Janelle Monae

i feel you guys are still reading me too literally - i'm not repeat not diehard about the archandroid script but if you take something like ziggy stardust (good comparison btw) it has a concision and flow as an album in itself that does allow the concept to either loosely illuminate the album or be ignored entirely as the listener sees fit. in the sprawl and sheer repetitious mass of this monae it's a lot lot harder for that kinda freedom to breathe imo.

I don't know, I find it pretty easy to sink into the album, largely because of the repetition and the cyclical patterns it creates as the album moves through moods; it's like I'm riding her biorhythms or something.

Aside from the Of Montreal misstep, this album flows adequately to excellently (mostly the latter). Very satisfying on the musical level. I'm not that big on lyrics and concepts anyway, and I don't find myself tripping over them in this case, so they don't undermine the music for me either.

also the Of Montreal track is one of the points where I always stop to check which song I'm on because I'm enjoying myself so much; I don't get the hate

ya since i like of montreal it's kinda like... oh, look a song by a band i like. like a little intermission.

I've actually kinda come around to the OM joint though kevin barnes' voice is a bit much to take. it's a fun song I just have no idea what it's doing this album.

Yup -- we're going to be arguing about this album for years.

I sort of think that there's no way in hell I could ever get a grip on the overarching story if there is one because as a whole it's just too much.

I'm not sure the songwriting is as bad as people are making it sound, in fact I think it's pretty good, it's the arrangements that are bad more often than not. With the faster songs, Tightrope aside, I keep wishing she'd let them breathe a bit. I maintain the ballads are the best things here for that reason.

The songs are ok; it's the arrangements that grate.

i think they're grate too!!

(not that there's a song as well-crafted as "many moons" here - this isn't near to the standard of the metropolis suite.)

lex is so very OTM. By which I mean WE HAVE THE SAME OPINION ABOUT A RECORD THAT INSPIRES DIVERSE REACTIONS.

"many moons" is good (and the best song on metropolis) but there are like 8 songs on this that are better

i dont get rtc's complaint at all -- love the way this flows musically, its like a dj mix, slows down at the right spots/speeds up at the right spots & amazingly sequenced. & its funny that dudes will say 'the songs arent there' & then rtc makes a more fleshed out argument that suggests the songs are there & u guys rush to cosign him anyway. lets have some consistency haters

"many moons" is good (and the best song on metropolis) but there are like 8 songs on this that are better

― what it feels like for a goon (The Reverend), Thursday, June 3, 2010 7:21 PM (Yesterday)

ok wow - gonna listen to this tomorrow but you just must not have been in the "many moons is great" camp

no, i never really was

i mean, i like it but

I am firmly of the opinion that "Lettin' Go" is the best song she did prior to this album (and it still may be)

http://rlv.zcache.com/ding_ding_ding_tshirt-p2354000263304517744028_400.jpg
I've made the Debbie Deb comparison elsewhere and might as well make it again.

actually, now that I think of it, a lot of what I like about the new album is that it injects a dose of '05-era fun party jamz monae back into the metropolis-isms

um forks? where are you going with that?

ok, considering rtc's current line of attack, lol at

btw janelle monae (who would like to be cassie but never can be, come to think of it, kinda like a tinman who can't get rid of his heart), her thing is out now apparently. i'd say the ep format was a crafty idea but hopelessly fatal to her schtick at the end of the day.

― r|t|c, Tuesday, September 4, 2007 2:51 PM Bookmark

(wtf at cassie comparison?)

Going with what? Debbie Deb? Just that I'd like to see Monae embrace the "puttin on my makeup and hittin the club" vibe since she does it so well over the "i am a space robot bzzt bzzt"
Lettin' Go also reminds me of Lookout Weekend.

oh ok, I gotcha. that just liked a really randomly thrown in reference without contextualization

I think I've been comparing the two of them since I heard that song and I feel like I've said it a gazillion times IRL and maybe on Singles Jukebox; maybe not here I guess.

janelle monae (who would like to be cassie but never can be, come to think of it, kinda like a tinman who can't get rid of his heart)

\ o_O /

he's pretty good as far as totally inscrutable posters around here go

If you're not left with any of it (i.e., if it all goes over your head), then why not just enjoy the post as a "worthwhile showcase of commendable thought & writing," which you rightfully say it is? There's no need to get caught up in the idea of what it's "supposed to be" with any post, really -- it is what it is, to each reader, and obviously it comes across differently to different individuals.

hahahaha :D

O_O

If you're not left with any of it (i.e., if it all goes over your head), then why not just enjoy the post as a "worthwhile showcase of commendable thought & writing," which you rightfully say it is? There's no need to get caught up in the idea of what it's "supposed to be" with any post, really -- it is what it is, to each reader, and obviously it comes across differently to different individuals.

http://www.myconfinedspace.com/wp-content/uploads/2007/12/what-you-did-there-i-see-it.thumbnail.jpg

The more I think about it, the more grateful I am that the songs don't feel rigidly stuck in the overarching narrative (whatever it is). A lot of them work just fine as love songs, or psychedelia, or somewhat garbled inspirational socially conscious songs that are enjoyable because they are so great musically. I think I would get really bored if the songs were too busy moving a narrative along. It's kind of funny that her style of songwriting isn't really very narrative at all, much more lyrical (not that that couldn't still be used more rigidly than here to present a narrative).

ayooo this is a mess imho

a hot mess imho

it's hot imho

A Monae, a canal, Ponaema

I love this album so much. Right now the back-to-back pairing of "Come Alive" and "Mushrooms and Roses" is killing me!

"Dance or Die" is so badass.

i'll be your secret santa
do you mind

either what she does at 2:13 in "Come Alive" (and for 20 seconds afterward) is stitched together or she is genuinely scary

im glad the lyrics arent all story-related either. that would be pretty dull and lead to boredom/decreased replay value fast. songs after repeated listens def arent terrible, just not that memorable either. and the afrobeat track with saul is still too early, and also, a bit weak rhythmically/sonically imo, but then i thought the same when common tried to do afrobeat.

i know, that come alive scream thing- for a couple of listens i thought it was some kind of effect with guitar, but now im thinking its genuinely scary. xpost

after watching her live performance on Letterman, I'm pretty sure that's her with some slight effect on her vocal line to beef it up

just watched the letterman performance for the first time. it was good. though she didnt need to quote JB lines near the end. great performance though the song didnt quite conclude how id have liked.

listened to the first 17 songs this morning. i was hoping for a complete mess, or a noble failure, or a case of unfortunate overreach, but this is surprisingly flat and one of the only albums i've heard where i'm on like track 16 and saying to myself "really? that's it?"

she's not a v. developed songwriter and her spot-the-influence approach is boring. but mostly i think the production is really disappointing--this was a great opportunity to make a cool live band record and it just doesn't breathe at all.

i don't even dislike it really, just feeling kinda neutral which is mad unfortunate for an album like this.

^^this is how i felt

preordered this on vinyl, fuck the haters

My issue with the album is that it desperately tries to slam you in the face with immediate awesomeness, but it is actually a slowburner. I thought it was a decent try but nothing particularly special the first few times I played it, but because it was new and enjoyable I kept giving it spins; the more I played it, the more I liked it.

It is rapidly approaching being one of my favorite albums of the year but the steep curve it traversed while settling into that position is going to turn off a large number of people (as evidenced by this thread, IMO). I don't know, maybe it's a little too self-satisfied/inward-looking to properly reach out to people, at least in the way they expect from something under the R&B umbrella? (ie, no one is going to complain about Portishead navel-gazing all over Third because that's kind of why you buy Portishead albums; they are pulling you into their little world and blowing your mind on their terms, whereas most R&B/hip-hop seems to move along the axis of blaring out into your world and taking it over, so maybe something like this that is so determinedly inward-looking with all of these normally outward-facing signifiers is confounding people because the two approaches cancel each other out and you're left with something that comes across more clinical than you think it should be? Kind of making up stuff here but maybe that's part of what's happening when people listen to this?)

well it does feel clinical. but i guess i'm not sure what she thinks she's going for.

ya i was gonna say, this one did take me a few spins to start to dig

I would say that I like this about as much as the last Portishead album.