rolling r&b 2019

This UMI track from last fall ("Remember Me") is excellent:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CLcEe3uYlmI

Mahalia - Do Not Disturb

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

this new Kehlani song is lovely

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rAfxP6BfvNo

I'm well aware this doesn't need the promotion, but it's my favorite song in the world right now:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-_aGvdfLTKY

2018 but w/e

maiday - mandala
https://open.spotify.com/track/5EIB96qoNXb64QKMwARpAc?si=qWtpBBtLRhWQ4ExFon5qKw

another 2018 but w/e
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EzwKqxGQCuw

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4976Fgvf5Ps

👌🏽

i'm starting to hear summer walker's "girls need love" (from the kimmel clip upthread) on the radio and it sounds very great there

lol apparently there's a remix with drake now so i'm sure that will continue

i like the grittier timbre yk osiris accesses in his latest single. plus: guitar solo!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nPiFfJ0UTqE

xp Yeah, the Drake remix just dropped (I’m... not a fan, but really cool for her obv.)

Looks like she also cleaned up her Instagram, deleted a bunch of stuff — making it more “professional”(?)

yeah i'm not feeling drake's contribution to the remix either. the only good thing about it is that it extends the overall runtime compared to the original, which always seems surprisingly short

The disarming brevity of most tracks on Last Day of Summer is a great feature, but it’s true that 2:20 is really brief for a single (it’s actually cool to know that the album version has been getting airplay).

Hot beat on this track.

Lauriana Mae - Something Real

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l6z0K5w9mrk

This is jam u may dig if u also "just don't give a f***":

Shamba - IDGAF

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4llHGZs1DUE

Hot stuff:

Quin & 6lack - Mushroom Chocolate

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

Tayla Parx - I Want You

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9lZ1EVyVLLo

saw her last week opening for anderson .paak! she was really good

Awesome!

this is a jam

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BqRNV21MV14

i'm really excited about tayla

i think she will get her own thread before long

A girl can dream... 😝

(Srsly tho — I’m sure one of us will start a thread when her album drops)

Interesting piece on LVRN (with a particularly interesting bit on Summer Walker):

https://www.billboard.com/articles/business/8501674/lvrn-atlanta-record-label-look-story

They discovered her by chance, when LVRN’s studio manager, also named Summer Walker, decided to Google herself one day. “She saw there was a girl also named Summer Walker who sings and puts videos on YouTube and Vine and built a relationship with her because they shared the same name,” recalls Baiden. Soon after, they all got a text in their group chat that there was an artist they had to meet.

“(Walker) is one of those people that pisses you off just by how talented they are -- but she’s not a try-hard,” Baiden says. “She might be the first punk-R&B chick. She doesn’t like doing press. When you speak to her, her responses are literally one-word answers. She did her first TV performance in a hoodie. As an R&B chick, you’re supposed to get dolled up, stand there, look pretty and sing. But she gives no fucks.”

https://www.newyorker.com/culture/culture-desk/the-new-r-and-b-is-here-reflecting-confused-modern-love

Summer Walker is also in this Briana Younger r’n’b overview piece along with Elhae, VanJess, Pink Sweat$, Marco McKinnis, Eric Bellinger and more

ella mai was good tonight

Nice. Missed her DC appearance but wanted to see her

this is dope
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jdegiQel3yc

i like the beat but not a fan of the song

her uh questionable stagename is unfortunately impossible to ignore in her followup single called (not kidding) "hey lightskin"

Ciara - Thinkin Bout You

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kVczk4uIPPg

pretty good one

has an effortlessly joyful sound to it

a perusal of the youtube comments suggests this was algorithmically served to a large portion of its viewership

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-bs1c-L-CUk

the video actually contains portions of three songs from the artist's album satin psicodelic. i think my favorite is the one that plays in the middle, the v lush-sounding "baby i don't mind"

Ariana Grande and Victoria Monét - Monopoly

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t0pryRrJvfI

https://devinmorrison.bandcamp.com/album/bussin

Tayla's album is out (paging dyl!): https://music.youtube.com/playlist?list=OLAK5uy_mjnyW2rKiZuHiHG1Jbwtss0WBJEnIuImM

the final track, "easy", is great even if it ends too early. still need to spend more time w/ the rest

new elle varner

http://smarturl.it/KindaLoveElleVarner

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t3aHdZfJckg

v much enjoying the new tink so far

Jessie Reyez & 6LACK - Imported

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uOYj7WfJQD8

Ceraadi - Loyal

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=79t9AQYOE7A

So much great stuff already this year, IMO

"loyal" is so nice -- such a smooth, bright springtime vibe to it

some of jessie reyez's vocal quirks are a little hard for me to stomach but she's pretty all right. she wrote "promises" with calvin harris and sam smith!

Yeah — I agree about the vocal quirks, but that song works well for me... I like its woozy, (purposefully) amateurish/“naive” vibe, if you know what I mean (that sounds like a knock, but it’s not meant to be!)

(“that song” being “Imported”)

almost every fifth harmony solo single is miles better than the band's stuff, and this in particular is very early-200s Mya

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vmBcEZ-ruAc

Kiana Ledé (whose single "EX" was linked by Dyl upthread) has a good new EP out.

pretty solid collection. i was almost mad at "shawty" finishing so soon!

ever since jeremih's "planes" i'm always nervous when i see j. cole guesting on an r&b singer's track but i'm feeling this

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FFuZ2avoYmw

never heard of ari lennox before

Mahalia - What You Did (feat. Ella Mai)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=azA0RJMUK0E

i was very ready to like that but something about so prominently sampling an already heavily sample-based production can strike me as odd enough to derail my enjoyment of the whole track. idk, i guess i liked "fergalicious" but it may have helped that at the time i was too young/ignorant to know of its precursors

Are you saying it samples an intermediary track that sampled “I’m Going Down” (and not just the original song)?

that's what i thought, but apparently not. i'm looking at its credits via tidal now, and norman whitfield (composer of "i'm going down") is naturally listed as a composer. not listed however are the writers of the track i assumed it was actually sampling, "oh boy" by cam'ron (those writers are cam'ron, juelz santana, and the producer just blaze).

i would maintain, tho, that the way certain vocals are sampled/looped and beats are constructed is so similar in parts to "oh boy" that i'm almost certain that evoking an association to the latter track was intended

I agree that Cam’ron’s deployment of the sample is pretty iconic

I was gonna go to this show; “life got in the way,” and now I regret that: https://variety.com/2019/music/news/summer-walker-jhene-aiko-usher-los-angeles-novo-1203399722/

this is cool

https://shafiqhusayn.bandcamp.com/album/the-loop

'The Loop' is the new LP by Los Angeles based polymath Shafiq Husayn, an epic project which saw its inception in 2012 through a series of studio sessions at Shafiq’s home, including collaborations with the likes of Thundercat, Erykah Badu, Flying Lotus, Bilal and Anderson Paak. Amongst a close knit circle of friends and family the golden tones of The Loop were created, deeply rooted in ideas of song, story, history, guidance and spirituality. The album bumps, jumps and jangles through progressions in jazz, hip hop, soul and funk, following on from his debut album ‘Shafiq En’ A-Free-Ka’ and adding further to his rich history of timeless, unique music. On The Loop past, present and future are brought together through a psychedelic concoction of time traveling drum machines, celestial string sections and trails of synthesizer vapour. Inflections of Sly Stone, Pharaoh Sanders and Earth Wind And Fire traverse with Marley Marl and Dilla-esqe drums making for an organic yet LA-trifying experience.

Shafiq has brought together an impressive array of LA's musical royalty, enlisting the likes of Thundercat, Miguel Atwood-Ferguson, Kamasi Washington, Chris ‘Daddy’ Dave, Eric Rico, Coultrain, Computer Jay, Jimetta Rose, Om'Mas Keith, Kelsey Gonzalez, I-Ced and more to provide the backbone to his recording sessions. Drawing in features from an international cast of performers and artists like Erykah Badu, Robert Glasper, Hiatus Kaiyote, Fatima and Karen Be amongst others.

I knew I shouldn't have clicked on "Lizzo" trending on Twitter only to read about the Ari Lennox thing.

Just got into “Ass Like That”, the Victoria Monét song posted upthread, thanks to SaidTheGramophone’s Songs of 2019 list. The beat and the horns in particular are wonderful.

Any final additions, to close out 2019? I feel like it was a good year for R&B.

how is sir's album (from top dawg entertainment)? i've been hearing his single w/ kendrick "hair down" on the radio and it's a welcome addition for me

a few others to have crossed my radar recently that i think are p solid:

teyana taylor & kehlani "morning"
h.e.r. feat. yg "slide"
r.lum.r "how this feels"

new-ish brian mcknight song is nice

teyana taylor & kehlani "morning"

This song is good but... those lyrics!

a couple eyebrow-raising lines for sure lol

h.e.r. feat. yg "slide"

Wow, this is some track (and video)... thanx for sharing. (I don’t like the rap too much, but the song’s strong enough to survive it.)

not a problem, glad you appreciate it. not my fav verse, guest or otherwise, from yg, but i'm glad it's there if only for the "i ain't gotta know astrology..." line lol

h.e.r.'s been hard to get a strong sense of. some of her music is remarkably good, pushes just enough against current fashion to thrill, and then some of it sounds so flat, as if calculated to go down easy with the grammy voters that seem to love her so much

Yeah, this is the first song of hers that I’ve really gone in for... She’s obviously v talented, but usually not quite my style?

Just got into “Ass Like That”, the Victoria Monét song posted upthread, thanks to SaidTheGramophone’s Songs of 2019🕸 list. The beat and the horns in particular are wonderful.

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

this may be the best of the admittedly few ro james songs i've heard (no slouch tho considering the company)