R&B SKELETONS IN THE CLOSET!

PRINCE GOT A R&B SONG HAPPENING RIGHT NOW. LET'S JUST HOPE RADIO, WILL ACTUALLY GIVE IT SOME SERIOUS AIR PLAY.

Harlepolis said:

I understand what your saying about looking for the positive but let me put it to you like this....
Imagine if you spent your childhood and part of your adult life growing up in Disneyland where everything is fun and there are so many different rides to choose from then all the sudden Disneyland closes down and you got to hangout at some messed up house in the ghetto... Now wouldn't you have a hard time finding something positive in that? That is how I and many others here see R&B.... When it was good it was Disneyland now its some ghetto ass crib in the hood compared to what it once was. You might be one hell of an optimist but I can't see nothing good about todays stuff compared to what I have seen in the past....

Harlepolis said:

You are right... we are getting fareekin old.

~~~~~

I do miss the good o'l days (to me, they were the good o'l days)

I went grocery shopping today... I just love going grocery shopping and while you are looking for "just that right tomato", the most beautiful tune comes over the overhead speakers.

Then, the song playing is... Gloria Estefan... "I Don't Want to Loose You Now" or Lionel Richie (some take you back love song).

Yeah... I hear you all. I miss "the moments" and the songs that take us back to certain (very personal) moments. Music is magical in that way... they bring the past back to life, even if momentarily in our conscious mind and heart.

I give some new stuff a chance, buy the album and give it a whirl or two... then it goes into the CD rack and there is usually stays. (Prince is my only constant exception)

Music today just does not grab at me the way it use to, although I feel it is a sign of my own personal change... not entirely the music. We grow and new moments/interests drive us through life differently. For me, what touches me the most... beyond music itself is enjoying the sound of music with someone by your side.

DavidEye said:

No. But that wasn't even the issue. The issue is whether R&B is still "alive" as a viable genre. The artists may not compare to the trailblazers you listed above, but they're still making good music.

If we are going along that track of writing off "the next generation" of artists, why don't we just write off Gary Burton, Chick Corea, Jaco Pastorius, Herbie Hancock, Weather Report and (gasp) post-bop Miles? After all, we know that they couldn't compete with Blakey, Silver, Monk, Coltrane, bop-era Miles, etc., the greats of the 40's, 50's and 60's who revolutionized jazz.

No one is questioning the greatness of the 70's artists. But as music lovers, we do ourselves a disservice if we write off such promising new talent.

...It seems to be more "R" than "B" goin' on...My biggest complaint is why cant new artists record an album without every other track featuring somebody?? I can only speak for myself, but u an only take so many Fat Joes, Ja Rules, Method Mens (so on & so on) adding their two cents to every single....

roodboi said:

good point.

namepeace said:

Good point but there is a great difference in that era of jazz and in music in general. If you didn't have some talent or some potential you weren't going to last long period. Your peers were too good and too talented to just lay down and let you take over with a subpar sound, so music was still being done the right way now that is not the case.... Too many shortcuts leading to half ass music..... There is nothing wrong with a new generation taking over but when you don't have a "solid" foundation then whatever you create isn't going to be good just like R&B and other types of music today.

namepeace said:

R&B might still be alive as a viable genre,but creatively,it's on life support

Sinister said:

Sinsister,you and I are on the same page

Sinister said:

Well lol in reality, I didn't grow up in no Disneyland but from the heart of Harlem's ugliest ghetto projects and that type of living FORCES you to look 4 the positive even if you're surrounded by a thick pile of wet fresh shit(Excuse my ghetto french there lol) which explains high volumes of why I'm one helluva an optimist However, I KNOW what you're trying to say but I don't agree with you.

But hey, if you feel that way then you feel that way, I can't make you change yo mind. Hopefully, you(and the rest of ya'll here) may look PASTE this uglieness in the state of music biz 2day and check whats worth hearing(Yunno, the stuff that you don't really see in the front line when you're walking in some wrecka stow, you feel me?).

roodboi said:

It's a marketing thing more than anything else. I dislike it too...too many cooks in the kitchen...

Sinister said:

Amen , Sinister!! Don't get me wrong, I love Dwele, Meshell, Donnie, Jill Scott, Van Hunt, D'angelo, Rashaan Patterson, Vikter Duplaix, Stephen Simmonds, Kindred...and I hope they all get a chance to growand develop ...but it's also a very different playing field now...As Philip Bailey recently said, back in the 70's artists would get signed and the record companies weren't necessarily looking for an immediate Platinum hit... they would release albums, tour year in and year out, give the artists a chance to develop their craft, and gradually build up a loyal following. EWF's first big smash album was That's the Way of the World, but Columbia spent five years getting their name out there. Today's record companies aren't going to stick their necks out like that.

They don't want you spending alot of time and money in the studio, programming is cheaper than having a band, Your'e lucky if you get a 2 album deal, and unless they make a fairly quick return on their investment, you're through.

Rhondab said in an earlier post that it seems as if the video image was more important than the music, and in Today's climate,it is . In an interview, Quincy Jones pointed out that up through the 70's , it didn't matter if a singer came to the studio with rollers in her hair and a housecoat...as long as she could SING... Try THAT now...Image is everything, they need an image to sell...Does This have "Street Cred" or "we're looking for someone with an Usher-type vibe,..."does he or she have the right look, is the video ready yet?...

I guess you can always go Independent, but don't look for any airplay. As others here have said, Radio stations play what record companies Pay them to play...Radio will never sound like it used to in "Disneyland"...

paligap said:

Now that's true.

DavidEye said:

That's pretty much it. Nelson George said as much in a book almost 20 years ago in his book The Death of R&B. I highly recommend it to anybody who cares.

All of you make good points about the whole issue, and there is no doubt that complaining about the creative aspects (along with the skill or lack thereof exhibited by the artists/performers) of music has ALWAYS gone on. That's a generational thing and will continue to happen whether it's valid or not.

But the fact of the matter is that during the Reagan years there were more kids than ever before who didn't have access to learning music in schools. Samplers were replacing musical instruments in the studio, and Mtv birthed a whole generation of performers who couldn't prove their mettle on stage from a purely musical standpoint, because they were so used to being gussied up to be in front of the camera like a bloody actor - they didn't have to prove themselves during live gigs. There used to be no studio technology to clean up some third-rate singer's weaknesses that didn't have the vocal ability to carry a song. These things are some of the major differences in today's music as compared to the Old School. Sampling has its place, I don't hate it (because there IS a creative way to use it), but if it's at the expense of the continuation of an entire generation learning and/or developing some musical chops, that's when it becomes detrimental to music in general.

Harle is right about there being good music and terrible music of every era. That's a fact that can't be denied. But another difference is that a monopoly like Clear Channel owning tons of radio stations across the country have not allowed music from left field, or just more creative music in general, to even get a consistent chance for airplay on mainstream radio - and mainstream radio (and video) is the conduit for musical trends, whether they be good or bad. Today we DO have to search out the more quality music instead of waiting for radio to introduce it to us. But for the most part that hasn't always been the case, and that's unfortunate.

Supernova said:

True!!

mochalox said:

Can I add to that, mocha?

okaypimpn said:

mochalox said:

Thanx, babe.

I'm echoing Supernova's praises for the book The Death Of Rhythm Of Blues by the great author Nelson George. That book is a must read for r&B fans.

From an earlier post of mine.....these are some of the things that I think have gone wrong with r&b music.....


1. LACK OF QUALITY SONGWRITING THAT CONNECTS TO THE PEOPLE- Let's face it. This is one of the main problem in all of music really, not just R&B. They just don't write em' like they used to. Back in the day you had Gamble & Huff, Curtis Mayfield, Smokey Robinson, Stevie Wonder, Linda Creed etc...with lyrics that touch the mind, hearts and soul of the community. Back in the 70's, my parents, my relatives, my friends and myself wouldn't hesitate to trot down to our local record store to buy even a brand new 45 rpm of an artist (before the album even came out) because the songs were so good. These songs told stories that we could relate to. A lot of these songs were describing our state of mind, the world we were living in, the hurt and pain we were feeling from that breakup from that relationship, our financial being, and our spiritual stuggles and triumphs. These songs captured the very essence of what we were feeling at the moment. You know that moment we laid our eyes on that fine specimen of a human being. People could relate to the songs back then. Even the dance songs back then were good. A lot of those dance songs, even though they dealt with the subject of dancing, at least the writers were clever lyricists and knew how to craft and structure a good song. And YES...a lot of the dance songs had great powerful lyrics {like a lot of the Gamble And Huff songs}. Songs like McFadden And Whitehead "Ain't No Stopping Us Now" was powerful and potent. This was a dance/disco song, yet the song was a black pride anthem. Yet anyone from any race could dance to it (and even relate to it). This can be evidenced by the fact that it crossed over from R&B radio to Top 40 POP radio. Now-a-days, the songs are so one-dimensional. The subject seems to deal from "everybody hatin on me" to these sex-crazed songs about freaking somebody all night long. Yes I know, nothing is new under the sun, artists have been making sexual songs like this throughout history. But at least Marvin and Barry had some class about the lyrical content of their sexual intentions. The common complaint I hear from people about people now is that the lyrics are so dull lacking any originality. Everybody is doing the same thing the same way.

2. GOOD LISTENERSHIP- What Brother 9/15 getting on the music listeners?!!! The nerve of him to front on music listeners i.e the record buyers..... YES I AM..... today all a lot of music listeners care about is a good beat. When you hear people mention the greatness of a song now, it's usually "yo I like that song it's got a TIGHT beat". People seems to have lost sense of a song having great melodic structures with beautiful chord changes and chord progressions. Now it's all about The Beat. It's not a stretch to say that people will fork out their hard earned dollars for a whole CD as long as the majority of the disc have tracks with blazing beats. Whenever an artist have a successful debut album and then tries to come back and challenge themselves as a musician an artist (at the same time challenge their audience), sales of the sophomore album will usually drop. Let me give three artists off the top that come to mind that had great debut albums but then flipped the script on their sophomore effort only to get a lukewarm reception {Terence Trent Darby, Erykah Badu and Lauryn Hill}. Because music listeners want the same things over and over. An artist can come out with an album of strong artistic merit and flop commercially and eventually get dropped by the label(if it happens enough times). Back in the day, artistic merit was rewarded with platinum and multi-platinum success{think Earth Wind And Fire, Curtis Mayfield and the Spinners just to name three artists}.... Now artistic merit in most cases are not rewarded and lame artists that lack vision of any type or groups that lack any type of cohesiveness are put up on a pedestal. It's a shame but that's where we stand now as it relates to R&B music.


3. LACK OF MUSICIANSHIP- No need to elaborate here. After all who needs REAL musicians that supply REAL in-the-pocket grooves so REAL people can FEEL it when you got drum machines and beat sequencers suppling those TIGHT beats.


4. THE CD MEDIUM- These artists now-a-days can't even come up with 38 minutes of good music let alone an 80 minute CD worth of good materal. In the 70's after the album concept got established, a record buyer may get only 38 minutes of music (with 7 to 8 songs). But guess what? At least 6 of those songs were good and many times, the whole album was excellent. Now-a-days a record buyer will spend $20 bucks for only 2 or three good songs. People are now complaining, because it is getting absurd. You know anytime USA TODAY and BILLBOARD magazine run articles about this (within two months of each other), the situation is serious. Record companies are now contemplating releases EP's instead of full length CDs.

5)WHAT THE COMMUNITY WILL ACCEPT- As long as people keep buying "In Da Club" "Bump, Bump Bump" and "Freak A Leek" produced by Lil Jon{I know he's from the ATL like me, but I can't even begin to explain how disguisted I feel when I hear his songs....just a bunch of foolishness...PLAIN AND SIMPLE. OUTKAST ....now they represent the ATL/South in a much better fashion}. As long as people support it, record companies are going to continue producing it. It is a sad day in black ahem R&B music, when these types of songs are all on the radio and on the charts. If the record buying public was to stand and say "we're not going to buy this type of stuff anymore..good beats or not", then record companies would take notice real quick. In other words, the community would be hitting them in the pocketbook. And the bottom line, is the bottom line is all the record companies care about.

So yes, the state of r&B music is in sad shape now. Yes there are a few good artists out there making good music of substance. But all in all, the gist of what's out there is a lot of junk that is spelled J - U - N - K!!!


Brother 9/15
[This message was edited Mon Apr 12 6:50:17 2004 by BRO915]

BRO915 said:

Supernova said:

Another point that can be made is...how many of today's R&B songs are gonna be regarded as "classics" twenty years from now? I mean,let's face it,people are STILL listening to Smokey,The Temptations,Marvin and all the other Motown stuff.There's no doubt that those artists and their music will live on forever.Same goes for Al Green,EW&F,Roberta Flack,Donny Hathaway,Rufus and Chaka,etc.But somehow,I don't think that songs like "Ignition","Milkshake" and "Hell Yeah" are gonna have much longevity.I could be wrong though.

DavidEye said:

That is the million dollar question.....What if we are wrong and these songs they play now are classics later? Well to answer that lets look back to the 90's how many true classics are there? Jodeci's first album is a classic perhaps a keith sweat song or two...What about Adina Howard or Montel Jordan no classics albums just one hit possibly 2 hit wonders. The artists today who have all these disposable hits will only have a greatest hits CD to show for all their "Phat beats" and street cred but will not be held amongst the greats of the 60's, 70's and 80's and few 90's. But the thing with classics is you "know" when you hear a classic there is no doubt about it.

Remember when it was jus' soul....??

roodboi said:

Actually, Soul evolved out of R&B.

Rhondab said:

that is so truw..if there were no videos people like Britney Spears wouldnt stand a chance on radio with her terrible voice