena Marie), but I went almost 30 years with the wrong assumption. Then I watched this:
TV One’s documentary of Heatwave
Didn’t know that either. Blew my mind.
Can’t say that I thought of it, but I can understand the assumption.
My husband had that experience with Michael McDonald of the Doobie Brothers. He loved their music but I don’t think he owned an album or anything. Several years ago, I was at work and my husband had the day off. This was when Michael McDonald was doing ads for some phone company, and my husband had just seen the ad for the first time. I got an E-mail from him to my work address, reading simply, “Michael McDonald is white?!” (Perhaps there was more punctuation involved. You get the idea.) I had to muffle my laughter; I’m not sure how he made it that long without fixing out, considering he liked McDonald’s music more than I did.
Oh yeah. He’s from Cleethorpes, up north. I find that amusing, especially since you’d think such a funky guy would be from one of the urban centers like London, Birmingham, or Manchester.