Damn, this was definitely worth the wait. Fantastic record, one of the best of the year, and it's a good thing I didn't finalize my year-end lists yet, because this might just land on it. Next up, Billboard BREAKDOWN, and one final album review - what will it be? Stay tuned!
So imagine you're a music critic for a major publication, and you've just finished submitting your picks for your year-end list of the best albums of the year. A stressful choice, and a list that will inevitably be inundated by angry protests and comments why other albums weren't chosen, but you're secure in your picks - it's not like anyone drops albums worth caring about in December, right - Wait, didn't I say all of this last year with Beyonce's self-titled album that came out of nowhere? Well, if anything, this release might be even more surprising, from one of the most critically acclaimed and respected and yet reclusive R&B artists to ever chart, one of the men responsible for starting the neo-soul movement in the 90s with music drenched in the iconography of the past while still making music that felt relevant and modern. Yep, we're talking about D'Angelo, an R&B star who emerged a wave of potent buzz in the mid-90s with Brown Sugar, which eventually became a commercial success but was a critical darling right out of the gate. And having revisited that album since, I can see why: D'Angelo wasn't a forceful presence behind the microphone, but he didn't need to be - the man wrote slick, beautifully textured music, had buckets of charisma and sensuality, and was a pretty damn good songwriter to boot. This was a guy who was a peer of Usher, R.Kelly, Raphael Saadiq and Boyz 2 Men, and yet he stayed away from much of the histrionics of the times to stick with more subtle, restrained, yet just as passionate music. As such, his albums have a timeless feel to them that's impossible to fake. This is a guy who could cover Smokey Robinson's classic 'Cruisin' and do it justice, and that's pretty damn impressive. From there, D'Angelo took several years off and came back with Voodoo in 2000, and while I can't say I was the biggest fan to move more in a groove-centric direction over melodies, it doesn't make the album any less great. And make no mistake, Voodoo is a damn great record: smooth as hell, funky, poetic, and sexy as all hell. It was Voodoo's commercial hits that led to D'Angelo becoming a sex symbol in R&B - which sadly was one of the reasons he stopped touring. Between that and some personal problems, he took a long hiatus from recording his own projects, vanishing from the spotlight outside of a few scattered guest appearances. And while there had been rumours D'Angelo was going to make that third album, it was often compared to the long-nascent project Smile by Brian Williams - a record that was actually completed ten years ago after decades in development and is goddamn amazing. And yet, in one of the biggest surprises of the new year, D'Angelo is back with a new album, and from the rave reviews and sheer panic from sites that already published their year-end lists to praise it, I had to hear this record. So I checked out Black Messiah - how is it?
