I don't think anyone mentioned Plantation Lullabies? That's still my favorite along with Bitter. Bitter is like a whole experience. Everytime I listen to it, it's like entering another room or world. Cookie is good but my least fav altho Earth is worth it.

JackieBlue said:

oh wait....i take that back calhoun.....i meant Plantation Lullabies....

All y'all are crazy. Cookie is the FUNKIEST meshell album to date. Yes, it has some slow tracks like Earth, but to me, this is the album prince was trying to make with TRC. Here's how I would sum it up (very general terms):

Plantation Lullabies - Hip-Hop
Peace Beyond Passion - R&B
Bitter - Soul, very mellow and very slow
Cookie - Funk, with a lot of spoken word, even more political than previous
Comfort Woman - reggae influenced, mellow and romantic

Take your pick, they are all amazing, with different vibes, but all meshell. Next to prince, she is my all time fave.

I love Plantation Lullabies. I can listen to every track on it and not skip (but I can say the same thing for PBP and Bitter, too).

I was turned on to Meshell through Bitter in 1999. From there I bought Plantation Lullabies and PBP. I've bought every album of hers.

Last night, I was listening to "Free My Heart" on repeat and it is haunting.

I need to see Meshell in concert again.

What's up with the jazz album?

Before I start off, I'd like to say that Bitter is Me'Shell Ndegeocello's best album and one of the best albums of the last 10-15 years. But this thread is about Cookie, not about any of her other albums, so I will stick to that.

Like Prince, Me'Shell shown an ability to reinterpret blues, jazz and soul by blending it into a distinct sound. Cookie is a fun, frantic record with different sounds -- Rock, blues, hip-hop and soul -- that somehow all fit together nicely. While the album contains a lot of sultry ballads ("Criterion"), songs within the "Bitter" vein of love and loss ("Earth"), Ndegeocello also hits hard with "statement songs" like "Dead Nigga Blvd." "Hot Night," (a true banger with Talib Kweli) and "Pocketbook." In many ways, it is an "anthropological mixtape": it sounds like a synthesis of "Sign O' The Times," "It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back," and "The Revolution Will Not be Televised."

Cookie is just part of one of the best musical runs by any artist since Prince in the 1980's.

JackieBlue said:

Concur with ya, no other album in her catalog overwhelmed me from beginning to end like PL.

It's her fusion of Curtis Mayfield, Gil Scott-Heron, and herself all in one shot. Most artists don't have an album that visceral and compelling in their entire careers, and that was a debut album. I had lost faith in my generation's recording artists until that album required me to play it constantly for a solid year and a half.

For once in their lives the critics were right.

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[Edited 11/23/04 20:16pm]

Cookie is my favorite Meshell album and introduced me 2 her, that's Y i will always have an passion for that album. My album of the year for 2002. Wonderful

Comfort Woman is great, but it's jussa lil 2 mellow 4 me.

EVERYcd of hers is a must-have.

SupaFunkyOrgangrinderSexy said:

rockwilder said:

And THAT, my friends, is the bottom line

JackieBlue said:

Doesn't that one go w/o saying?