D'Angelo - Black Messiah (2014)

So who of the professionals or p&j voters among us is including this in their best of 2015 albums?

Had to compile my 2015 Top 10 for MOJO last month, and Black Messiah was on the list of albums we'd reviewed in 2015, and I was like, some great, great albums this year but yes, Black Messiah is still the best album of that bunch.

I absolutely love just about over a third of this (The Charade, Sugah Daddy, Really Love, Betray My Heart, The Door, Back To The Future). The other parts I find either over-busy or a little bit too backgroundy for me to truly love.

yeah i voted for Black Messiah in P&J in 2014 but not for my local paper's year-end list that's due in November, and as i do the paper's list this year i'm sticking to 2015 releases. i'm not really worried about this album being overlooked!

I've thought about including it because I didn't last year (I've a vivid memory of downloading and listening to it on my way to jury duty on Dec. 15). I included Beyonce's album on my 2014 ballot. But I don't wanna deny a good album a spot.

it should still be on ballots (speaking as someone who has nothing to do with P&J). tail end of a year has always basically meant the next year, for these kinds of things.

It depends on the critic. If I've been assigned to review it, thus forcing me to concentrate for a deadline's sake, I'd have included it. I wasn't, so I absorbed it in leisurely fashion over the holiday.

even before Beyonce and D'Angelo dropped their buzzer beaters, i've always been pretty big on keeping my ears open to December releases on my year-end lists, some of my favorite albums in recent memory (including Last Train To Paris) got in under the wire on my lists that way. and that's partly because i know i'll have no desire to fit them into the next year's list.

depends when you (have to) make your EOY lists, right? most critics will prob submit multiple ones (i've submitted a couple already) but i don't really consider them ~official until my own final one on 31 dec. then that's it, done, not revisiting or thinking or carrying over

Coming back to this for the first time in a while, enjoying it even more now that the critical buzz haze has dissipated. The arrangements and production are just fucking masterful.

yea I've been playing this a lot lately, it's really really good

Also the rhythm section is so fucking sick, like on par with prime motown, stax, James Brown band, p much any groove rhythm section.

could see it wind up being my album of the decade

It's not as good as Voodoo but very few albums are.

literally none, imho

IDK, it's such a different feeling album to me, almost hard to compare

This is my 2nd favorite album ever.

Voodoo is my 2nd fav ever

<3

yup

Clicked on this hoping that Trump spurred him to finish his next album.

Chris Dave, the drummer on this album, has made an album of his own which will be out on Blue Note next month.

hmmm, i know Questlove, james gadson, and chris dave all played on Black Messiah, but i've never seen a track by track breakdown on who plays on what - until now.

https://storify.com/amaah/black-messiah-liner-notes

ain’t that easy - james gadson
1000 deaths - questlove
the charade - questlove
sugah daddy - gadson
really love - started with questlove, ended with gadson
back to the future, pt 1 - questlove
till it’s done (tutu) - unclear?
prayer - chris dave
betray my heart - questlove
the door - d’angelo
back to the future (pt 2) - questlove
another life - questlove

Tutu is unquestionably Questlove on drums.

Among other things (just the sound, and the press roll at the beginning), I think of that three note fill (that starts on the 4 and has a flam at the beginning) as one of his signature licks.

has a new song on the RDR2 soundtrack

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=obJuKmMjFG4

https://images.ctfassets.net/5jh3ceokw2vz/3QfGPJD8zMvifV37RhuOne/b97ad8c2ab17e28986cc5a192306c2c6/0Z0A9862.jpg?w=1600

https://wepresent.wetransfer.com/story/dangelo-the-devils-pie/

^^ Great photographs and story about Carine Bijlsma's documentary about D'Angelo.

The doc is great!

Is there any way to watch this online yet?

You might need a VPN, but it's here:

https://www.2doc.nl/documentaires/series/3doc/2019/devils-pie-dangelo.html

Listening for the first time since probably 2016 and i'm not sure why i haven't been pumping this one a month minimum

you are hereby ordered to pump it 4x month for the following year to make up for your mistake

Be nice if The Charade weren't always so timely and poignant

it's been awhile for me too

Just listened to this album a few times the other week, it has definitely continued to justify its immediate hype.

Sooo did any intrepid slskrs ever happen on a rip of that 'slingbaum' track with D & Badu?

His best album. Thank God hes gotten better album by album. Even if they do take a while.

Agreed. As amazing as Voodoo is, this one is where it's at imo.

Not sure why it took so long for "Another Life" to click in for me but ... man ... it really is among the best things he's ever done.

There's an interview with Ben Kane in the newest Tape Op, he says that he worked on Black Messiah for a decade, just hoping it would come out at some point. And now that they're back in that process, so working on new music that maybe will be released someday.

i think maybe the most unbelievable "moment" in music that year is from the introduction to The Charade, from 18 to about 26 seconds in, as the vocals rev up like a train and the drums fading in as well. it's a feat of wizardry to pull it off as smoothly as he does. if you're not paying attention, you don't even notice how it's rolls up into the verse. just beautiful

typo city but great song A+

‘1000 Deaths’ slays me...Eddie Hazel soundtracking a Vietnam vets final bad trip...awesome!!!

"the charade" is a miracle of a song, agreed

Another life is sublime,beautiful,tragic, just one of his all time best songs. Incredible. Esp that fractured vocal. Black messiah makes a lot if brown sugar sound tentative, and voodoo sound over ambitious, puffed up, and like he was trying on soneone else's clothes on. This album is when he really started showing himself.

I don't care about 2020 opinions, I care about hearing this viny-only vanity project by some Italian keyboardist with D'Angelo, Erykah Badu, and Chris Dave.

it'll show up eventually

I'm surprised it hasn't already!

https://pitchfork.com/thepitch/who-the-hell-is-slingbaum-dangelo-fka-twigs-erykah-badu

Ok, apparently he's not Italian. But almost certainly independently wealthy.

all the descriptions of it sounded terrible tbh

the slingbaum album is indeed easy to find on soulseek fyi

xp Karl--heck yeah, great point: haven't listened to it in a while, but yeah, the way the drum machine and synth and brief bass harmonics and guitar and vox all 'wake up' in those 25 seconds is so seemingly effortlessly exciting

And also hard agree that, while having admitted it's been a minute, Black Messiah has likewise def become my go-to D in recent years