Maurice White had a plan. It’s 1972, and Earth, Wind & Fire are about to perform at Philadelphia’s Uptown Theater, coming on after some doo-wop acts. They’re a new band from California sporting afros and dressed in dashikis. The crowd doesn’t know what to expect.
White walks out, sits down and gets into the lotus position. The rest of Earth, Wind & Fire join him in meditating. The crowd starts seriously booing but, after a few minutes, they settle down.
Finally, White starts playing the kalimba. He tells fellow vocalist Philip Bailey to get behind the congas, before the rest of the band constructs a groove one-by-one. Soon enough, Earth, Wind & Fire might as well be levitating.
In Ahmir “Questlove” Thompson’s new documentary, “Earth, Wind & Fire (To Be Celestial vs That’s the Weight of the World),” now streaming on HBO, the band’s harsh reception is explained simply by Stevie Wonder: “Sometimes, people are afraid of change.”
But for Thompson, the Roots co-founder, that groove at the Uptown Theater is the precise moment that Earth, Wind & Fire became the band we all know, with hits such as “Shining Star” and “September.” He’s become an in-demand music documentarian after the Oscar-winning “Summer of Soul.”
When the surviving members — Maurice White died in 2016 — of Earth, Wind & Fire reached out, Thompson thought that a documentary about the legendary soul group was a no-brainer.
“Everyone loves Earth, Wind & Fire but people don’t know Earth, Wind & Fire,” Thompson told The Washington Post in an interview. “Like, gun to our heads, people couldn’t name like all the group members. Maybe some album titles. The music’s ubiquitous, but this is the band that you know nothing about.”
The documentary follows White’s journey from Memphis to Chicago as a kid, where he started playing drums for jazz pianist Ramsey Lewis, then his path to California, where he went from idealistic songwriter to the man who released “Let’s Groove” because the band needed a hit in the disco-era. At various parts of his life, White is depicted as an almost-psychedelic animated figure.
“I always wanted people in the mind state of Maurice White,” Thompson said. “You can’t help but feel [it] when you see five-year-old Maurice, heartbroken, and his heart chakra goes down. You can tell where we are in the film based on the glowing of his heart.”
White had lofty goals for the band: “He wanted a fifty-fifty crowd,” onetime Earth, Wind & Fire manager Bob Cavallo said in the film. “It wouldn’t be a White crowd or a Black crowd. It’d be both.”
But White’s aims went even further: He wrote that he wanted to evolve consciousness through music and change the world. The documentary dives into the spirituality and wellness routines that were central to Earth, Wind & Fire’s success — meditation, manifestations, even specific green juice recipes.
Astrology, numerology and mysticism made an impact on a young Thompson. “If you look at the cover of ‘Open Our Eyes,’ the earth just looked real sludgy,” he said. “To this four- or five-year-old, that was a very scary-looking logo.”
Thompson was far from the only kid struck by what Earth, Wind & Fire were doing. Former president Barack Obama said in an interview for the documentary that Earth, Wind & Fire were one of his first concerts, noting that he danced to their slow-jam “Reasons” at school events.
“Earth, Wind & Fire kind of said, ‘I have joy, and I have imagination, and I will force that onto the world whether they are ready for it or not,’” Obama said.
As Earth, Wind & Fire grew more successful, White refused to loosen his grip on the band, even going as far to underpay bandmates and treat them like session musicians. Those tense relationships reverberated with Thompson.
Almost 40 years ago, Thompson founded the Roots along with rapper Black Thought (neé Tariq Luqmaan Trotter). If he’s taking something away from making “Earth, Wind & Fire (To Be Celestial vs That’s the Weight of the World),” it’s that his collaborators need to feel valued.
“Tariq and I am in our phase right now where, ‘Okay, maybe it’s time for us to see a therapist, too,’ because it’s a relationship,” said Thompson. “You need couples counseling sometimes.”
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