and a percentage of those Ocean fans revere him because he's admitted to same sex feelings thus is a hero and different from other R&B artists.
― The burrito of ennui (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Wednesday, 8 July 2015 13:50 (nine years ago) link
It's such a boring and arbitrary "feud" since I wouldn't even imagine either of them occupying the same lane musically. It's like comparing Trey Songz to The Weeknd.
― Greer, Wednesday, 8 July 2015 14:10 (nine years ago) link
this feud is infuriatingly reductive and everyone blaming miguel for stoking it should have an issue with the reporter who asked the question in the first place
― maura, Wednesday, 8 July 2015 15:11 (nine years ago) link
(also i find frank ocean's thing pretty snoozy tbh.)
but like why does the media have to set up a FITE between two artists of color who are defying boundaries? it's almost as if their minds are B L O W N by the idea that two non-cishet white bros can balance artistic and commercial success without canceling each other out!
(also as meaghan garvey pointed out this whole thing leaves out dawn richard, who is also on their level, but maybe these unimaginative writers can only engage in one othering act at a time)
― maura, Wednesday, 8 July 2015 15:19 (nine years ago) link
Yeah, way too many outlets reporting on this feud whose R&B music coverage is otherwise lacking or nonexistent.
― Greer, Wednesday, 8 July 2015 15:29 (nine years ago) link
i am glad my reading doesn't take me to any place where such a "feud" is happening
dawn put out a better album than either of these guys tbh
― like a giraffe of nah (forksclovetofu), Wednesday, 8 July 2015 16:32 (nine years ago) link
― like a giraffe of nah (forksclovetofu)
yeah
Well, and once again, it doesn't occur to critics that they can compare male artists to female ones.
― The burrito of ennui (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Wednesday, 8 July 2015 16:34 (nine years ago) link
Despite numerous efforts and liking a few songs on various EPs of hers, I still find Dawn largely impenetrable, but agree with the sentiment that there's plenty of other interesting things going on in the genre that don't get talked about whole folks bicker back and forth about Miguel versus Frank.
― Greer, Wednesday, 8 July 2015 16:41 (nine years ago) link
But maybe this is all more suited to the general R&B thread.
― Greer, Wednesday, 8 July 2015 16:42 (nine years ago) link
after "what's normal anyway" this album is perfect
― J0rdan S., Wednesday, 8 July 2015 17:05 (nine years ago) link
to me the big separator b/w this and KD is that KD kinda loses its plot halfway through. the songs individually are pretty good but there's nothing really unifying them, and the album kinda just peters out
this one ends so strongly that when i'm done w/ it i'm just like "damn"
― J0rdan S., Wednesday, 8 July 2015 17:07 (nine years ago) link
I like the quiet no frills opener but "DEAL" and "The Valley" are still slogs. "NWA" is OK. The rest is gravy. "face the sun" makes me feel happy all over.
― The burrito of ennui (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Wednesday, 8 July 2015 17:11 (nine years ago) link
yeah i'd agree with that - i relistened to KD the other day and had completely forgotten how front-loaded it is (but, as you say, not because the songs in the back half are bad per se)
"what's normal anyway" seems anomalous but i'm thinking it might be the heart of the album in some ways? if the first half of the album is the roleplay to the back half's pure feeling (obv only in a rough sense, not song-by-song accurate)
xp
― lex pretend, Wednesday, 8 July 2015 17:12 (nine years ago) link
I was surprised to learn that "what's normal anyway" wasn't a solo composition.
― The burrito of ennui (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Wednesday, 8 July 2015 17:15 (nine years ago) link
damn i hadn't even looked at the credits yet -- are the wikipedia ones right? benny blanco & cashmere cat worked on "...goingtohell" ??? so random
― J0rdan S., Wednesday, 8 July 2015 17:32 (nine years ago) link
also, "flesh" is miguel, raphael saadiq and.... jai paul's brother?
― J0rdan S., Wednesday, 8 July 2015 17:34 (nine years ago) link
The Thrill -> How Many Drinks -> Where's The Fun -> Arch & Point flows perfectly, I have no truck with this historical revisionism. Especially given there have been literally hundreds of more brazenly front loaded albums in recent years.
It does look worse up against the near flawless back half of the new one, admittedly, but I still rate KD slightly higher overall.
Is Miguel trying to tell us something on What's Normal Anyway?
― Matt DC, Wednesday, 8 July 2015 17:53 (nine years ago) link
Wiki credits are wrong.
― The burrito of ennui (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Wednesday, 8 July 2015 18:19 (nine years ago) link
Jai Paul's bro is on Flesh though right
― Number None, Wednesday, 8 July 2015 18:22 (nine years ago) link
― maura, Wednesday, July 8, 2015 11:11 AM (3 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink
well, Miguel and Frank happened to be in the same room for the first time in 2 years the day the interview took place, maybe the writer would've pushed that angle if that wasn't the case but we'll never know. and while i prefer Miguel musically, he really just has never taken the high road in this stuff. he actually said that Frank coming out “could have been a marketing ploy" in a radio interview, the whole subject of FO just seems to make him talk like a jackass.
― some dude, Wednesday, 8 July 2015 18:24 (nine years ago) link
him making a point of being all "I want people to know who I am and that I love women!" when announcing this album reads a bit differently to me now
― the naive cockney chorus (Simon H.), Wednesday, 8 July 2015 20:13 (nine years ago) link
http://i.imgur.com/rC7Ox4z.jpg
― 龜, Wednesday, 8 July 2015 20:30 (nine years ago) link
:D
― difficult-difficult lemon-difficult (VegemiteGrrl), Wednesday, 8 July 2015 21:49 (nine years ago) link
oh come onnnnn
― maura, Thursday, 9 July 2015 00:26 (nine years ago) link
liking this album a lot more since I deleted "The Valley" and "gfg"
― List of people who are ready for woe and how we know this (seandalai), Thursday, 9 July 2015 00:53 (nine years ago) link
i mean, this is something Miguel has been asked about, and has responded to, since the beginning of his career. this is from a year before Channel Orange:http://necolebitchie.com/2011/06/miguel-addresses-his-sexuality-i-love-women/
― some dude, Thursday, 9 July 2015 01:01 (nine years ago) link
there are gay rumors about every (and i mean EVERY) successful male R&B singer but Miguel is one of the few where it became an overt component of his interviews/career narrative right off the bat without any real basis for it
― some dude, Thursday, 9 July 2015 01:02 (nine years ago) link
I like frank ocean but I don't want to fuck to it. Point miguel.
― Popture, Thursday, 9 July 2015 02:32 (nine years ago) link
^
― The Reverend, Thursday, 9 July 2015 03:23 (nine years ago) link
lol at the idea of anyone who posts to a message board making decisions about music based on their sex lives
― J0rdan S., Thursday, 9 July 2015 03:42 (nine years ago) link
speak for yourself?
― The Reverend, Thursday, 9 July 2015 04:12 (nine years ago) link
anyway, you can totally have sex to frank ocean if that's really your criteria
― J0rdan S., Thursday, 9 July 2015 04:40 (nine years ago) link
― maura, Wednesday, 8 July 2015 15:19 (Yesterday) Permalink
Brainwasher pointed out jazmine Sullivan's album is continually left out in these things (and maybe a more populist/popular example than DR)
― supreme problematics (D-40), Thursday, 9 July 2015 08:15 (nine years ago) link
I want to like JS more but every time I listen to her I'm just kind of like "smart songwriting" but nothing else draws me in.
― The Reverend, Thursday, 9 July 2015 11:23 (nine years ago) link
― J0rdan S., Wednesday, July 8, 2015 9:40 PM Bookmark
I guess, but his music (and he himself) are kind of weirdly unsexy to me.
― The Reverend, Thursday, 9 July 2015 11:24 (nine years ago) link
what is this "music to have sex to" thing?
― The burrito of ennui (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Thursday, 9 July 2015 11:57 (nine years ago) link
i am disgusted that any of you people are having sex
― 龜, Thursday, 9 July 2015 12:00 (nine years ago) link
srsly
― The burrito of ennui (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Thursday, 9 July 2015 12:05 (nine years ago) link
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0ImRyPymRAM
― I Am Curious (Dolezal) (DJP), Thursday, 9 July 2015 13:43 (nine years ago) link
I think we can all agree that sex is weird and gross
― the naive cockney chorus (Simon H.), Thursday, 9 July 2015 16:52 (nine years ago) link
this album on the other hand just seems to get better every time I hear it, and I really don't get complaints about the sequencing
― the naive cockney chorus (Simon H.), Thursday, 9 July 2015 17:12 (nine years ago) link
I feel like you guys are just grasping at "people we also like" straws to bring up Dawn or Jazmine as supposedly obvious female contemporaries of Miguel/Frank when Tinashe and Janelle Monae and Jhene Aiko are a much better fit
― some dude, Thursday, 9 July 2015 17:13 (nine years ago) link
what if ~they're all different~
― the naive cockney chorus (Simon H.), Thursday, 9 July 2015 17:22 (nine years ago) link
They're all very different! I just think "why bring up Frank Ocean and not Dawn Richard" sounds disingenuous or like you expect every writer to conform to your not very widely shared view of the R&B landscape
― some dude, Thursday, 9 July 2015 17:32 (nine years ago) link
Disingenuous more so because it skirts around the reasons why gender still plays a disproportionate role in determining how we evaluate singers (or artists in general).
― Hikikomori Povich (tsrobodo), Thursday, 9 July 2015 17:43 (nine years ago) link
I think Tinashe is a good fit!
― The burrito of ennui (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Thursday, 9 July 2015 17:53 (nine years ago) link
Yeah, the reach to Dawn Richards and not say, Jazmine Sullivan or Tamar Braxton or K. Michelle also feels representative of a disconnect between who a small set of music critics want to be relevant to R&B at the moment and who the average R&B listener is actually listening to on a regular basis.
― Greer, Thursday, 9 July 2015 17:54 (nine years ago) link
hmm well no I don't hear much Sullivan, Braxton, or K Michelle in Miguel.
― The burrito of ennui (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Thursday, 9 July 2015 17:58 (nine years ago) link
also: "a disconnect between who a small set of music critics want to be relevant to R&B at the moment" and R&B listeners is non-existent. IF you listen to R&B or adult R&B radio, you're sharing tastes with listeners.
― The burrito of ennui (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Thursday, 9 July 2015 17:59 (nine years ago) link