Janelle Monáe - Dirty Computer album/film

OOOH SHIT

i mean i don't begrudge her the acting stuff because she was good at it and had done acting and drama since before her music career (rather than the usual 'musician wandering into hollywood' process) but whether or not she's still doing the metropolis suite concept with DC it is nice to here something after 5 years since her last one

The most otm comment I read about her last one is that it sounded like the menu music from marvel vs capcom

GONNA TAKE YOU FOR A RIDE

^ haha yeah!

The arch android is one of my fave albums of the respective year, excited about this new one

I presume this is the one Scott Stereogum was hinting at...hints of Kiss are there, but not at a distracting level.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tGRzz0oqgUE

And then there's this one, which seems...clumsy?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mTjQq5rMlEY

More curious now than before to see/hear how this all weaves together.

hard to compare something at first listen to stuff i've been playing for years, but "make me feel" is exciting: another killer piece in her "working-in-the-same-vein-as-past-black-pop-auteurs-but-still-being-individual-rather-than-imitating" mode

django jane doesn't soar quite as high, but still solid and enjoyable, and y'all gotta admit she got bars. little disappointed at her for namechecking her involvement with fem the future and then turning around and tossing in a handful of cis pussy power cliches but that's the way the cookie crumbles i guess

What is fem the future? What are "cis pussy power cliches"? And why does this disappoint you?

Yeah, I didn't reaelly get that. I didn't pick up on anything particularly offensive, but then again, cis white male talking, so....

fem the future is a grassroots movement for "women and those who identify as women" (in other words, women) janelle's worked with and attended events by

"cis pussy power cliches" is in reference to the multitude of variations upon framing the vagina as the center of/some magical beacon of feminine essence

not surprised the same person who played the "having (and potentially mistreating or dehumanising) disabled family members entitles me to speak over actual disabled people and act like i have a better understanding of their experiences" card is having a hard time sympathizing with another socially marginalized viewpoint

(and @ moodles, it's not "offensive" insomuch as it's just a little tiring to see it coming in this day and age from someone who frames herself as an ally)

Why can't women celebrate being women and be trans allies at the same time?

Django Jane is fine but Make Me Feel is fantastic, probably her best single yet

Make Me Feel is fantastic, probably her best single yet

I might still put it behind Q.U.E.E.N., but it's way up here.

i guess my opinion could change with further listens but so far i like it better than "q.u.e.e.n."

musically i still love her Archandroid I/II stuff the most, but she's definitely gotten better and better as a visual and dance artist

the way Make Me Feel builds and builds and then explodes in the bridge is so good and the video is incredible too

Well, the pussy *is* pretty powerful, afaict.

Not feeling "Make Me Feel". Sounds too much like "Kiss".

Why can't women celebrate being women and be trans allies at the same time?

― how's life, Friday, February 23, 2018 1:36 PM (yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

framing womanhood and the vagina as inherently linked is kinda.... the opposite of being a trans ally....

since i haven't seen it come up here yet, anyone got any feelings on the april 28 release date?

jesus did Drake ghostwrite "Django Jane"? soooo Drake

Make Me Feel is p good but I think they went one too far bringing in the guitar lick on verse two, just brings the "Kiss" comparison a little too in focus

xp

Is it inherently anti-trans for a woman to mention vaginas in the context of a song about feminism?

cis male here, so while acknowledging this music isnt really for me, i fell that the "funky" one is really unfunky.

"Not feeling "Make Me Feel". Sounds too much like "Kiss"."

not feeling your comment, don't understand something sounding "too much" like "Kiss"

as an afab woman i feel like 'acknowledging a body part that has been a major part of my life since my first period and especially since the first time i bled through my peach cotton capris' is by no means ignoring the trans experience. (also... why don't dick references get called anti-trans male?)

also i'm glad the men have weighed in. 'so drake' huh? lol

like i think there has to be a way to acknowledge the trans female experience while also acknowledging that having a vagina needs to be transmuted from a situation that is often a pain in the ass (feel free to figure out a tampon/pad/liner/cup budget every month, or even to find one when you're desperately in need of one and have run out, those of you who never have had to) into a situation that is powerful

i feel like i'm treading on touchy ground here and i'm sorry but i also feel like it's weird that trans men rarely speak up for their rights as vociferously and i wonder if it's at least partially because of socialization

Glad you jumped in, maura. I wasn't feeling great about piling into this argument, but also felt Janelle was being unfairly called out.

it's really frustrating because obviously transphobia is a big problem! but the erasure of afab women's experience – which has its own HOST of societal stigmas, like i have lived in so much fear of bleeding through my various menstrual supplies that my life is markedly different now that i have an apparatus to stop my period, because i have often been confronted with zero supplies – isn't the answer

anyway these songs are both great

(and i know gloria steinem's 'if men could menstruate' is problematic in the lexicon of the times but seriously, if amab men could menstruate, things would be REALLY FUCKIN DIFFERENT in public bathrooms)

(ok maybe not in gas station ones but most others)

but then again, cis white male talking, so....

Moodles is so close to having a breakthrough right here

Haha, don't hold your breath, I'm rapidly turning into old man yells at cloud.

framing womanhood and the vagina as inherently linked is kinda.... the opposite of being a trans ally....

― heliogabberlus, vendredi 23 février 2018 17:35 (four hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

God forbid the idea that someone with a different sexual/racial/gender experience can't identify with something different.

My brain keeps mixing up "Make Me Feel" with "Kiss", except not the Prince version. The Art of Noise featuring Tom Jones version.

xpost hey maura the drake thing was me and to me her flow sounds exactly like drake, which may be more a testament to how influential he has become and how far his flow has really been incorporated into rap at this point.

I personally can't hear that flow and not think Drake but maybe others hear it different.

i blame Drake for everything

framing womanhood and the vagina as inherently linked is kinda.... the opposite of being a trans ally....

― heliogabberlus, vendredi 23 février 2018 17:35 (four hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

God forbid the idea that someone with a different sexual/racial/gender experience can't identify with something different.

― Van Horn Street, Saturday, February 24, 2018 3:29 AM (thirteen hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

maura's otm but trans women shouldn't have the burden put on them to identify w afab women

Prince connection is legit, guys:

So it turns out that Prince did the music on the new Janelle Monae track, "Make Me Feel", according to his DJ, Lenka Paris :) pic.twitter.com/FqosHWK5MZ

— Casey Rain | S-Endz | The Neosoulja (@CaseyRain) February 24, 2018

:O

I heard this for the first time at the weekend and had to go hunting for what it was later, thought it might be her but wasn't sure. Think it's terrific, who cares if it sounds like 'Kiss'? The vocal line in the bridge is what really makes it, and that's new.

I’m sorry but I think it’s terrible...kinda has the same effect on me as Uptown Funk...leaves me cold...can’t hear the Kiss comparisons either...

c'mon

I'm not a fan either, but it's clearly heavily indebted to Kiss

It might be but I haven’t been able to get to the end...

so is this going to be a lock for pazz & jop #1 once it becomes her first mainstream hit? lol

Well Carly Rae Jepsen does have a new album planned for this year...

That's ILM's #1

Maybe we'll see a tie.

like Django Jane

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

collab with grimes(?), really great i think

Can’t figure out wtf Fred is on about

Back in arch days Janelle added me to MySpace and man that made my day. Her happiness on this record and gospel upbringing rings hard for me. Janelles happy = I’m happt

Happy

I like that

the jubilance + strength combo is so addictive, cannot stop listening.

Sorry only Toto on take a byte, does anyone know what that reference is?

Not hearing any drakeness I’m confused.

Enjoying the record but I still prefer the first two she did.

drake flow has been so pervasive in pop i barely hear it anymore. genuinely think janelle’s raps are better lyrically than what she sings on this record

but also i can handle a lotta corniness especially when it’s gay as hell

(I suppose "Americans" might work better if you're american but to me it sounds like an 80s big american movie's closing song !)

People in America are very traumatized by Trump right now so this kind of corny bullshit works really well on them. Plus, never forget the Santayana quote "Americans love junk. It's not the junk that bothers me, it's the love."

― grawlix (unperson)

so ever since tom pepinsky briefly went viral way back in early 2017, i've been following his blog. and his latest post - hey this board could have something to say about it! it's called "glam, metal, and regime change". (link: https://tompepinsky.com/2018/04/27/glam-metal-and-regime-change/ ) i clicked through to the slides. i clicked through to his example of a video from the "arab spring":

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fgw_zfLLvh8

okay, now this is what the music of regime change sounds like. resistance depends on manufacturing a viable alternative, on manufacturing _hope_. i understand that's a discredited neoliberal concept right now, but it will need to be rehabilitated.

To clarify my not-really-liking-it statement upthread. It's the combination of:
- Janelle having an OK voice, not great, but in the past having interesting melodies that carry her average voice. Not to be all Geir Hongro, but this has some pretty average tunes.
- It used to feel, lyrically, like she was a little less of open book. Now the sexual references, social media references, political references are more obvious, even simple. I won't argue the sexual politics of this though - I have a lot of respect for what people have said upthread about what it means to them.
- The beats kind of suck. Actually, for me this a big thing. There was so much exciting music on vol. 1, and a good amount on vol. 2. No track on here has me all "shit!" and searching for production credits the way the first 2 albums did. For me, this album has become the Janelle Monae show "as personality," and not the Janelle Monae show "as musical prodigy."

mmmm. i didn't take it as "average" at all. i do think it's simpler and more straightforward than her past work, and that's really what i like about it. it's the sort of thing that's difficult to do well, and she does it well.

Forgive the comparison in advance, because it just popped into my head, but this seems like her 90125. After a career of concepts and overkill, I really appreciate the straightforwardness of Dirty Computer.

To further clarify - and this may seem rockist, if that's still a thing - but it now sounds like she's singing over beats, whereas on the earlier stuff it felt like the music was coming out of her, if that makes sense.

it felt like the music was coming out of her, if that makes sense.

I've felt that way before (re: a number of artists), but not with this album. idk

what

To further clarify - and this may seem rockist, if that's still a thing - but it now sounds like she's singing over beats, whereas on the earlier stuff it felt like the music was coming out of her, if that makes sense.

― paulhw

like in this sense?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ig-ZoUQKst4

No.

gross

Oh me oh me oh me oh my

Read (most) of the Wilson review and I left it thinking this album (which I haven't gotten to yet) must sound like St. Vincent making Prince's symbol album. I did see her play a club show with Prince once, and I felt that he (or probably more specifically/fairly, the situation) was bringing something different out of her, compared to when I'd seen her before. Curious!

wait hold up "the beats kinda suck"? out of all the criticisms, this is what i'd least expect, the production is so lush and limber. (not to mention that one of the first things that struck me is how flexibly her voice moves w/in the songs' landscapes; even phrasing aside "singing over beats" is such a wrong take)

eric otm

That stretch from Crazy, Classic Life to Django Jane just flows so nicely. Even after listening to the album like 10 times, I'm still surprised when each song in that sequence is actually better than the last one.

Also, it never occurred to me that she has only an average voice until I read it on this thread (but as a fan of Astrud Gilberto and Neutral Milk Hotel, you'd have a hard time convincing me that's a real limitation). I listened again after reading that, and her voice still sounds better than 95% of the other stuff I listen to.

Do you also think Dionne Warwick only had an okay voice?

Yeah that's crazy, Always felt like there was an obvious gulf between the range of things she can do with her voice and what she's trying to do in her music.

On a lot of songs her singing is often clipped and tense (best word I can think of to describe it) because of the density and occasional clunkiness of her lyrics, and her pastiching ways but I didn't imagine that the underlying quality of her voice would be obscured by that.

Like if she made a career of singing like this it wouldn't cross anybodies mind to question her voice.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xoJz8yWNbNg

Janelle has an amazing voice

I wish I could love Janelle like you guys love Janelle. It all sounds flat to me.

I think her voice is great, which is why the autotune on this disc sorta irks me

so far I like this a lot. I'm glad it's not ultra long like the last two. ArchAndroid probably had better tunes but I think this is her most solid offering so far.

Excellent article (cover story) of recent rolling stone

Confirmed how pivotal religious music and culture was to her growing up which is all over this record but in monae’s unique spin

my favourite record this year

Saw her live for the first time this past Friday. Great show- strong vocals, dancing, backing visuals, good band and dancers. A fair amount of social and political commentary. While I have nitpicked her songwriting and vocal delivery in the past, those items didn’t bother me too much Friday. Had me reconsidering a bit.

she is excellent live

She makes a couple appearances on the just-released Sorry to Bother You OST.

Saw her on Colbert last week too

thanks for the tip Simon

man the Pharrell track really sounds like she's trying to do Fergie doesn't it

idk it might be my favorite song on here

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ivqFkLYxp8

and

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j4Ui5QKq4yA

Yes! Saw those. I think they first aired the night I was seeing her live

Anyone read this?

https://www.harpercollins.com/pages/the-memory-librarian

back with some slightly reggae-ish afrobeat-trap:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-xf28VXMB2w
Janelle Monáe feat. Seun Kuti & Egypt 80 • Float

really underwhelming

Yeah I got really excited at the prospect of Janelle Monae doing afrobeat when I saw the artwork and Seun Kuti and Egypt 80 involved but then the actual song isn’t really interesting.