Rolling R&B Thread 2012

"show me" is fucking amazing

Yeah, can't deny the dance tracks are pretty glaring outliers, but at least they're smartly sequenced to bookend the record. If you replaced "Can't Stop," "Scream" and "Euphoria" with three of the better bonus tracks, this would be one hell of an album, more or less.

"Twisted" is pretty lame. "Dive" sounds like a Savage Garden cover or some shit.

sav garden would probably have the panache to get away with "precipitating walls" solecisms tbf

Yeah, can't deny the dance tracks are pretty glaring outliers, but at least they're smartly sequenced to bookend the record. If you replaced "Can't Stop," "Scream" and "Euphoria" with three of the better bonus tracks, this would be one hell of an album, more or less.

yes

i enjoy "can't stop won't stop" an unsettling and disturbing amount

AND RIGHT WHEN I SAW YA!
I FELL IN LOVE!

that's the one where he says "i'll be your skin lotion" right?

feeling the new mmts clapper

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=itnvwZ4Z1Hc

Trey Songz is really good at making the most of shameless club songs about being in the clubs.

"Heart Attack" has totally won me over. It just sounds bigger than most radio R&B right now; it's a total power ballad.

think there was some elle varner talk earlier but this sounds great on the radio

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mJIbNepRCS8

yeah i love it (despite reservations about her squeaky oversinging), although rtc already told me that my enjoyment of it is a symptom of being stuck in 2004

I've never listened to that song in its entirety because I seriously cannot sit through the chorus. I like the fiddle, though.

i love that!

verging on some kelsian yodelling towards the end there <3

haha don't make me sound like even more of an ogre than i already am you dick

lol

feel like i should know better than to love that mmts, and then i feel like i should know better than to know better

how can you ever resist that operatic hamming tho, STOP TRIPPIN U CAN'T CONTROL THAT FREAK!

what i would say to trey though is, hey, my mans, you are keeping it rolling and that is all well and good but where is your defining thong song that etches your silly swag into the public consciousness forevermore, reach for them stars homie

yeah it definitely feels like now that he's conquered his lane, both his bangers and his weepers aim to just maintain what they've already accomplished and not go any further. which is still kinda admirable given the desperate crossover splatter everyone else is going for, but it would be nice if he seemed to still have some unrealized ambitions.

thank god he's not following CB's lead and rapping on singles, though -- his flow on the "bait" remix and that dreamchasers 2 track are just horrifying.

his "flow"

i liked his rapping on "wonder woman" fine, at least as far as r&b dude rapping goes

yeah he's done some pretty decent rapping and rapping-ish stuff on random remixes like "I'm The Ish" etc. over the years but on those 2 recent tracks he's just annoying as fuck

both his bangers and his weepers aim to just maintain what they've already accomplished and not go any further. which is still kinda admirable given the desperate crossover splatter everyone else is going for, but it would be nice if he seemed to still have some unrealized ambitions.

I can't argue with the gist of this, but I think it undersells him pretty badly. There's a clear advancement of his craft from album to album, ending with PP&P, which was a rock solid through and through; it was a traditionalist contemporary R&B album that never felt stiff or classicist, and that's an impressive feat in its own way. He's not dazzling anybody with innovation, but if his plan is to keep making bigger, better R&B albums in hopes of having a pop audience come to him, rather than having to chase them, I'm OK with that.

not sure who this guy is... miguel tweeted a link to this last week or something

really strong song imo

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VKfrhDmhbqI

every time Trey drops an album or mixtape i think "maybe this'll be the one i actually listen to" and then i don't. he can be great in small doses but an hour of all that emphatic vibrato just seems exhausting.

he's pretty uncompelling all told

every time Trey drops an album or mixtape i think "maybe this'll be the one i actually listen to" and then i don't.

ha otm

These #TweetTuesdays tracks are making me pretty excited for a new Tweet album. The new one is super soft.

new kellz is quintessential "tasteful mid-tempos for the moms, with a couple of oddities to leaven it" but it's v enjoyable anyway

that was the last album too, the question is is it better/worse than that

These #TweetTuesdays tracks are making me pretty excited for a new Tweet album. The new one is super soft.

― Evan R, Tuesday, June 19, 2012 10:18 AM Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

officially obsessed over here

not as great on one listen, the last one seemed kinda more opulent and lavish than this

xp

what is the new tweet track called?

Have we discussed this yet?

https://twitter.com/_MAXWELL_/status/205133542668251137

Lead single from blackSUMMER'Snight forthcoming soon! Which means the album can't be far behind. So excited about this.

oh thank god, three years was way too long a wait

It's ironic that #SUMMERS almost certainly won't be released until fall, earliest

Also, Lex, the new Tweet song is called "C 4eva". Acoustic is a good look for her, even if I think I like "Trouble" more

we fuckin w/ this new jeremih single?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qOwEddREowI

production is interesting

oh it's the same beat as that goapele song

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kRn2DAggPEE

of course! was just scratching my head for a few minutes trying to place that. i really love that goapele song so can't really get into this.

Can't get into the new Jeremih song---his pseudo-rapping on it is just dreadful---but that ultra-Teriusy "Late Nights" track from a few months ago that never made any waves still pushes all the right buttons for me. Hoping his mixtape drops soon so I can enjoy it in the summer.

http://25.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m5uo2eZmF01rxlzpfo1_500.jpg

wtf kinda tumblr bullshit is that

just think its funny that gross rockist rap nerdery has infiltrated R&B discourse thanks to frank ocean and the weeknd. congrats

lol yeah cos r&b fans never ever made assertions like that prior to the scapegoats de nos jours showing up

Yeah this isn't really that different to people comparing say Jill Scott and Destiny's Child a decade plus ago is it?

Except that there's now no hard distinction sonically (i.e the old battle lines were drawn on an organic/soulful vs electronic/beat-heavy axis as much as lyrics/persona).

theres very much a diff i'm saying this is outsider rockism as opposed to old ppl rockism

Except that there's now no hard distinction sonically (i.e the old battle lines were drawn on an organic/soulful vs electronic/beat-heavy axis as much as lyrics/persona).

this also strikes me as a p notable change too!

yeah I was just thinking I suppose the difference is that the current distinctions are drawn as between individuals' relationship with (roughly) the same culture/aesthetic rather than as between two competing (and stylistically/arguably generationally distinct) aesthetics.

It's kind of like a fusing-together of the old authentic vs plastic division and the old innovators vs campfollowers division - the treatment of e.g. Frank Ocean is neither as another (say) Musiq Soulchild nor as another (say) Timbaland but a kind of combination of the two.

In some ways this kind of approach is harder to argue with (though that doesn't mean it's correct) because the protest "why shouldn't I want in-effect contemporary popular R&B with modern production and 'smarter' lyrics / subject matter?" seems more reasonable than "contemporary popular R&B is the very devil."

And you can attack the implied definition of 'smarter' as myopic and occasionally eye-rolly but outright objecting to stuff in that mould is difficult to justify objectively.