D'Angelo - Black Messiah (2014)

voodoo is much better. but this is still super nice

I actually thought of Kid A while listening to this for the first time, with "1000 Deaths"/"Really Love" and "National Anthem"/"How to Disappear" as first-half tonal disparity twins

not even d'angelo can escape without a radiohead reference :(

sorry :(

well someone invoked Pomplamoose upthread so it can only get better, surely

I've always liked Voodoo, but some people itt obviously LOVE it to a degree I've never managed to reach. For me, Black Messiah pushes some buttons that Voodoo doesn't (noisier production, more devil in the details, etc). I can't fault someone who's loved Voodoo for the last 15 years for saying this isn't quite as good, but it's continuing to kick my ass all over the place.

1,000 Deaths sounds SO much better on my stereo at home. I was listening to it mostly in my car today which has a pretty shitty sound system and all I could hear was distorted bass, it just sounded like soup

so much better at home!

Loving the hell out of "Back to the Future Part 1"

― Tim F, Monday, December 15, 2014 5:14 PM (5 hours ago)

this song is so killer

voodoo is one of my favorite albums of all time and uh idk if i'm ready to suggest black messiah is better or worse than it

for the most part imo it does different things

Agree with every word of Johnny and Brad's posts above. For me distinguishing itself from Voodoo was the biggest prerequisite for this album's success, and it more than accomplishes that. (Also helps that this album differentiates itself in all the right ways imo; everything I loved about Voodoo is represented here, along with a crapload of surprises and innovations)

Voodoo > Black Messiah > Brown Sugar imo

The album has been out 24 hours!

Something about the guitar in "Betray My Heart" reminds me of Isolee "Beau Mot Plage."

i have a kind of dumb poorly-formed thought that I can't really shake -- 'Sugah Daddy' sounds like the blended style that Outkast were going for with the music in Idlewild. Which would have been a hundred times better if it sounded like this imo.

this sounds so much better on CD (and i have pretty good ipod headphones).

i can't really judge how this sounds until i've blasted it in a car with three high friends heading out into the pennsylvania wilderness

another life might be the best thing hes ever done. not sure why it wasnt on the rip i downloaded....

god, this album...

"1000 Deaths" is the one that's taken my breath away

heh

http://www.vulture.com/2014/12/everyone-freaked-out-about-dangelo-black-messiah.html

one thing voodoo has over this record is the slow inexorable build toward "untitled"

in this way black messiah does function more like a sly album, a bunch of exercises that together knit an unsettled atmosphere

any reports on the how the vinyl pressing sounds?

vinyl's not out till Feb, is it?

I want it though

ah ok, i thought i read someone say they'd saw vinyl up thread....

the climax of "Another Life" is sorta "Untitled" like though

the climax of "Another Life" is sorta "Untitled" like though

as i was writing that i thought to myself that "another life" is like a tiny album

but my point is that the tension-and-release of voodoo is very specific and extreme and black messiah doesn't even go for it. to its credit i think

So today from Ben Kane, ie the engineer -- turns out Humorist/Phil's Reality of My Surroundings take wasn't far off:

1k deaths: was once told D was inspired to write the music to this directly after being blown away by a joint at a Fishbone concert.

Voodoo had that perfectly-formed-in-the-heavens quality to it that I don't think this record has, but I don't think that is a bad thing. It feels like more of a Project, and I need more time to get my mind around it. I like everything I hear on it, nothing has quite earwormed me, and I will definitely keep listening to it.

I like that I've seen every track named by someone as the standout or the one that caught their ear first.

I think Sugah Daddy is my fav so far. I'm not crazy about the maxed-out sound of Charade but I haven't heard it on a good system/good headphones yet.

this feels shaggier and more improvisational to me than voodoo. "betray my heart" starts out sounding like it could be "spanish joint part ii" but it's got other ideas, loping along, finding other riffs.

can i just reiterate, i am so happy right now.

i have got to listen to this on headphones - i am so enraptured by "sugah daddy" through to "betray my heart" but i swear my mp3s of the first two tracks must be fucked bc they still sound like total messes and i can't even seem to hear what's going on in them

i do wish his vocals were higher in the mix generally

i have no sense of any of these as SONGS yet

yeah I feel the same, they're more like really elaborate jams

i also need a lyric booklet so badly because i can make it approx five lines on the whole album and this is a BARRIER to me

*make out

the official lyrics are up here fyi: http://www.metrolyrics.com/news-story-dangelo-black-messiah-lyrics-revealed.html

lex maybe you should just make out to this album instead

lex maybe you should just make out to this album instead

apart from having a bf without the requisite taste, i don't feel like this is a partic sexy album anyway? like, not in the way voodoo or brown sugar were

i think my opinion on it would be so different if it actually just started at "sugah daddy"

'Sugah Daddy' sounds like the blended style that Outkast were going for with the music in Idlewild

haha this kind of occurred to me too - this is an album Andre 3000 wishes he could make

guitar playing and all

i thought caring abt lyrics was rockist? like they should just function as sonic elements of a song. i left my cheat sheet at home tho

this is an album Andre 3000 wishes he could make

otm

'prayer' has really started to put in roots as something i don't want to be without in my life

Production more crowded than anything he's done (not in a bad way)

whole thing sounds busier than usual. His vocals aren't controlling and dictating the tracks like they usual do. But

Betray My Heart has some gorgeous gospel, though sounds like a Voodoo pre-sessional jam that didn't quite progress onto the level of a fledged voodoo track. Never the less beautiful.

Ooooh Check out those Delphonics late 60s soul licks on the last track Another Life!! Smooth azz track to end.

His voice has suffered a little in the last 14 years

Doesn't have the groove or the confidence of Voodoo, doesn't have the melodies of Brown Sugar

Sugah daddy to Really Love is a powerful moment

He's channeling prince stronger than ever before

Sounds good after 1st listen though I'd put it has his 3rd best album

Still agreeing with myself.

He's following a benchmark classic of the genre and then a bonafide classic in popular music in general so what he's come up with here, which is essentially a live jam session feel recording was actually a real smart move. With the 60s soul adorations, uptempo, gospel nods, and all sorts of musical homages I think is a cool move at this point. Moving away from the Rhodes sound of Brown Sugar almost completely now muddies his melodies to maybe where he's feeling more comfortable at this point after all his personal issues. He's not the same person as on Brown Sugar writing those smooth clear consistant earworm melodies on every track. He's always been most influenced by Prince but on some tracks on here like Sugah Daddy he's gone there stronger than ever before. S.D is almost a straight Prince homage.

Cool stuff. I'm not sure someone like D'Angelo is capable of making disappointing music.

re: the hope upthread that this would be his new amerykah, it's more like his worldwide underground

I don't know if I agree - Worldwide Underground doesn't really hang together as an album and, for all its qualities, is quite misshapen and feels like a grab-bag of unrelated tracks to me, whereas this has a really strong, coherent flow (albeit clearly being an album that reveals more with every play).

re: the hope upthread that this would be his new amerykah, it's more like his worldwide underground

― lex pretend,

Not sure what the thing is here with the constant comparison linking with other "neo soul" artists (He's like Bilal!! x200, Come on really?) but I'm gonna have to engage in this scraziness after this absurd comment! This album is far, far far far more like New Amerykah Part 2 than anything on Worldwide Underground. New Amerykah pt2 has the live instrument lazy melodies session jam feel that W.U completely lacks (beat machines!)