"You Can't Win" is an
R&B,
pop and
soul
In many religious and philosophical traditions, there is a belief that a soul is "the immaterial aspect or essence of a human being".
Etymology
The Modern English noun '' soul'' is derived from Old English ''sāwol, sāwel''. The earliest atte ...
song written by
Charlie Smalls
Charlie Smalls (October 25, 1943 – August 27, 1987) was an American composer and songwriter, best known for writing the music and lyrics for playwright William F. Brown's 1975 Broadway musical ''The Wiz'' and the 1978 film version of the same ...
and performed by American recording artist
Michael Jackson
Michael Joseph Jackson (August 29, 1958 – June 25, 2009) was an American singer, songwriter, dancer, and philanthropist. Dubbed the "King of Pop", he is regarded as one of the most significant cultural figures of the 20th century. Over a ...
, who played
Scarecrow
A scarecrow is a decoy or mannequin, often in the shape of a human. Humanoid scarecrows are usually dressed in old clothes and placed in open fields to discourage birds from disturbing and feeding on recently cast seed and growing crops.Lesley ...
in the 1978
musical film ''
The Wiz
''The Wiz: The Super Soul Musical "Wonderful Wizard of Oz"'' is a musical with music and lyrics by Charlie Smalls (and others) and book by William F. Brown. It is a retelling of L. Frank Baum's children's novel '' The Wonderful Wizard of Oz'' ...
'',
[Jones (2002), pp. 229–259] an urbanized retelling of
L. Frank Baum
Lyman Frank Baum (; May 15, 1856 – May 6, 1919) was an American author best known for his children's books, particularly ''The Wonderful Wizard of Oz'' and its sequels. He wrote 14 novels in the ''Oz'' series, plus 41 other novels (not includ ...
's ''
The Wonderful Wizard of Oz
''The Wonderful Wizard of Oz'' is a children's novel written by author L. Frank Baum and illustrated by W. W. Denslow. It is the first novel in the Oz series of books. A Kansas farm girl named Dorothy ends up in the magical Land of Oz afte ...
''.
[Brooks, p. 30] The movie featured an entirely
African American
African Americans (also referred to as Black Americans and Afro-Americans) are an ethnic group consisting of Americans with partial or total ancestry from sub-Saharan Africa. The term "African American" generally denotes descendants of ens ...
cast and was based on the 1975 Broadway musical ''
The Wiz
''The Wiz: The Super Soul Musical "Wonderful Wizard of Oz"'' is a musical with music and lyrics by Charlie Smalls (and others) and book by William F. Brown. It is a retelling of L. Frank Baum's children's novel '' The Wonderful Wizard of Oz'' ...
''.
After the original soundtrack version was recorded, Michael Jackson and
Quincy Jones
Quincy Delight Jones Jr. (born March 14, 1933) is an American record producer, musician, songwriter, composer, arranger, and film and television producer. His career spans 70 years in the entertainment industry with a record of 80 Grammy Award n ...
went back into the studio and re-recorded the track. It was the re-recording that was released in January 1979 as the second single from ''
The Wiz: Original Motion Picture Soundtrack'', following the release of "
Ease On Down the Road
"Ease on Down the Road" is a song from the 1975 Broadway musical ''The Wiz'', an R&B re-interpretation of L. Frank Baum's ''The Wonderful Wizard of Oz''. The Charlie Smalls–composed tune is the show's version of both "Follow the Yellow Brick ...
" in 1978, and was Michael's first solo chart single on
Epic Records (despite the fact that
the soundtrack album for ''The Wiz'' was released by
Motown and the now-defunct
MCA Records
MCA Records was an American record label owned by MCA Inc., which later became part of Universal Music Group.
Pre-history
MCA Inc., a powerful talent agency and a television production company, entered the recorded music business in 1962 w ...
). The 7-inch version split the song in half, with "Part 1" as the A-side and "Part 2" as the B-side; the full-length version was released as a 12-inch single and later was included on ''
The Ultimate Collection'' in 2004.
The single only charted in the United States, where it reached number 81 on the
''Billboard'' Hot 100 and number 42 on the
R&B singles chart
The Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs chart ranks the most popular R&B and hip hop songs in the United States and is published weekly by ''Billboard''. Rankings are based on a measure of radio airplay, sales data, and streaming activity. The chart had 100 p ...
. Since its release, the song has been well received by music critics. The song has been performed by contemporary singers such as
Jill Scott and
Charles Grigsby.
In 1982 "Part 2" of "You Can't Win", in which Michael Jackson repeatedly sings the line "Can't get outta the game", was vocally overdubbed, and the resulting track was titled "Can't Get Outta the Rain"; it became the B-side of "
The Girl Is Mine
"The Girl Is Mine" is a song recorded by American singer Michael Jackson and English musician Paul McCartney. The track was written by Jackson and produced by Jackson and Quincy Jones. It was released as the first single for Jackson's sixth s ...
", the first single from Jackson's landmark album ''
Thriller''. Despite "Can't Get Outta the Rain" being melodically identical to "You Can't Win", as well as lyrically identical except for the word "rain", Jackson and Quincy Jones are credited as the song's composers, not Charlie Smalls.
Composition
"You Can't Win" was originally written and performed during the pre-Broadway
Baltimore
Baltimore ( , locally: or ) is the List of municipalities in Maryland, most populous city in the U.S. state of Maryland, fourth most populous city in the Mid-Atlantic (United States), Mid-Atlantic, and List of United States cities by popula ...
run of the stage version of ''
The Wiz
''The Wiz: The Super Soul Musical "Wonderful Wizard of Oz"'' is a musical with music and lyrics by Charlie Smalls (and others) and book by William F. Brown. It is a retelling of L. Frank Baum's children's novel '' The Wonderful Wizard of Oz'' ...
'' in 1974, sung by the chorus of Winkies, the Wicked Witch's slaves. The number was cut from the musical before the official Broadway opening and wasn't performed again until the movie version was under consideration, 3 years later. The producers resurrected the song as a solo for Michael Jackson to replace "I Was Born on the Day Before Yesterday", which had been
Scarecrow
A scarecrow is a decoy or mannequin, often in the shape of a human. Humanoid scarecrows are usually dressed in old clothes and placed in open fields to discourage birds from disturbing and feeding on recently cast seed and growing crops.Lesley ...
's solo in the Broadway musical. "You Can't Win" and its corresponding scene in the movie allude to mistreatment of
African American
African Americans (also referred to as Black Americans and Afro-Americans) are an ethnic group consisting of Americans with partial or total ancestry from sub-Saharan Africa. The term "African American" generally denotes descendants of ens ...
s. Jackson stated in his 1988 autobiography ''
Moonwalk
Moonwalk may refer to:
Space travel
* Moonwalk, an excursion on the Moon, see Moon landing
** For a specific event, see List of spacewalks and moonwalks 1965–1999
** For a specific person, see List of people who have walked on the Moon
*Extrave ...
'' that the lyrics to "You Can't Win" are about humiliation and helplessness, feelings, he stated, that many people have experienced at one point in their life. The singer added that the song was also about "the feeling that there are people out there who don't actively hold you back as much as they work quietly on your insecurities so that you hold ''yourself'' back".
[Jackson, p. 140] "You Can't Win" opens with the lines, "You can't win, you can't break even, and you can't get out of the game. People keep sayin', things are gonna change, but they look just like they're staying the same." William F. Brown, who wrote the book for the Broadway musical, stated that such verses made "You Can't Win" a "black message song".
Musically, the track has been described as an
R&B,
pop and
soul
In many religious and philosophical traditions, there is a belief that a soul is "the immaterial aspect or essence of a human being".
Etymology
The Modern English noun '' soul'' is derived from Old English ''sāwol, sāwel''. The earliest atte ...
song by Renée Graham of ''
The Boston Globe
''The Boston Globe'' is an American daily newspaper founded and based in Boston, Massachusetts. The newspaper has won a total of 27 Pulitzer Prizes, and has a total circulation of close to 300,000 print and digital subscribers. ''The Boston Glob ...
''.
According to the sheet music published on Musicnotes.com by
Alfred Music Publishing
Alfred Music is an American music publishing company. Founded in New York in 1922, it is headquartered in Van Nuys, California, with additional branches in Miami, New York, Germany, Singapore, and the United Kingdom.
History
In New York Cit ...
, the track was performed in
common time
The time signature (also known as meter signature, metre signature, or measure signature) is a notational convention used in Western musical notation to specify how many beats (pulses) are contained in each measure (bar), and which note val ...
, with a
tempo
In musical terminology, tempo ( Italian, 'time'; plural ''tempos'', or ''tempi'' from the Italian plural) is the speed or pace of a given piece. In classical music, tempo is typically indicated with an instruction at the start of a piece (ofte ...
of 80 beats per minute. It adds that the song is composed in E major with a range from
B3 to C5.
In ''The Wiz''
The scene that corresponds with "You Can't Win" in ''The Wiz'' begins with
Dorothy Gale
Dorothy Gale is a fictional character created by American author L. Frank Baum as the protagonist in many of his ''Oz'' novels. She first appears in Baum's classic 1900 children's novel '' The Wonderful Wizard of Oz'' and reappears in most of it ...
(played by
Diana Ross) stumbling upon a scarecrow being heckled by crows while stuck in the air on a pole. Dorothy remains hidden while the crows mock Scarecrow for asking to be let down. They state that he will remain on the pole because that is his role and there is nothing to get down for. The crows tell Scarecrow that even if he was let down, he would not be able to walk as he is a "straw paper dummy". Scarecrow tries to reason with the birds by reading relevant quotations from figures such as
Francis Bacon
Francis Bacon, 1st Viscount St Alban (; 22 January 1561 – 9 April 1626), also known as Lord Verulam, was an English philosopher and statesman who served as Attorney General and Lord Chancellor of England. Bacon led the advancement of both ...
and
Cicero
Marcus Tullius Cicero ( ; ; 3 January 106 BC – 7 December 43 BC) was a Roman statesman, lawyer, scholar, philosopher, and academic skeptic, who tried to uphold optimate principles during the political crises that led to the esta ...
as a rationale to be freed. The crows do not relent, however, and make him recite their "Crow Commandments": "Thou shall honor all crows", "Thou shall stop reading all bits of paper and literature" and "Thou shall never, never get down off of this here pole". In addition, the birds tell Scarecrow to sing the crow anthem, "You Can't Win". After the song concludes, Dorothy comes out of hiding and releases Scarecrow from the pole. Together, they then dance their way down the
yellow brick road
The yellow brick road is a fictional element in the 1900 children's novel ''The Wonderful Wizard of Oz'' by American author L. Frank Baum. The road also appears in the several sequel Oz books such as ''The Marvelous Land of Oz'' (1904) and ''Th ...
in search of
The Wiz
''The Wiz: The Super Soul Musical "Wonderful Wizard of Oz"'' is a musical with music and lyrics by Charlie Smalls (and others) and book by William F. Brown. It is a retelling of L. Frank Baum's children's novel '' The Wonderful Wizard of Oz'' ...
, singing "
Ease on Down the Road
"Ease on Down the Road" is a song from the 1975 Broadway musical ''The Wiz'', an R&B re-interpretation of L. Frank Baum's ''The Wonderful Wizard of Oz''. The Charlie Smalls–composed tune is the show's version of both "Follow the Yellow Brick ...
" as they go.
[Campbell, p. 40]
The song is also heard in ''
The Wiz Live!
''The Wiz Live!'' is an American television special that aired live on NBC on December 3, 2015. Produced by Craig Zadan and Neil Meron, it is a performance of a new adaptation of the 1975 Broadway musical ''The Wiz'', a soul/ R&B reinterpretation ...
'', replacing "I Was Born on the Day Before Yesterday".
Analysis
Elwood Watson, author of ''Pimps, Wimps, Studs, Thugs and Gentlemen: Essays on Media Images of Masculinity'', states that ''The Wiz'' offers an "important allegorical treatment of ordinary African American men living in the wake of the Civil Rights Movement". Watson writes that while the crows do not intend to cause physical harm to Scarecrow, the beginning of their scene recalls experiences of the ritual lynching of black men in the United States. The author states that the crows' refusal to allow Scarecrow to read literature was reminiscent of laws that forbade black slaves from being educated. Watson writes, "Scarecrow's desire for knowledge that will help him interpret the discourses and institutions that shape his life signifies on the slave narrative. With its emphasis on literacy and freedom, African American slave narratives document that for many African Americans literacy was understood as an essential path to freedom."
[Watson, pp. 72–74] Watson continues:
The Crows' insistence that reading is useless, even dangerous for Scarecrow because it only leads to discontentment takes on an especially haunting reminder of the ways in which the residues of slavery continue to injure contemporary African Americans. The Crows reinforce Scarecrow's subjection at their hands through a song whose refrain "you can't win child, you can't get out of the game" that aims to disabuse Scarecrow of any aspirations toward freedom ... Their insistence that "reading is stupid" suggests that a Eurocentric education does not promise liberation from "the game" that race and racism create ... The Crow's dismissal of education and western thought fails because they do not offer Scarecrow an alternative that will emancipate him. The Crow's attempt to discipline Scarecrow by displacing his hope with nihilism. For The Crow's so-called book of knowledge is less valuable than what they perceive to be real knowledge-street smarts. Though they are not tethered to a pole, they are seemingly unable or as their commandments and anthem suggests, unwilling to find opportunities than their present location provides. The Crow's chorus to Scarecrow's song is revealing for what it says about their loss of hope ... The Crow's are even more disadvantaged than Scarecrow because, unlike him, they are hopeless. The Crow's chorus, like The Crow Commandments, reflects their disillusionment with their inability to realize the promise of upward mobility.
Watson continued his analysis, writing that despite the crows' attempts to erode Scarecrow's confidence, "
egives no indication that he intends to abort his efforts to liberate himself physically and intellectually." Watson concluded his study of Scarecrow and his scene by stating, "His encounter with Dorothy will help him to realize, contrary to The Crow's assertions, that Scarecrow's pursuit of knowledge can indeed help him to win opportunities for improving his life."
Release and reception
In January 1979, "You Can't Win" was released as the second single from ''
The Wiz: Original Motion Picture Soundtrack'', a
double album distributed by
Motown Records in September 1978.
[Grant, p. 42][Grant, p. 374] The single was issued after the September 1978 release of "
Ease on Down the Road
"Ease on Down the Road" is a song from the 1975 Broadway musical ''The Wiz'', an R&B re-interpretation of L. Frank Baum's ''The Wonderful Wizard of Oz''. The Charlie Smalls–composed tune is the show's version of both "Follow the Yellow Brick ...
", a duet between Jackson and
Diana Ross, who played protagonist
Dorothy Gale
Dorothy Gale is a fictional character created by American author L. Frank Baum as the protagonist in many of his ''Oz'' novels. She first appears in Baum's classic 1900 children's novel '' The Wonderful Wizard of Oz'' and reappears in most of it ...
in ''The Wiz''.
[Grant, p. 40] "You Can't Win" was distributed under
Epic Records, and was Jackson's first solo single issued by the company after Epic executives signed him and
his brothers to the label in 1976.
[White, p. 261] "You Can't Win" entered ''
Billboard''
's
R&B singles chart
The Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs chart ranks the most popular R&B and hip hop songs in the United States and is published weekly by ''Billboard''. Rankings are based on a measure of radio airplay, sales data, and streaming activity. The chart had 100 p ...
on January 20, 1979. It reached number 42 and remained in the chart for ten weeks.
A month later, on February 24, 1979, it entered the
''Billboard'' Hot 100, where it peaked at number 81. The single stayed in the chart for three weeks.
In May 1979, "You Can't Win" was released in Britain, as was a 7"
picture disc
Picture discs are gramophone (phonograph) records that show images on their playing surface, rather than being of plain black or colored vinyl. Collectors traditionally reserve the term picture disc for records with graphics that extend at lea ...
of the song. The single failed to enter the British charts.
[Grant, p. 44] When Jackson's ''
Off the Wall'' was first released in August 1979, the picture disc supplemented the album.
[Jones (2005), p. 64]
Since its release, "You Can't Win" has received positive reviews from music critics. A journalist from the ''
Kansas City Star'' said that the song was the best one from ''The Wiz''.
Kenny Mack of the ''
Santa Monica Daily Press
The ''Santa Monica Daily Press'' is a freely distributed microdaily newspaper in Santa Monica which was founded in 2001 by Dave Danforth, Carolyn Sackariason, and Ross Furukawa. The Santa Monica Daily Press is the only local daily newspaper in c ...
'' asserted that Jackson's "famous vulnerability and the power of his voice on 'You Can't Win' combined for perfect casting" in the film.
''The Boston Globe''
's Renée Graham stated in 2005, "Halfway through the
ong Ong or ONG may refer to:
Arts and media
* Ong's Hat, a collaborative work of fiction
* “Ong Ong”, a song by Blur from the album The Magic Whip
Places
* Ong, Nebraska, US, city
* Ong's Hat, New Jersey, US, ghost town
* Ong River, Odisha, ...
Jackson lets out a whoop, and the tune evolves from a pop-soul confection into a true R&B delight, spiced with barking horns and hand-claps as funky and loose as anything Jackson has ever done."
Writer Geoff Brown wrote in his book ''Michael Jackson: A Life in Music'' that the singer's performance of "You Can't Win" in ''The Wiz'' was "one of the few bright moments in a drab remake of ''The Wizard of Oz''".
[Brown, p. 71] Margo Jefferson wrote in the biography ''On Michael Jackson'' that the entertainer sang the song in the film with "rough, gospel edges of desperation". She added, "The torment feels genuine. It's a painful scene."
[Jefferson, p. 51] After
Jackson's death in 2009, Edmund W. Lewis of ''
The Louisiana Weekly'' said that he was "still amazed at the quality of
he singers performance in The Wiz". He added, "As the scarecrow, he sang the hell out of
he song"
Legacy
"You Can't Win" has been referenced and performed on several occasions. In the 1982 blockbuster film ''
E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial'', a snippet of the song is heard on a car radio.
In 2001
Jill Scott performed the song during the ''
Michael Jackson: 30th Anniversary Special'' celebration.
[Grant, p. 375] In 2003, during the
second season of ''
American Idol
''American Idol'' is an American singing competition television series created by Simon Fuller, produced by Fremantle North America and 19 Entertainment, and distributed by Fremantle North America. It aired on Fox from June 11, 2002, to Ap ...
'', contestant
Charles Grigsby sang "You Can't Win" for a movie theme night.
An ''
Entertainment Weekly
''Entertainment Weekly'' (sometimes abbreviated as ''EW'') is an American digital-only entertainment magazine based in New York City, published by Dotdash Meredith, that covers film, television, music, Broadway theatre, books, and popular cu ...
'' writer said that the song choice was "oddly appropriate", as the hopeful was eliminated from the competition after the performance.
Decades after the release of "You Can't Win", William F. Brown stated that the song had been dropped from his theater productions of ''The Wiz''. He said this was because the musical was not a black message show, but a show for everybody to enjoy. He expressed the opinion that "You Can't Win" was no longer relevant, stating, "
t'sall changed. Black people can win."
Track listings
Limited edition picture disc – 7-inch single
* "You Can't Win (Pt. 1)" – 3:43
* "You Can't Win (Pt. 2)" – 2:58
Charts
Notes
References
*
*
*
*
George, Nelson (2004). ''
Michael Jackson: The Ultimate Collection'' booklet.
Sony BMG.
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
External links
Michael Jackson's official website
{{good article
Michael Jackson songs
Songs written for films
1978 songs
1979 singles
Songs written by Charlie Smalls
Song recordings produced by Quincy Jones