Janelle Monae

I have a sneaking suspicion you don't know what the word "never" means

*cough* TWILIGHT SINGERS... *coughcough*

ive relaxed my position from 'never' to mostly. and no twilight singers doesnt really change that.

Prince covers

Two great ones off the top of my head:

Cyndi Lauper - When You Were Mine
Elvis Costello - Pop Life

Just got this in a mailout:

Janelle Monae proved that she is undoubtedly a star on the rise in a live session KCRW (89.9FM and KCRW.com) taped in front of a small studio audience at legendary producer Bob Clearmountain’s Berkeley Street Studio in Santa Monica, and now it will hit the airwaves just in time for the holiday weekend.

The forward thinking R&B diva’s performance, as well as an interview with KCRW Music Director Jason Bentley, will be available online in the archives here and air live on Morning Becomes Eclectic at 11:15am on July 2: http://www.kcrw.com/music/programs/mb/mb100702janelle_monae

Janelle’s ambitious sophomore album “The ArchAndroid” is currently the most played album on KCRW and the station supported the Atlanta-based musician very early on in her career.

The interview touched on a wide variety of topics, from her desire to “preserve art,” her musical theater background and comparisons to David Bowie to working with Sean Combs, her own artist collective -- the Wondaland Arts Society – and, best of all, her hairstyle.

“I'm the type of person that I experiment in my room when I'm alone and I just come up with all these crazy things, and whatever works, you know, works. It works for me and it's a “Monae.” People call it a "Whompador," and a "Pompador,"- it's called a Monae.”

Janelle referenced her single “Tightrope” in talking about how she is handling the praise she is getting for her work, saying she’s not getting to high off of any accolades or too low off critiques but sticking to her core values.

“My community and the people are my main focus and I want to always stay connected to them and creating the music that uplifts them,” said Monae.

“I have parents, my mother was a janitor growing up and my father drove trash trucks and my stepfather, who is just like my father, works at the Post Office. So, I wear uniforms, black and white, paying homage to them. It just keeps me connected. This is my job, this is my responsibility to create music to uplift them and free them from any oppression, or people holding them back, or depression. I want my music to be their choice of drug, you know? So that's what I'm focused on.”

Hear the full performance and interview, and view a transcript, online here: http://www.kcrw.com/music/programs/mb/mb100702janelle_monae

Okay, one small complaint. In the spoken word bit in the last track: "This time we will relax." After all this dramatic musical and verbal ("and violence will not move me") build-up we get "this time we will relax"?! That sounds like my mother making plans for another Friday evening at home watching TV and eating to many Doritos. (Thank goodness Janelle Monae comes back singing before it ends.)

(I somehow have trouble referring to her simply as either "Monae" or "Janelle." Not sure why.)

late pass but this record is fun as hell. 2010 is the best for music. is this thread worth reading?

there's a decent amount of hate iirc

People get quite involved. Some of it's interesting, probably worth a skim.

its weird how almost every interview i read with JM is near identical. someones been press groomed very well.

well ive only read about 4, but still.

or.... everyone is asking her the exact same things

Just bought a couple tix for the Janelle Monae + Of Montreal tour, which is gonna be monstrous.

xpost -- exactly what I was thinking.

i'm always surprised when people are, er, surprised that artists give the same answers to every interviewer. if i had to spend all day being asked the same or similar questions i'd go on autopilot after a while too.

well yeah it could be that. but i also thought it might just be old fashioned artist grooming. plus it would also tie into jm's love of 50s/60s pop.

I interviewed her recently and found that the first 20 minutes was boilerplate blah while she was talking about the album but she opened up and became more interesting and warmer as we moved on. It supports my theory that most interviewees can only keep up the boilerplate for half an hour, which is why I always try to get an hour if I can, and why publicists like to keep things short.

so basically, always ask for the last slot in the day? ;)

or first!

# BookishBohem
Anyone who DOESN'T like Janelle Monae is probably just a CLONE of whatever's popular and is terrified that they might have to change now.

# Sky Pie La Blondie iSpySky
You can be indifferent toward the music if it's not your cup of tea, but Janelle Monae is one of most well-intentioned artists around today.

# SMarie GiirlFriday
RT Seriously if u dislike Janelle Monae...u generally suck as a human being. #thereitis/ this is where i wud side eye @mskayess; not Nemore!

"Seriously if u dislike Janelle Monae...u generally suck as a human being."

^^correct.

It's not exactly news, but I have not stopped loving this album.

my vinyl copy is still in mail limbo :(

Anyone else see her on SYTYCD?

She's supporting Vampire Weekend in London in December!

Supporting? What's wrong with you people over there.

What's wrong with you people over there.

new board description

VW are more popular in the US, too, Ned

christ, archandroid is only getting better. just ignore the egregious spelling mistakes on the vinyl packaging. i want to smack the person responsible for failing on such a monumental record.

xpost -- no need to remind me of that! I'll pretend otherwise!

how's about that "cold war" video, eh? i loved the shit out of it. i hear it as someone emerging from a spine-crushing relationship, so i don't care if that crying was real or her theater or whatever background

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lqmORiHNtN4

man the tightrope remix is fucking fucking fucking HORRIBLE

So so good.

ultimately this ended up being one of those things that i thought was really cool then never ended up wanting to listen to

it's wack

Great album, still.

"Oh, Maker" in particular is devastating.

ultimately this ended up being one of those things that i thought was really cool then never ended up wanting to listen to

― underrated klaatu albums i have loved (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Thursday, August 26, 2010 2:56 PM (3 hours ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

Yeah pretty much feel the same - a week or so of intensive listening, no urge to do so since. One of those better in theory deals probably, Should give it another go soon though, she is good.

yeah i still think it's good in theory, just never strikes my mood

Great album, still.

― ilxor has truly been got at and become an ILXor (ilxor), Thursday, August 26, 2010 8:04 AM Suggest Ban Permalink
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yeah i still think it's good in theory, just never strikes my mood

― i got what t.rex turok the mic right (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Thursday, August 26, 2010 1:38 PM (5 hours ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

i dont agree with this entirely but i def feel like its a record where i have to be in the mood to listen to a lot of it to want to listen to any of it -- def a record that gains from the kitchen-sink-dj-mix feel imo

I still like it...Unlike most other people I wasn't anticipate the album at all and only checked it out after the overwhelming praise on ILM and elsewhere. So it's been a slow getting-to-know-you rather than Yeah!-Yeah!-Yeah!-breakfast-bye.

It will be Top 10 for me this year, I expect.

"wasn't anticipating" - sigh.

Oh, Maker

I had a weird dream about listening to a foreign edition of this album and for some reason they had left off "57821" and another song, and I didn't understand why.

But did it have an Obi strip? Or a bonus remix track?

For some reason this album only works for me in bite-sized segments... I can listen to almost any sequence of two or three songs from this and find something to enjoy but taken as a whole it's just irritating.

"the r&b album that dog latin likes" is in apt enough summation of this