Where did his love of blues music originate?
Apparently he had an almost-religious experience as a young boy listening to the radio and hearing James Brown’s “Please, Please, Please.” It stirred something in him, this little kid stuck in a white, Leave It To Beaver-style South Carolina suburb. He started sneaking out at night to the Township Auditorium, defying segregation laws, to sit in the balcony with his buddy Joe Sligh hearing the great R&B legends of the day. Sligh says Atwater worshipped James Brown for the spectacle more than the music. The tight rein JB kept on his band, the absolute domination, the pageantry of a Pentecostal Broadway show, and above all, the cult-like devotion of the audience—Atwater wanted all that in his political campaigns. He was the first operative to become a star, and he became worshipped by legions of Young Republicans. He was their James Brown. I was struck by Howard Fineman’s observation that “the media beast can only be chewing on one ankle at a time.” Fineman sums it up. We’re social anim
