Rolling R&B Thread 2007

for me it's still "SOMETHING NOW IS TAKING OVER ME" with polow cranking the wind machine up to 10 billion, that bit is just amazing

had to listen again, it really is like an exorcism or something

re chris brown again: haha a part of me kinda suspects t-pain might be fucking with chris deliberately! i'm probably just playing dollshouse again but somewhere inbetween that v funny intro ("what them boys gon do for me?! bah!!!") and ooh, this little thing makes me think t-pain isn't above abusing his position a little now he's on top

Ha ha yes! It kinda upsets me that Fantasia hasn't had a bigger career. She really has the most ridiculously great OTT voice.

yes, i must listen to her album. today in fact.

what did u think of nicole 'whatever you like' in the end btw? the video's um... arresting (until that bit when she's eyedeep in the water and i think "ooh, like pharoahe monche!" THAT'S PROBABLY JUST ME THOUGH) but it still strikes me as a bit all bark hollow bite personally

Yeah I was a bit underwhelmed by it. Sort of a mixture of "Beep" and "Like This", except that it's not really very catchy or well-constructed like "Beep", and certainly not as astonishing as "Like This". Nicole is a bit wasted on understated-vocal tracks (whereas Kelly is perfect sounding like she's carefully measuring each phrase).

oh i'm glad ur into 'like this'! thought it was just me, and maybe al. i did indeed grow to love kelly's album.

btw what is up with that bizarrely millenial insistence on kelly having some sort of shoddy-looking LIVE WEBCAST of the party she's hosting in the 'like this' vid!! so deliciously dated.

Yeah, "Like This" is great, although the album did nothing for me in the couple of listens I got in before temporarily misplacing during a recent move. I think "Love" (the Solange co-write!) was the only other song that really grabbed me, let me know what else I should be listening for if/when I relocate the disc.

"Whatever U Like" could have legs for me but right now it's just kinda...there, and the goofy "hot as a stove" stuff would probably work better if it was someone more like, say, Fergie. She's still a really underrated vocalist and I like most of what she's been on so far, but I kinda have to wonder if there's any reason for a Scherzinger solo album right now, although maybe the rumored relationship w/ Iovine is the only reason she needs to make it happen. But seriously, I'm sure the Pussycat Dolls machine could use a new album to keep the reality show going and all (unless the 'next doll' they search for is one who can actually sing lead to replace Nicole?), and it's not like she's going to do something really stylistically different from the PCD album, or like PCD had any qualms about putting her upfront and singing I/me lyrics instead of us/we lyrics before. Still haven't got my head around "Super Villain" to say anything about it either way.

"btw what is up with that bizarrely millenial insistence on kelly having some sort of shoddy-looking LIVE WEBCAST of the party she's hosting in the 'like this' vid!! so deliciously dated."

That's very early 00s J Lo.

Can anyone else hear the Coldplay influence on "Better without You"?

K. Cole single...not bad.

She really has the most ridiculously great OTT voice.

"Like yo' name is Missy ELLIOTT! My name is FanTASIA BARRINO!"

Not many singers can pull something like this off - Fantasia's album is worth it for this alone

Has there ever been a song as good as Cassie's "Is It You"???

I agree Tim. It feels like lightning could strike twice for her, but I'm not sure she can overcome the "OMG did you see her on 106 and Park though? She can't even sing!!!" ridiculousness. I'm positive that can't keep 'em off the charts Akon and T-Pain are equally vocally horrible (if not as lifeless) live, but they've survived quite well. I fear she'll never recover from this seeming obsession with her vocal shortcomings (or maybe I just read Concrete Loop too much).

Yes, yes, yes...I'm in love with Cassie right now. She needs to stick with Ryan Leslie; they're a magical duo.

I prefer "Sometimes" to "Is it You" to be honest.

I guess I should listen to "Is It You" again, because it didn't stay with me at all the couple times I did.

BOO on Tim for using Rihanna as a go-to example for "one of the most charasmatic and accomplished modern r&b singers" on P*tchf*rk today.

I didn't write anything like that Alex. Is that in the abstract?

You know I would have said Teedra!

Yeah, that phrase is in the front page blurb, which they usually take/paraphrase from the body of the review, so I just assumed it was in there somewhere, but you're right, it isn't. My bad. Boo on whoever said it, anyway!

The more clipped disco-funk of "Take Control" might be closer to "anonymous" r&b (one could just as easily imagine it coming from Nicole Scherzinger

You do know that the original version of "Take Control" was by Tori Alamaze, right? I prefer Amerie's version, though.

Am I the only one who likes "Touch"? I keep seeing it get slagged off everywhere.

yeah, 'is it you' is great. i 4ever love the way cassie can go from supposed siren android auteur vehicle to this sweetly blank (um, blankly sweet?) teen relationship muse.

(or indeed "gloriously inconsequential" like tim said of amerie's cassiest move, that'll do too)

"he said he had fallen so in love with me / and i said ditto, ditto, ditto." is <i>still</i> the line though, the cassie urtext! oh and that delightfully whatever badgirl rock one, haha

also - ryan leslie's ridiculously sweet tooth is yet further proof of him being the patrick bateman of this rnb shit that i always knew he was. i could talk forever about him i think!

btw janelle monae (who would like to be cassie but never can be, come to think of it, kinda like a tinman who can't get rid of his heart), her thing is out now apparently. i'd say the ep format was a crafty idea but hopelessly fatal to her schtick at the end of the day.

http://www.digstation.com/AlbumDetails.aspx?albumID=ALB000009731

see, there's no real reason why wizard of oz refs should be particularly teenpop 2k7ish

so haha why am i feeling the deepest of regrets now

DJ ENVY & RED CAFE is maybe the least promising set of words ones read all day but turns out i got undemanding fondness for this thing

(dj spinna i am too herby to let you go!)

Yeah "Ditto" is fabulous. The Cassie album really grew on me and I liked it a lot to begin with, it sounds like an unacknowledged classic now.

Maybe the difference between "Ditto" and "Is It You" is that I found i had to let my guard down a bit in order to appreciate the former, whereas the latter combines that totally unreflective sweetness (which is actually kind of rare in teenpop, which paradoxically tends to sound more knowing and grown-up when talking about the same thing) with this sort of all-embracing universalist feel, kind of international-language-of-pop.

Though I should note that such tunes are rarely hits, perhaps the public are somehow suspicious of this vibe? "Me & U" and "Long Way 2 Go" are such songs of their era, whereas "Is It You" kind of transcends era, which could hurt it perhaps.

Yet another J.Lo single that uses a classic hip hop break, this time it's Eddie Kendricks "Keep On Truckin'", and like all of the other ones it's AWESOME.

she'd make a great bolltwood singer.

*bollywood

The Lloyd album is so good

Though if you didn't like the singles, don't bother. It's very of a piece.

What if I love one of the singles and think the other one is the blandest thing on earth?

Check out the album and you'll come around on whichever you think is bland.

Fair enough.

keyshia cole drops today, anyone heard it?

I just listened to it briefly. The production was amazing, but none of the tunes really grabbed me. The Jill Scott album is kind of similar but sounds more promising.

yeah I love "Let It Go" but am kind of hot and cold on Keyshia herself, and the 2nd single sounds way too much like other Darkchild productions for Shareefa and Mary J. I might feel generous and pick it up during my trip to the store this week anyway, though.

heh so this so uncool of keke palmer's is really lobbing the teenpop cat amongst the pigeons - proper disney assault on rnb (maybe the first??) featuring yr likes of clutch, darkchild, dream, and rotem. also: it is fkn excellent yo. unnerving steely musical theatre training behind every fluffy "ta da!!" makes it supertight, all these anonymous jazz hards constantly poking you in the ribs. 'rainbow' is a set piece to die 4; the new single 'keep it moving' is a total late summer stunner, the lil sister to j.holiday, CHECK IT NOW but maybe don't watch the video at the same time cos it is way better than all that cutesy nausea might suggest.

special word for 'game song', aka the clutch-penned video game thing andy k mentioned on the other thread; KILLER CHORUS OF DOOM ("THAT'S WHY I, I HATE MADDEN, THAT'S WHY I, I HATE MADDEN") but only if you get past wincing at clutch's smartarse provocative first lines:

i turned 13, i can keep company
he comes over and sits with me
we watch movies, go online
under strict parental guidance

now correct me if i'm wrong but surely rule 0001 of teenpop is never bring the bloody age into it!! these guys are smirking all the way to the bank, i'm telling you, and one dreads to think what else theyre gonna come up with for tiffany evans. but god help me i kinda like em for it still.

<img src="http://ec1.images-amazon.com/images/I/41VQ0GnPDXL._AA240_.jpg";>

btw sorry but has there ever been an uglier cover ever

http://ec1.images-amazon.com/images/I/41VQ0GnPDXL._AA240_.jpg

cmon bitch

kinda love 'let it go' now too, but then who would ever hate it? so um, i dunno

havent caught the new single yet but i quite liked 'didn't i tell you' ft too short; the runners seriously get more hammer horror everytime i hear them. i think the song is secretly about vampires tbh.

"so now the sun coming up, you wanna chaaange"

Things I was wrong about: "Because of You"; the Robin Thicke album. Both of those are pretty damn great.

that keke palmer vid is AWESOME, thx rtc!

np. everyone else here shd check the brick & lace/kat deluna stuff we got into on the not talking about dancehall 2007 thread btw

there are no incorrect observations whatsoever in andy k's keyshia rvw, yet i cannot back his kindly spun conclusion. the girl is a void in a bad wig.

rtc can you give a rundown of yr take on mary j's career? which albums you dig now, which you were into and have burned out on, or were blah then rediscovered or ... something. what did you think of breakthru? what about that joint w/ method man and diddy? my life vs. whats the 411?

i kind of want to understand if u think keyshia is redundant, or just overly worshipful, or why she doesn't fit in to the whole mary j mythos ... lots of great artists are initially perceived as pale imitations (i.e. the barry white bites isaac hayes! kind of nonsense that no one in their right mind would say today)

(esp cuz they were all biting lou rawls)