Rolling R&B Thread 2010

its prolly excellent but i havent listened to it yet. still love CB even if he is satan or whatevs

omarion album?

"speedin" is the obvious standout on that album, I also like "wet" a lot... otherwise it's pretty forgettable

Haven't gotten around to Ollusion but wanted to chime in that Mario's D.N.A. from last year is being heavily felt lately. I liked "Break Up" but didn't expect there to be so much more to like. L.O.S. track uses Fray-like piano in conjunction with a pretty strong beat for a track that could have crossed over imho. "Before She Said Hi" is a 90s hip-house sound that doesn't get dusted off much these days. Tricky/Dream tracks are quality if not revelatory. Really only the Jim Jonsin track doesn't land. It's a solid album in a solid year for R&B.

ciara song is *shrugs*

sounds like soulja boy produced this tbh

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1qXNRljN3F4

it's really good

if not a bit thin

ha! it interpolates gucci's "photo shoot" -- also maybe the first waka verse to please meh

i was kinda hoping he'd just keep doing 'waka flocka flocka waka flocka waka waka' or whatever for an entire verse

has he stopped doing that now?

wow that chorus is pretty great

lloyd ft mystikal prod by bangladesh

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_a58lv71Jfo

beat is this big brassy/jazzy thing that sounds... uh like "bouncin back"

bangladesh can be so good when he doesn't recycle the same shit over & over!

i trust that someone will alert maura

it's so nice to have mystikal back, i've welcomed him

I like the beat but I dunno if lloyd's voice is a good fit for it

yeah you might be right -- it opened up to me on headphones idk -- beat actually has a lot of empty space

I'm always real resistant to anyone ripping off ray but this is okay on first listen.

i wish mystikal wasn't a rapist and had a music career instead :(
dude's voice has changed

lmao @ lloyd trying to sell lines like "i'm a beast, i'm a dog" and "i turn into a manimal every time that the moon is full". his voice is so damn girly that when one verse started i spun around thinking my wife was in the room.

on one listen i agree with dyao, i like the song and the beat is actually really great, but it's not the perfect fit that the lush pixelcloud arrangements on lloyd's last ep were (did anyone else d/l it in the end? felt as though i was raving into a void about it - doesn't help that i can't think of a great deal to say about it but it's really pretty special, and i go back to it all the time)

i thought it was v solid and of a high quality compared to most stuff that came out last year, but enough of a definite shift in content and production towards a more realistic(/generic) male r&b artist model to have killed his magic somewhat - for me anyway. i wasn't mad at it though, he gave the auteurish post-inc sound a good few years go and it wasn't getting him anywhere so fair play to him changing it up at young money now.

lloyd's ep was one of the great releases of 2009. if the-dream wasn't around I'd be claiming it was the prime rnb release.

i want more of that, to be honest. why couldn't that have been the foundation for an album? it's not like it screamed "INNOVATIVE" but it's damn well made it's still unique, the tone of it, the melodies. this one is 'decent', but it's nothing like what I want from Lloyd. I want the smoothness, the somber melancholy of "a night off"

baffled @ the two of you seeming to think the ep is on a par with the previous albums - i'm not saying there arent the odd residual resonances still lingering (which always will, with his voice) but that's all they really are to my ears.

I agree with you guys; that Lloyd EP was a revelation. I don't know why it was buried as a free download EP at the end of the year when nobody was paying attention... if he had added a couple extra songs, that would have been an amazing record. Young Goldie really had a cohesive tone that it carried throughout all seven songs, which was a refreshing break from the design-by-committee sound of too many R&B records.

I was really excited to hear Lloyd's follow-up full length, but this new song actually makes me a little less so.

ship had the best criticism in this in that it's a bit incongruous for wispy ass lloyd to be all "i'm a beast, i'm a dog" -- otherwise i think it's a great song

I said this on another thread but I really like the Raheem DeVaughn album. Excellent points: 1) He uses Dr. Cornel West as a hypeman on several (skippable but hilarious) tracks. 2) No "Text Messages." ("Bulletproof" remains, but I don't hate it. 3) The topical songs aren't earthshaking but they are heartfelt and sometimes kinda inspiring. Don't listen to the 8-minute posse cut "Nobody Wins a War" if you are into realpolitik or if you have a low tolerance for Jill Scott doing spoken-word pacifist slam poetry though. 4) Six songs more or less in a row about sex, including the soon-to-be-infamous "B.O.B.", which stands for...naw, I don't wanna spoil it. It's not "Bombs Over Baghdad." 5) Kinda gotta get the 2-disc version or you won't get the 11-minute house jam "Lose Control" OR the Bun B feature on "Wing and a Prayer." "Soldier Story" also goes pretty hard.

mystikal sounds pretty good on that imo

That Raheem DeVaughn album was one of the year's big disappointments for me. It has a couple transcendentally good songs, "I Don't Care" in particular, but a lot of the didactic political songs (not to mention the Cornel West interludes) are really intolerable. Raheem has a great voice, but nothing to say that isn't really trite.

lol at lloyd butching it up. good song tho

I need to play that ep again. it kinda went in one ear and out the other the one time I played it

agreeing with the others about the lloyd ep - so pretty and seamless, like a faberge egg

i really dig the mystikal verse on this

what makes the lloyd ep so special for me is, yeah, how coherent and thorough within its self-containment it is; there's a really strong sense of overcoming adversity throughout, whether re: lloyd's career or the various emotionally frozen women he sings to who find love impossible or unimaginable; or even the weirdly visceral extended drugs metaphor on "pusha" - and yet there's nothing strained or effortful about how these are resolved, lloyd makes it sound so pretty and graceful - he makes overcoming adversity sound alluring. the melodies throughout are always on point but i find the looped guitar samples on "think of me" and "everyday" particularly irresistible. and i never noticed how great the lyrics of the chorus are - "every cloud has its time before the sun" <3 <3

Lloyd's voice is also so damn weird, and so fragile that it's easy to drown out. The Young Goldie EP really complimented it in a way I've never heard before. In part because of the silky production, it reminds me of the first Al Green/Willie Mitchell albums. Before Willie Mitchell, Al Green was trying his best to sing out shouting soul-man anthems, which really didn't play to his strengths. Then Willie Mitchell created a softer sonic template that flattered Green's voice without overwhelming it. I think Lloyd is the type of singer who needs that attention.

I liked the EP but found it a bit forgettable.

yeah, i do like the new goapele
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9WYggG0ercw

yonghost (4 days ago) Show Hide
im gonna fuck on this song, enjoy it , please my baby  and thank Goapele for it

not tryna be a pedant or anything but that song is from last year

o rly? my bad then. saw it listed as a "new single" in a show review.

not sure what's up w/ foxx's new album -- speak french was pretty bad but i like this a lot better -- uptempo, glitzy beat & his voice sounds really great -- this is a low qual rip but the cdq could end up being very nice - we'll see where it leads

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dW63Rp8bILQ

who knows what r les is up to -- can't imagine who would allow him to put out a new album after his 09 output, but i guess he's still making tracks -- this won't make any fans of people who don't dig the dude, but for stans it's a nice switch up -- sounds kind of early 00s to me, all stuttery, short guitar plucks & punchy drums that almost mimic timbo's beatboxing era -- not to make too much of it tho

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WJ3eCYHCi4k

& maybe this will find more of a home here than on the drake thread -- his new single with terius -- conflicting reports on whether or not this is the final version or not -- i would tend to say not considering terius doesn't really do much of anything with his verse (it's more of an extended outro than anything) & his vocals are mixed super low -- and even tho this wasn't produced by tricky or los it sounds like something that could've been on the back half of love/hate to me, it has a "purple kisses" vibe (or "bed," i guess -- minus los's popping drums) -- i think the chorus is really pretty tho, it hits that sort of sublime weightless falsetto that the second half of the chorus of "best i ever had" did i think

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zx0PUdVPgjA

So I know you guys aren't really feeling Usher this go-around, but have y'all gave the album a listen? 'Cuz there are some tracks on there... I mean, there were some leaks that I think should've made the album and it certainly isn't his greatest album but this track in particular:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dz05RzrcjYg

Is kind of next level. Produced by Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis... intergalactic slow-jam, it's one of the best songs I've heard all year.

really great song, yeah -- it's nice to know that the three of them still have some chemistry

and yeah j0rdan that R. Les track is very early 00s, wouldn't sound out of place on a Jagged Edge album or something like that. It's kind of early for 00s revivalism isn't it? lol... The Drake track is pretty chill, he's much better as an R&B dude than he is as a rapper actually, he should stick to that...

few other tracks :

Monica "Stay or Go"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9RTkjCgL6LU

haven't really gotten a chance to give the Monica album a proper listen but I had to post this track because I've been in love with it since I heard the demo, and Monica's version is great. It's kind of your typical Ne-Yo midtempo until the beat switches up in the chorus. Such a pretty melody though, and come to think of it Ne-Yo has been sort of quiet lately so it's nice to hear something he's written... he needs to come out with a new album soon.

Fantasia "Control Freak"
http://usershare.net/egzgx2a2hru7
Can't find a youtube for this one, but it's worth downloading... Fantasia could sing practically anything and I'd be in love with it, she's my favorite r&b vocalist of this generation pretty easily (well... her and Jazmine Sullivan). This song happens to be an excellent baby makin' jam in the vein of "I Nominate U" from her last album (which is a classic!)... production is very minimal, sensual... I can hear the sweat dripping practially. I hope this makes the album.

Kelly Rowland "Smooches"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m8hucsspgcQ

There's some INTERNET DRAMA over this song since it was supposed to be Teyana Taylor of "Google Me" fame's first single and Kelly apparently "stole" it from her... the song is cool, I would much rather hear Teyana on it to be honest, Kelly isn't really convincing...

Marsha Ambrosius "She Don't Matter"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JsuQyruhQto

This song was on LeToya's seriously slept-on Lady Love album from last year. It was one of the standouts on that album, and it's the standout on Marsha's Yours Sincerely mixtape (though the whole thing is great and worth downloading)... Marsha really is an excellent songwriter.

I'm kind of bored with R&B recently to be honest. We're in need of an R&B jesus or something, someone to save this shit 'cuz things are looking pretty lame :-\ I need Return of the Ahnk to leak now please.

really like that usher space jam

oh k-ro do you really think we're still in the age where "a milli" knockoffs are acceptable things to come with?

i need to hear the full usher album, but between mars/papers/little freak i still don't know why this album doesn't get some love. Daddy is admittedly horrible...