Article: Calling Mr. Dynamite; Film revisits "The Night James Brown Saved Boston".(Arts and Lifestyle)

Byline: JED GOTTLIEB

James Brown never had much use for restraint. There's no place for modesty on albums like "Live at the Apollo." Wallflowers don't earn nicknames like "Mr. Dynamite" and "The Hardest Working Man in Show Business."

But in Boston on April 5, 1968, the Godfather of Soul held back.

The night after James Earl Ray murdered Martin Luther King Jr. in Memphis, Tenn., riots broke out across the country as Brown prepared to play Boston Garden. Worried that widespread violence would overtake the Hub, city leaders transformed Brown's show into a soul-soothing panacea when they televised it live on WGBH (Ch. 2).

One of the great, mostly forgotten moments ...

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