"If All I Was Was Black" is the sixteenth studio album by Mavis Staples. The album was written and produced by Jeff Tweedy, who also features on the fourth track. Staples said about the album "(It) bring us all together as a people. That's what I hope to do. You can't stop me. You can't break me. I'm too loving. These songs are going to change the world".

Dozens of luminaries from rock, country, and soul gathered at the Meadowlands’ Izod Center on October 3, 2012, to pay their collective respects in an unforgettable final tribute to Levon Helm. This incredible night was filled with one-of-a-kind performances by greats including Gregg Allman, Mavis Staples, Allen Toussaint, John Prine, Joan Osborne, Ray LaMontagne, John Mayer, Joe Walsh, Dierks Bentley and many others. The iconic artists performed songs associated with Levon Helm and The Band including “Up on Cripple Creek,” “Life Is a Carnival,” “Ophelia,” “The Weight,” “Rag Mama Rag,” “Ain’t Got No Home” and “The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down”.

In 2011, Mavis Staples stepped into Levon Helm Studios in Woodstock, New York (better known as The Barn) for a Midnight Ramble performance that would end up being her last with Helm, who died the following year. That performance will become public with the release of ‘Carry Me Home,’ a recording of that performance that represents some of Helm’s final recordings before his death.