Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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12 of 13 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
BRILLIANT!!, 28 Feb 2008
WOW!! This album has had so many mixed reviews, from what i've seen online. If people understand Erykah, they will know that she is NOT your everyday kinda woman! She is a deep,sacred,virtuous, unique black woman on a WHOOOOOLE other level, and she is on her journey to even higher, spiritual, creative heights, both personally and musically, and boy am i travelling with her!! lol...
I'm loving this album!! i guess being an old soul helps (i'm 25 and LOVE 70s funk, from vicki anderson to james brown, and classic soul) and i also love Madlib's beats from the albums he has out at the moment, and the work he did with Madvillan. The man's a genius! And of course i'm a huge neo-soul fan :).. I just can't wait to listen to it some more, so i can delve into the lyrics and even more of the production! I'm loving the whole album, but especially 'me', 'soldier', 'the cell' (man what a beat!), master teacher, honey and telephone..
This is MOST DEFINITELY different from her previous albums, so i wouldn't advise anyone who hasn't listened to it yet, to listen to it with her previous work in mind! If you're a commercial head, u won't like this album or 'get' it, SIMPLE lol.. You'll only like 'honey' lol, but if you're a deep neo soul/alternative/funk lover, u will luv it!.. If you're an Erykah fan and disappointed with this album, after a few more listens i think u will begin to feel it, especially if u embrace her individuality! :)..
At the end of the day, it all depends on your personal musical tastes and also by viewing Erykah for MORE than just the music, and not to 'pigeon-hole' her music, and by capturing her essence as a person and the essence of her music, and understanding and appreciating that people grow and change...
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8 of 9 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Erykah rocks the freakquency!, 10 Mar 2008
This album is absolutely brilliant! The lyrics are philosophies which throw emotional challenges in the face of the listener. Erykah weaves unusual musical influences together - not only collaborations with ?love and Bilal (guest vocals on several tracks) but also different instruments (French horn, synthesizers etc) creating a rich and unique sound.
You got to be in the mood to listen to the music but when you're in it - you'll get the lyrics and it makes you feel like you're part of the story she's telling. She's openening up in her lyrics ("Me" and "Telephone") and her voice is so clear just like back in the "Baduizm"-days. One track is unfinished "That Hump" (from a jam session) - that's the work of real ARTISTS! I feel she's eventually making the music she always wanted to. She's sometimes difficult to understand but maybe that's her trademark - to give the listener the opportunity to get inspired and take away something personal from her music!
Badu's no joke, I can't await the second part!
(Plus those album illustrations and the art direction are fantastic too!)
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7 of 10 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Willfully self-indulgent but interesting........, 12 Mar 2008
Badu's latest opus after eight (!) years (unless you count the "EP" Worldwide Underground) is an intriguing but undoubtedly self-indulgent piece of work. Much has been made of the hip-hop direction she has adopted on this album which does lead to the use of repetitive loops and meandering, rambling song structures with few real hooks. Still her vocals are so compelling that in the majority of cases you don't mind with perhaps the exception of "Twinkle" and "Master Teacher" which result in a definite mid-album dip. Unfortunately there are a preponderance of semi-skits after a number of songs that are sadly not indexed separately from their accompanying main tracks so you can't program them out after the first listen (which you'll really want to do, believe me), another example of self-indulgence together with the fact that some of these "skits" last 2-3 minutes! It is best not to dwell on her lyrics too deeply especially in "Me" where she puts a shout out to the odious Louis Farrakhan (the leader of the Nation of Islam who has some pretty loathesome views including some directed at a significant proportion of Ms. Badu's audience). Apart from the "bonus" track; the single 'Honey' only two tracks have real vocal hooks, 'Amerykahn Promise' and 'My People' both alas lifted off songs by other artists (who is she "Oasis"!), the former off 'American Promise' by RAMP and the latter off 'My People... Hold On' by Eddie Kendricks. This is a pity since Ms. Badu has previously exhibited great compositional ability and experimental doesn't necessarily have to mean tuneless. Despite its manifest flaws I do rather like this album (although a bit of record company discipline just for once might've come in handy) since it displays an admirable degree of ambition and there is no doubt Ms. Badu is a charismatic and compelling artist which is why she still commands a sizeable cult audience even after an absence of five years. However it is ultimately an album to admire rather than love unconditionally and in that regard it rather reminds me of Bjork's recent "Volta", some intriguing ideas but a little more audience consideration would've been appreciated as well (if only to remove those damned skits or at least index them separately from the proper songs!).
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