Erykah Badu: C /D, S&D

well greil marcus is also a misogynist imo, which doubles up on things

genteel, effete black music

Uh?

Lex have you really always been into neo soul like that? I don't remember you posting about it all that often

Critics generally liked neo soul is my recollection but I was probably not reading the same critics. I did have a knee jerk neo soul is overrated period that was very ilm inspired but more a result of ilm enabling my "no reason to feel guilty about..." W/ more pop oriented r&b which was obv super exciting at the time. It's weird to think about now bc I was a big fan of Jill Scott and "a long walk" was on mix tapes when I was a college freshman... I mean I thought Macy gray was the shit in high school and in part for rockist reasons (she also had a cool voice though)

My hating on neo soul period was brief bc then I got a girlfriend and found pop r&b didn't really speak to that as well as grown folks r&b did. Or something. At any rate I was really into dwele

Dwele <3

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yxGkLOY0lwI

(((d-_-b)))

As a rock critic who has been writing about these neo-soul artists for a decade and change and who, until I started working for MOJO, was banging my head against a wall with regards to getting them substantial coverage, the main kickback I used to get from editors was that they didn't think these artists were "interesting" enough, which I think is doubtless a permutation of what Dan says above, about how middle class black artists are considered by magazine editors (who are often from considerably more privileged backgrounds) to not be "real" enough. The example of this that still sticks in my craw is when I was pitching Mos Def, circa his first album, to an editor who replied "We hate him, we hate 'mummy's boy' rappers." I mean, Mos Def is hardly even middle class! He grew up on the same housing project as Biggie!! But if you're not selling drugs or shooting people then you aren't "real", as far as these chodes are concerned.

Also, really gladdened to see positive mention of Corinne Bailey Rae here, as I think she is wholly underrated.

Also, I almost picked up an Anita Baker album at a charity shop the other day but didn't. Am regretting it now. Did I fuck up? I love Sweet Love.

biggie didnt grow up in housing projects fyi

ack i meant jay z - marcy projects.

corrine bailey rae's closer is/was one of the best neo soul songs of the past decade.

im not sure critics have ever really gotten erykah. its funny how dangelo has now become so rated outside the usual R&B/rap circles, cos i dont remember it being quite so unanimous back in 2000, but its nice to see. erykah however, i think still isnt quite there, even in spite of flaming lips endorsements etc. maybe dangelo just fits the old soulman model they are more comfortable with whereas erykahs precedents (minnie ripperton, betty davis, etc etc) are maybe more obscure to most rock crits.

"if you're not selling drugs or shooting people then you aren't "real", as far as these chodes are concerned."

the opposite also holds true somewhat, or used to much more at least (see: michael franti), with critics who prefer the likes of idk, ghostpoet or lupe than rick ross or waka flocka flame. but i think when neo soul was really peaking, back in the mid-late 90s, i think most critics here, would have been like 'its not real R&B' or futuristic enough (cos yknow, R&B and black music is only good for that). like when simon reynolds drew a binary rza (boring, trad, staid, etc) in the late 90s and what timbo and missy were doing.

*drew a a binary between

tbh most critics i know are wild badu fans but that could be the circles i run in

since the first amerykah album, sure, but when she made mamas gun, or baduizm? i only remember her getting raves from R&B/rap critics

i think in the uk, most rock/pop critics had bad desree flashbacks (fwiw, i did not mind desree!)

Definitely Mama's Gun and Worldwide Underground

Lex have you really always been into neo soul like that? I don't remember you posting about it all that often

i wasn't on ilm in the late 90s! but actually, that was when i was still young enough to be influenced by rock critics, who all told me neo-soul was boring, so i actually didn't check out a lot of the key albums til much later.

since the first amerykah album, sure, but when she made mamas gun, or baduizm? i only remember her getting raves from R&B/rap critics

yeah this is otm, new amerykah - being all Political and Weird and all those bullshit reasons for credibility so beloved by critics - changed her standing among UK critics a lot. (i don't mean all critics, just most mainstream ones.)

presented without comment http://www.theguardian.com/music/2010/apr/01/erykah-badu-new-amerykah-part-two

yeah even I think the straight soul stuff on new amerykah 2 is awesome. dunno then how petridis is even capable of forming such opinions

anyone else in the 2 > 1 camp btw? it's close but

they're different flavours, i can't really decide which is best. they're both best.

not read that review, but vol 2 was her doing what she can do in her sleep, just not as well as she has done previously IMO :|

Also, I almost picked up an Anita Baker album at a charity shop the other day but didn't. Am regretting it now. Did I fuck up? I love Sweet Love.

― A college wearing a sweater that says “John Belushi” (stevie),

You fucked up but you can still repent. Buy it.

Thank Alfred - repent I shall!

Love Eryka, love Corinne, love Anita, love Goapele, Van Hunt, Dionne Farris, and many of their other "lame" contemporaries. Anyone who's carrying the torch of '70s r&b/soul/funk with competence and style is okay by me.

I think much of this issue boils down to fear of admitting appreciation of an artist one might hear in Starbucks. And bigotry, obvs.

I think I remember Badu getting decent coverage in MOJO late 90s, substantial live reviews etc

How it is possible to come to the conclusion that Anita Baker is "ridiculous", whatever you think of the music? JFC

i feel like the schism we're talking about still exists -- a lot of great ballad-driven 'upscale' R&B coming out these days (Marsha Ambrosius, Toni Braxton & Babyface, etc.) but a lot of critics and music people only care about the hip hop-ish stuff like Ty Dolla $ign etc

gets no better

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mjn8QZmyPlk

Condescending to young black female singers is the easiest thing in the world, and because their forbears aren't mythologized like Nirvana or the Clash, white kids don't grow up appreciating them.

This one did, fwiw.

it's not just critics, though; when I was a teen in the late 80s/early 90s Anita Baker songs, Sade, "Piano in the Dark", and so on, were mainstays on top 40 radio. a few years later, "On & On", "Killing Me Softly", and so on. nowadays if I want to hear e.g. "Hurt You" I can't hear it on pop radio. I know there are a zillion threads about this but as a non-critic I want to hear this music like I used to, without delving into specific genre radio etc.

Yeah, it's a little sad that I've had to be plugged into ILM to discover artists like Teedra Moses who could've easily made their mark on the charts twenty years ago.

I can't resist quoting from that Petredis review:

"Her attention has shifted from barricades to boudoir."

And comparing neo-soul to Ocean Colour Scene, Cast, and other nobodies that constituted the "second wave" of Britpop.

this inspired me to listen to new amerykah pt 2 which i'd kinda forgotten to check out...anyway....check out her "related artist" tab on Spotify....one of these things is not like the other

http://s7.postimg.org/halp41icr/baduspotify.jpg

Tho I think the first Nu AmErykah is the better album, I think I'm listening to pt. 2 way more often than pt. 1 these days truth be told.

DJP, 100% not surprised that it was chaki who said it! posted because it's always weird to go back to old ilx shit and see how often sentiments like that go unchecked, or little-checked

there's difft levels of 'indefensible shit we said in days bygone' but I still cannot entirely credit chaki with that, my god

xp: there were like 5 ppl upthread, including myself, who were all "shut up, chaki"?

i know, it just seems like now it would be a huge pile on!

also possibly a separate clusterfuck thread!

i feel like also the numbers were smaller then, so a few posts did actually denote a pile-on

the tenor of the discussion here has certainly changed over the past ten years ye

i remember just a few years ago, when i was image-bombing the "would smash" threads, a moderator went to my personal facebook and used a picture of me to replace the pictures i had posted, making it hilariously look like people were being grossed out by my face and body! i feel like that might not happen in this current atmosphere, and i am really thankful for that, too. :)

yea ws threads in general seem frowned upon these days, right? maybe not the vintage one, which seemed like it had a friendlier spirit anyways

idk. it is embarrassing to think about now.

there are still a lot of gross threads like that getting bumped often enough
eg fitness chicks

n-e-way love erykah & jill scott, always have

"We wanted a video that spoke to Badu's eclecticism. Those album covers represent all the influences that she embodies."[6] Albums covers that were recreated in the video are those of:[5]

Rufus featuring Chaka Khan (1975) by Rufus
Blue (2006) by Diana Ross
Maggot Brain (1971) by Funkadelic
Paid in Full (1987) by Eric B. & Rakim
Honey (1975) by Ohio Players
Perfect Angel (1975) by Minnie Riperton
Chameleon (1976) by Labelle
3 Feet High and Rising (1989) by De La Soul
Let It Be (1970) by The Beatles
Illmatic (1994) by Nas
Physical (1981) by Olivia Newton-John
Nightclubbing (1981) by Grace Jones
Head to the Sky (1973) by Earth, Wind & Fire

i really love that Physical is one of the records.

haha yes!

they are all great records tbf

theres a good moment in chappelles block party movie where iirc erykah does a kind of eye roll while jill scott is on stage...

erykah and jill scott forming like volition during that heavy psych version of You Got Me is perhaps my favourite music movie moment of all time.