Erykah Badu: C /D, S&D

they are all great records tbf

theres a good moment in chappelles block party movie where iirc erykah does a kind of eye roll while jill scott is on stage...

erykah and jill scott forming like volition during that heavy psych version of You Got Me is perhaps my favourite music movie moment of all time.

i remember some posters getting mocked for objecting to the WS threads at the time, just saying

on topic, these posts are otm

i feel like the schism we're talking about still exists -- a lot of great ballad-driven 'upscale' R&B coming out these days (Marsha Ambrosius, Toni Braxton & Babyface, etc.) but a lot of critics and music people only care about the hip hop-ish stuff like Ty Dolla $ign etc

― some dude, Tuesday, October 7, 2014 12:43 PM (3 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Condescending to young black female singers is the easiest thing in the world, and because their forbears aren't mythologized like Nirvana or the Clash, white kids don't grow up appreciating them.

― guess that bundt gettin eaten (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, October 7, 2014 1:07 PM (3 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

and fyi that toni braxton & babyface album some dude mentions is one of the albums of the year, just wonderful stuff

I should check that out. For the longest time, I dismissed Babyface because I don't really care for him as a performer until I realized (somewhat recently) that he'd had a hand in the bulk of the '80s/'90s R&B that I loved.

theres a good moment in chappelles block party movie where iirc erykah does a kind of eye roll while jill scott is on stage...

I remembered that as an approving eyeroll. Like a "can you believe she's this good" eyeroll.

totally!

i feel like the schism we're talking about still exists -- a lot of great ballad-driven 'upscale' R&B coming out these days (Marsha Ambrosius, Toni Braxton & Babyface, etc.) but a lot of critics and music people only care about the hip hop-ish stuff like Ty Dolla $ign etc

― some dude, Tuesday, October 7, 2014 12:43 PM (3 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

I don't disagree with the former examples but the latter is your personal axe grinding, If he's getting critical attention it's basically from ilx ppl or a reflection of his pretty significant mainstream pop success. I mean he wrote one of the year's biggest songs, came up with the biggest producer in hip hop, and collaborates with a huge cross section of artists. Are you really surprised he's gotten more attention than artists without top 40 singles? And the notion that he gets blanket critical respect is pretty distorted too, fader cover or no it's not like his tapes have gotten blanket praise from critics, most of whom haven't been afraid to mention misogyny or criticize his reliance on guest artists

A better example of popular r&b with critical acclaim is Beyoncé or frank ocean

(Never mind that Ty is a producer/songwriter/singer, which gives him a level of auteur status none of those artists have but I don't even think that's translated to much crit love regardless)

I see where D-40 has hung his hat now that Gucci is in jail

A lot of what's happening itt is, I think, insurgent critical perspectives have become institutional ones in a way they hadn't been. We now live in an era where Aaliyah is on the cover of wax poetics... I remember saying I liked Aaliyah in college and having r&b heads tell me I was crazy.

I see where D-40 has hung his hat now that Gucci is in jail

― 💪😈⚠️ (DJP), Tuesday, October 7, 2014 1:32 PM (2 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

There are like 40 different artists this fka twigs fanboard has tried to say I was obsessed w over the past few years it is weird

How many bat for lashes stans tried to clown me for saying Gucci was an important artist that haven't pulled out "Daniel" in four years

anyway to get back on topic there was a rockist angle to a lot of the ways that ppl argued for neo soul at the time—return to 'soulfulness' obsession w/ the past fetishization of 'organic' sounds... at some level the critique was right. it's funny to hear:

back in the mid-late 90s, i think most critics here, would have been like 'its not real R&B' or futuristic enough (cos yknow, R&B and black music is only good for that). like when simon reynolds drew a binary rza (boring, trad, staid, etc) in the late 90s and what timbo and missy were doing.

― StillAdvance, Tuesday, October 7, 2014 4:52 AM (9 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

like, i was coming to this board from the opposite side, and this focus on futurism etc was new to me and refreshing (not talking about chaki's post, obv)—the idea of listening to R&B from this pop POV was alien to most music writing I'd ever read ... you ask the average R&B critic what was good and they'd be like oh the classisist stuff ("cos yknow, R&B and black music is only good for that"). its a relentless chase for an authenticity that doesn't exist.

i don't doubt there are stereotypes at play whenever people are endorsing or dissing any partic R&B style (esp when they do it like THAT). But it's funny to watch this discussion yo-yo like this.

by 'the critique was right' i am certainly not talking about chaki's post nb

actually, i have to admit, back in the late 90s i was also on the 'neo soul is what more R&B artists should be making! why are people thinking timbaland is better than dangelo and erykah badu?! why doesnt k-ci make a whole record like if you think youre lonely now?!?!'. that wasnt so much rockist (and to put everything down as rockist actually just feeds rockism) as hip-hopist, that idea that 'real' musicians = 'real' R&B/soul (real basically meaning old/60s/70s) like what you heard on old samples etc. but in fairness, a lot of baduizm and brown sugar werent just revivalism, they sounded like the 90s. there were no samplers being used on 70s records. ali shaheed made brown sugar sound like a hip hop record. the idea that it was just like a black american britpop doesnt quite work as it always sounded of the time (voodoo and mamas gun came later, and were much more traditional, but who cares). so yeah, relentless chase for a non existent authenticity sounds about right. but hey, playing music tribes can be fun.

erykah busking

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KsQY8lqFScM

She's posted a soul mix over on mixcloud a couple days back here.

just came here to say that return of the ankh is amazing and is just making me feel really good right now, i love this album so much

We're not officially in the longest wait between Badu albums since the beginning.

not NOW

thx for the heads up daylight

We're now officially in the longest wait between Badu albums since the beginning.

:(

she's touring tho

I thought she was just doing DJ tours

nah full live show at the warfield coming up soon, shakey!

waaaaaht

I kinda hate that place but that's tempting

https://soundcloud.com/erykah-she-ill-badu/hot-line-bling-but-u-caint-use-my-phone-mix

:D

singing colbie caillat on facebook remains the best badu jukebox moment of the past year imo

https://soundcloud.com/erykah-she-ill-badu/hot-line-bling-but-u-caint-use-my-phone-mix

god i love erykah

that link is... 2 posts up

hm, thought that was something different off the caint use my phone mix
anyways, it bears repeating

yes to the hotline bling refix (old news obv), not too sure about "phone down"

sounds like a demo -- it's missing, I don't know, a verse, middle eight?

I did not like "phone down" at all - thin, tinny, plus autotune, not playing to her strengths

jfc some grotesque shit posted itt way back, kind of fucked to know some of those people are still posting

i said hella dumb shit in this thread. really stupid thinking back then.

i love how hypnotic "phone down" is

i need to take some time with this
http://blaecny.com/music/mixtapes-albums/erykah-badu-but-you-caint-use-my-phone-mixtape/

SQUIRRRRRRLLLLLLLLL

oh shit £10? itunes you are rinsing us britishers

got through it three times and this is frankly brilliant

i mean, as with all things, i still wish drake wasn't on it
but he's fairly benign here

it's not Drake, it's a Drake soundalike who is signed to Erykah's label, very weird corny publicity stunt

her voice is always a joy to hear and obviously this is a tossed-off minor work by design, but it really is little more than a "songs about phones" listicle aside from the Andre 3k song

?
mixtape lists tracks as "feat Drake"

also listicles can be brilliant too

http://pitchfork.com/news/62273-erykah-badu-mixtape-out-now-features-andre-3000/

That IS weird. The guy on the track is tapping AS drake , like in persona, so I dunno what they were thinking