ohYeeeeeah said:

terrig said:

I think what we mean when we say 'out princing prince' is that Black Messiah a whole album of meaningful lyrics that are slipped into your ears like honey in hot tea that make ya wanna wanna wanna ...arent we waiting for Prince to seduce us again?


D'Angelos music is never sleepy, its sexy as hell. D'Angelo has influences, but he has his own sound, and the songs work together, but imo that makes for a cohesive record that works well with the other two, and thats art....imo.

There is another thread mentionning D'Angelo's cd.

I'm quite disappointed by BM. I really dig D'Angelo but there is no real evolution since Brown Sugar. He is groove writer but not a proper song writer. After all these years, he is using the same recipe with drums, percussions, bass and vocal layers. By the way, it is nearly impossible to hear what he sings about. Mumbling.

I'm happy to listen to his new stuff and I really like this guy but he does not have the range and the diversity Sly, Stevie and P have.

Still a great talent though.

Spot on.

BM is okay, but after 14 years....

I wish D the best but I'm not exactly blown away and I seriously doubt that P is somewhere curled up in a fetal position either.

luvsexy4all said:

KingSausage said:

luvsexy4all said:

tun me loose is betta than anything on Mess-iah

Please tell me that's satire. Please. You're kidding, right? The only thing that song turns loose is my fucking stool.

I actually listen to TML alllllllllllll the time. In terms of stuff I like listening to regularly TML would be on that list, and stuff that I find interesting at some level but would probably play once or twice in 5 years, pretty much all of BM falls in that list.

luvsexy4all said:

tun me loose is betta than anything on Mess-iah

I'm pretty indifferent to D'Angelo (including this new one), but nahhhhhhh.

lwr001 said:

he was like, i let john go for hannah and d got him and jesse...................fuckkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkk

Blackwell doesn't play on Black messiah, according to the liner notes

Color me shocked.

I actually thought there'd be more D'Angelo fans on this forum.

jackmitz said:

lwr001 said:

he was like, i let john go for hannah and d got him and jesse...................fuckkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkk

Blackwell doesn't play on Black messiah, according to the liner notes

didnt say he did , he is however the drummer for D's new tour

jackmitz said:

lwr001 said:

he was like, i let john go for hannah and d got him and jesse...................fuckkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkk

Blackwell doesn't play on Black messiah, according to the liner notes

didnt say he did , he is however the drummer for D's new tour

Black Messiah is good and all. No doubt. But come on. Let's not overhype it. I'm listening to it now, and with almost every song, I keep thinking to myself, "Cool. But I've heard this all before on Voodoo."

KingSausage said:

Prince fans are hilarious. They get all upset when someone other than Prince releases a stellar funk/R&B/ soul album. Like this new album means you gotta hand in your copy of AOA or some shit. It's funny to me that Prince writes about anything that demands your attention being a waste of time or whatever on Affirmation. Disappears from social media. Buries his head in the sand. D'Angelo? He addresses the issues of today. He doesn't shirk. http://mobile.nytimes.com...;referrer= Also, D'Angelo would never put his name on something as shitty as Plectrum.

I don't see anybody getting upset? Either people like something or they don't. Either way, it's okay for them to say so.

People are probably just appalled by all of the over the top hyperbole that serves no purpose.

KingSausage said:

Taurus said:

KingSausage said:

The Slate review of Black Messiah is right on. You people just can't recognize the masterpiece right in front of your faces. http://www.slate.com/arti...iewed.html

>

LOL this review was tailor made for you!

http://www.thedailybeast....isten.html

>

Redux

FINALLY!

D’Angelo’s ‘Black Messiah’ Was Worth Waiting 15 Years For

Depending on the level of Internet vacuum you exist in, you’re likely aware neo soul maestro D'Angelo and his backing band The Vanguard Beyoncé’d a new album, Black Messiah, at midnight on Sunday. His first in 15 years, a long-awaited and much-rumored follow up to 2000’s beloved—okay, legendary—platinum-selling Voodoo. Social media predictably exploded, with celebrities like Justin Timberlake, Questlove and Pharrell gushing and #BlackMessiah trending everywhere trends can trend. Even the media consensus was that it's great. Damn great. So great, in fact, that the Internet hate machine recoiled at its off-character outpouring of kudos and is starting to second-guess itself.

There has to be something wrong with it, right?

The low hanging think piece fruit is a comparison between Messiah and D’Angelo's last album, Voodoo, pitting the two track for track, beat for beat. Spoiler alert: Yes, they are sonically similar. Those with a slightly sleazier bent have dredged up reports of his weight gain, substance abuse, and arrest.

But of course dude's had his ups and downs—it's been 15 years. Children conceived to his smash “Untitled (How Does It Feel)”—and there are no doubt many—are in high school now, getting ready to get down to his music themselves.

This is a record birthed slowly over the course of more than a decade, polished like a creative diamond nugget inside whatever forge burns within D’Angelo's once-sculpted chest. Despite whatever analysis the nanosecond news cycle spews out, it's not for us to understand the ways of his genius. We're here to appreciate it, and those that feel the need to take difference with Messiah simply because it's a thing that happened and they want to get a little attention too should be ignored.

Because, again, it's really, really fucking good. Next level good. "If you don't get it then that's on you" good.

From the plodding, rubbery opening beats of “Ain’t That Easy” to the sparse, soulful, and aspirational “Back to the Future (Part I),” D’Angelo has bucked the trend of releasing an album full of standalone singles vectoring for Vevo views and instead dropped a cohesive album. It’s all in there, building up a complete musical and environmental package, yet without the “concept album” conceit.

“Betray My Heart” noodles through head bobbing guitar loops, and grand finale “Another Life” is a five minute and fifty-eight second Marvin-Gaye-meets-The-Roots-esque jam that leaves you breathlessly wanting more. Speaking of The Roots, Questlove has a presence here, with other heavy collaborators including former Tribe Called Quester Q-Tip and P-Funk’s Kendra Foster.

Recorded, according to the liner notes, on analog tape with primarily vintage gear, the pop-funk-soul-jazziness of it slinks around, infiltrating but not dominating. This isn’t an “in your face” record, this is one that you have to come to terms with on your own. There’s so much layered, lyrically and sonically, that even after upwards of 12 spins its nuances and various lyrical levels are still becoming clear. You can go as deep as you like, or float about on the surface. And of course there are more songs about sex, but D’Angelo also takes on social issues, balancing a song like “Sugah Daddy” (“It’s just the way she’s so raw and uncut / She needs a spankin’ to shake her up”) with “The Charade” (“All we wanted was a chance to talk / ‘Stead we only got outlined in chalk”).

This is a record birthed slowly over the course of more than a decade, polished like a creative diamond nugget inside whatever forge burns within D’Angelo's once-sculpted chest.

The album’s liner notes explain the seeming presumptuous Black Messiah moniker, and in doing so the mission behind the music, noting:

“The title is about all of us. It’s about the world. We should all aspire to be a Black Messiah” and “It’s about people rising up in Ferguson and in Egypt and in Occupy Wall Street and in every place where a community has had enough and decides to make changes happen… Black Messiah is not one man, it’s a feeling that, collectively, we are all that leader.”

It’s in this message that D’Angelo perhaps unintentionally, reveals the real reason it has taken him 15 years to craft a new masterpiece.

There are countless artists that can create flawless pop music or funky jams that make you dance or grooves to get smooth to. But in a world wracked with environmental turmoil and terrorism and protests against disparity, we needed this. We, the people, needed a soundtrack that is at once soothing and empowering, a call to rise up and also a reason to stay in bed, preferably with someone else, just a little bit longer. D’Angelo isn’t back now because he’s after money or fame or a chance to prove he could “do it again,” he’s back now because, after a decade and a half of watching and waiting, consciously or not, he knew it was simply time.

Now we all need to shut up and listen.

lwr001 said:

jackmitz said:

Blackwell doesn't play on Black messiah, according to the liner notes

didnt say he did , he is however the drummer for D's new tour

Hmmm..I thought I read an interview with ?uesto where he said that Chris Dave was the touring drummer.

The question is....Can one view Black Messiah as a strong, cool, and at times stripped-down-to-the-bone-soulful album and still dig AOA?

I believe it's possible. Hell, I REALLY dig Black Messiah....

I also believe that the usual suspects pulling the same 'ol "P should take notes from" (fill in the blank) are full of shit....

Just listened to Black Messiah. Glad to see D'angelo back, music really needs this album right now.

I hope Prince gets back to this kind of creative level but if he don't it's good to know that when bodies wear out we can get another.

Prince probably threw it in the trash where it belongs, like I did after hearing that mumbling incoherent mess of an album.

iZsaZsa said:

Does the record come with the lyrics??

I don't understand shit as well!

ohYeeeeeah said:

Black Messiah makes me feel like Prince has in the past, but doesn't particularly sound like him (other than a few nods here and there and the quoting of The Line at the beginning of The Charade).

I think the feeling and the similarities to Prince's actual sounds are being confused here.

KingSausage said:

The Slate review of Black Messiah is right on. You people just can't recognize the masterpiece right in front of your faces. http://www.slate.com/arti...iewed.html

You're right KingSausage, mgghsnksq lsaùaamlkre, herheia gglmmmmajhass skjdakjds nckankcnskca.

I love to speak D'angelo language!

slfjkldjfdlkjf kfjdkjfkdjfkdjfdk lamkfakfemaz to you all!!

brainchild said:

Prince after listening to "Black Messiah"

Perfect!

lrn36 said:

The thing is D'Angelo is doing stuff now that Prince has done before several times over.

[Edited 12/15/14 14:38pm]

No. There is nothing like '1000 Deaths' anywhere.

D'angelo is obviosly a hardcore Prince fan. As hardcore as any of us. But D'angelo doesn't copy Prince, he references Prince, and wears his love of Prince's music proudly like a coat of arms.

D'angelo sounds like D'angelo, and he's really unique. I say that he is holding up Prince legacy and sporit better thatn Prince is these days.

GetOfFunk said:

murph said:

The question is....Can one view Black Messiah as a strong, cool, and at times stripped-down-to-the-bone-soulful album and still dig AOA?

I believe it's possible. Hell, I REALLY dig Black Messiah....

I also believe that the usual suspects pulling the same 'ol "P should take notes from" (fill in the blank) are full of shit....

I dig them both.