trailing edge - episode 007 - july 2018 (VIDEO)

And here we are... goddamn, this took way too much work to finish.

Anyway, let's move on to the next album on the docket, and this'll be tricky... stay tuned!

video review: 'vii' by teyana taylor

Well, this was a nice surprise. Quite liked this, and honestly wished she had more traction on mainstream radio.

Okay, next up will probably be Diamond District, but I also want to get a crack on this Devin Townsend double album. Either way, stay tuned!

album review: 'vii' by teyana taylor

It's always interesting as a critic that covers pop music to take note of major trends, and the easiest way to do so is to take notes of the acts that seemingly debut from out of nowhere, with unexpected waves of buzz or just the right amount of propulsion to launch into the mainstream.

And where new bro-country releases dominated 2013, 2014 will likely be remembered as the year where R&B and soul returned en masse with a slew of debut artists from both the mainstream and independent spheres. And in a nice change of pace from the male-dominated wave of country, most of the debuting R&B acts are women, with SZA, FKA Twigs, Banks, Jhene Aiko, and Tinashe all bringing distinctly different sounds and levels of quality to the table. But what's notable is to look behind the scenes and see where these acts are coming from, as it seems like most major labels are fighting to get their R&B starlet in the spotlight to mixed degrees of success.

But the label that appears to be throwing the majority of their money into the R&B game is Def Jam - they already launched Jhene Aiko and are already looking to add to the scene with Teyana Taylor, a New York R&B singer who is most notable outside the music scene for featuring on the soul-crushing show MTV's My Super Sweet 16, a show where spoiled rich teenagers have ludicrously expensive sixteenth birthday parties and act like terrible people.

So okay, not a good sign, but to be fair to her, that was seven years ago - most people are terrible when they're teenagers, you grow out of it - and she's been around the music scene long enough since then to probably have developed some sense - or at least some great connections. Originally signed to Pharrell's personal label, she later connected with Kanye West and apparently hit it off so well she landed vocal pieces on My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy and eventually was signed to Kanye's G.O.O.D. Music, where she appeared on the compilation album Cruel Summer and now has finally dropped her debut album VII, apparently heavily inspired by 90s R&B like Janet Jackson, Lauryn Hill, and Mary J. Blige. And coupled with Kanye West's executive producer credit on this debut, it was enough to get me curious enough to check it out - how is it?