Mitty Collier “Got To Get Away From It All” (Chess 2050, 1968)

One of the points of me even writing about soul music is to expand the narrative beyond what is already known and cherished. Today’s post is brought to you by the weird fetish around Nina Simone, which tends to be something of the sort for a lot of people my age, especially white people.

So I thought to myself, who is on my mind today who’s a Black Woman who included political statements in her artistry. Or how more complex narratives about what experiences were sung about in the Soul Music era. After hitting on Kim Weston, I flashed to thinking about Mitty Collier.

Not only did she have one of the earliest Vietnam Protest records in 1966, but she recorded a song pretty explicitly about domestic violence not once, but twice.

“(I’ve) Got To Get Away From It All” first saw yeoman status on the flip of her first single for Chess Records in 1961, but there’s something a bit more smoldering about her 1968 update that was her topside swansong from Chess 7 years later. Also, in the world where we have people not clear on understanding Black Pain, Anguish and Angst, it seems appropriate to post a song about the desire to get away from violence and abuse. In under 2 and a Quarter Minutes, may there be an enrichment of understanding of experience that you see crossing your information scope today.