Raphael Saadiq - The Way I See It

lex has he played in london and i missed out?

amazing!!

can't wait!

aw, he's playing in chicago on thursday, wish i could go

holy SHIT was that a great great show

yayyyyyyy im so happy he's coming next week.

I was going to see him live with Janelle Monae but I had a class that I couldn't afford to miss :-\

he played london in...november or december, i think? at the jazz cafe. i remember seeing him and solange at the pigalle really close to each other.

saw him last night. it was o-k. i mean, the band sound great and his backing singers, the girl esp, really put their guts into it, but those new songs are just SO inoffensive. still, was surprised hes a pretty nifty dancer when he wants to be, he sounds great live, but the show was too made up of the new album for my liking (and yes i know hes there to promote the new album but still). he did a few lucy pearl songs, and some from the previous two solo albums, but waited til the encore to do TTT songs, which made my night, even tho he only really did like one verse/chorus/bridge/chorus for most of them. but there were so many songs he left out that i wish he had done instead of stretching out the newer ones unnecessarily. the band just seemed to be chugging away half the time in classic 60s motown revue style but without any real climax or anything. i know he really wants to get that winehouse/duffy/ronson money but i hope he puts his limp retro exercises away for the next album.

Almost everyone I know who's seen him on this tour reports a different set list (not song-for-song, just different emphases each time), which is something I like.

I still play the album a lot--the songs are great.

i think i prefer the "gospeldelica" of Instant Vintage--btw, Rev, you need to hear this...NOW!--these days, tbh. this is still a terrific album, tho. afrofutureism vs. retro-soul?

instant vintage wasnt futuristic.

if thats what you were implying.

kinda, yeah. retro-futuristic?

dunno. what makes it futuristic? i think ppl overuse that term wrt black music. it was just a good R&B/neo soul album. quite of its time when it came out imho.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/2009/apr/24/raphael-saadiq-interview

"I feel like a lot of white bands do it all the time," he says. "I didn't want to see another white-boy band come out and do a Motown sound, while all the black dudes are singin' with that thing (autotune) on their voices, rappin' and doin' all kindsa tap dancin'. I was like, 'No! I'm not gonna let the Killers come out and be in some suits an' some ties, and somebody else comes out doin' the Beatles, when I eat and sleep that!' Not to take anything from them - I love it when bands like the Killers or the Kings of Leon go back and pull somethin' from the past and make it theirs, I think that's the best thing. But I don't see too many urban groups doin' it."

says it all right fucking there

why cant the-dream be more like kings of leon?

;_;

Raphael Saadiq led a band reminiscent of Motown soul — and for an unexpected bit of Detroit, also belted a protopunk song from Iggy Pop and the Stooges, “Search and Destroy.”

A review of Saadiq at Bonnaroo

ha! he rules.

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

^ that is pretty great.

his daytrotter session is outstanding:
http://www.daytrotter.com/dt/raphael-saadiq-concert/20030483-3737977.html

Instant Vintage is a fucking classic. I don't like dude's recent stuff.

"Still Ray" is one the most blissful songs there is imo

^^I have recently come to adore this trak

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ooz85nVYfiU

YES YES YES YES

<3<3

i'm coming home to you
wear something seethrough

so iiii can seeee your heeaaart

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZXHs0t5VQM4

Just gonna call a spade a spade here. Terrible song, terrible video, and Raphael Saadiq sounding like the Strokes in 2011 is NAGL as it comes.

Would rather listen to the Fat/Beach Boys' "Wipeout."

otm!

this is really terriblr

As usual, I kind of dig things that people on ILM hate.

its the most generic pastiche of 50s rock cliches ever what is there possible to like abt it

this shit is bankrupt as fuck

Saadiq was good when he was doing his "gospedelic" thing. This is just bad.

Oh come on you big babies. That's a good song. There's so much crappy music out there, why do you have to tool on Raphael? He's real good goddamnit!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

its the most generic pastiche of 50s rock

There isn't a single 50s thing about that song dawg.

he is really good, which is why I expect better of him than this.

There isn't a single 50s thing about that song dawg.

― kornrulez6969, Thursday, January 20, 2011 10:47 PM (13 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

ok early 60s??

sorry i dont remember the exact recording dates for the surfaris

Instant Vintage is a classic. I have no interest to hear anything else from Saadiq, as talented as he is. It's just not an aesthetic I have any interest in.

the hate is way OTT in this thread. I put the song on expecting it to be next level bad and it's not at all!

don't really get the Strokes compare, Raphael is clearly trying to pay homage to early surf-tinged rock 'n roll, not the 00s replication of it. other than the vocal production, there are too many sonic details he gets right for it to be a copy of a copy. The main criticism I can give is that he took the stock sound and didn't do anything particularly new or interesting with it, more or less just filled in a template.

honestly this isn't something I'd spin a lot but I can say I "liked" it for sure. it's pleasant to my ear, not a standout but pleasing nonetheless.

I mean it really isn't much different than what he did on The Way I See It, going for retro but he just did it with a different subgenre.

i dont like 'the way i see it' either for the same reason so *shrug*

whats the pt of becoming a trad 60s revivalist

Um, because it's a genre in and of itself just like anything else?

He may have gone a little overboard with the throwback suits and big black glasses, but there's definitely some merit in recreating a sound and doing it well.

i guess, if u want to play a lot of weddings

but like, you're a talented songwriter! make something original! u can reference the past w/out mimicry

xpost guess nobody bothered to tell the neo-soul movement then