It's POLL For You -- ILM artist poll #103 -- JANET JACKSON (voting open until July 24, 2020)

still a fine piece of hair metal imo

I think its okay. Definitely stamps "1989" on the record in one of the less attractive ways, though.

Lemmy Kilmister of Motörhead intended to record a version of "Black Cat" with Jackson, but was prohibited. Lemmy stated, "I wanted to do a version of 'Black Cat' with her, but Sony wouldn't let me. You could tell from the video that she was having a good time, that this loud rock music is what she really wanted to be doing. I love that fuckin' song.. Great fuckin' song that but the record company wouldn't let it be possible.

Can I vote for Djimon Hounsou in the video for "Love Will Never Do (Without You)?"

actually, the only imperial era single I find meh is "Miss You Much."

― TikTok to the (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Sunday, 5 July 2020 17:32 (five hours ago) link

I suppose theoretically there's an argument to be made that "Miss You Much" is too similar to "Escapade" to stand tall on its own, but in practice "too similar to one of the best songs ever made" is the opposite of a put-down.

This is an auteurist argument, but I find the lack of a Jackson co-write instructive; "Miss You Much" sounds generic while even the words in the middle eight of "Escapade" leap out. I realize "Love Will Never Do" also boasts no Jackson credit, but that's an exception.

Miss You Much >>>>>>>> Escapade (and I like Escapade)

My numbers two and one respectively from that album.

The beat on "Miss You Much" is a monster.

The apricot scarf was worn by Nick
Nothing in the words referred to Mick

Who do you think you are, Rambo?
Or a cumulonimbus capillatus or a cirrus or an altostratus?
Somebody to make somebody like me proud
In the encyclopedia of clouds?

tell em carly

As much as I love All For You as an album, Son of a Gun is the main one I can't get on with it. The repetition of the "clouds in my coffee" part is so grating.

I initially loved "Son of a Gun" but when I came back to the album 5 years later, it really felt like a prank

both posts otm

I'm spending more time with the Janet album. Out of her imperial phase albums it's the one I know the least. One thing I noticed this morning is how some of the singles didn't quite hit me. I know Again was already discussed here, that's one of my least favourite ballads of hers. Also, I know this is probably controversial, but If doesn't do a lot for me. That chaotic intro sounded so jarring to me for some reason.

I'm wondering what people think of Whoops Now? It was really sounding so joyful to me walking home in the heat today. Her saying "tiddlywinks" is a career high point.

"If" is all time for me, esp. because of the video clip.

I can see not clicking with "Again" but it's one of those ballads from the era that just feels like a steamroller regardless of what you think of it, like "Saved The Best For Last".

Listening to Damita Jo again, and still blown away that Janet not only included both "Warmth" and "Moist" on the album but programmed them back to back (including with the "my turn" transition).

“Whoops Now” is a delight.

^^^^

not sure how i'm going to submit a ballot without most of the velvet rope album tracks on it

more treated violin solos in music thanks

it's really ridiculous how much range she covered over janet & the velvet rope, those albums are just so immense and fantastic at everything they try to do

i'm not a big fan of "what'll i do" but otherwise yes otm

i was thinking 'hmm maybe janet is edging out velvet rope as my favourite album of hers' but now i'm listening to velvet rope again and it's impossible to choose

"what'll i do" isn't anything special but i like it enough and sequencing it after "throb" is inspired

I love the hubris of this track; only in an artist in her imperial phase would release it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LsPb2EVCLdg

two of my favorite records this year do the "cohesive despite pretty wide genre-travel" thing and i wonder if it's because we all grew up on '90s janet

"this time" rules so much, like how did she get away with it - a 7 minute goth-r&b epic with a ridiculous operatic crescendo

the last two minutes of "this time".... fuckin legendary

the sequencing of the velvet rope is just fucking insane

"go deep" -> "free xone" -> "together again" -> "empty"

Listening to Damita Jo again, and still blown away that Janet not only included both "Warmth" and "Moist" on the album but programmed them back to back (including with the "my turn" transition).

― Tim F

This is the next album I'm going to revisit. Looking forward to it although without anything from this, I already have 50 songs on my shortlist.

i find it downright impossible to be objective about "if." if i were forced to find the "root" of my queerness it would certainly be watching the "if" video at the impressionable age of six, it was like a bomb going off in my life. the noteless guitar squalls, the percussion track's dense leafy compression, the fuckin... strings. the instrumental breakdown is like the logical endpoint of what "nasty" started

It's an insane production: the guitar squeal, the chinoiserie bit played on synths, then GIMME TEH BEAT

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BTSd4vqnMwo

the song is already its own atmosphere and then the video translates that atmosphere into perfectly-aligned images and choreography, i cannot begin to detangle them in my mind. janet walking in slo mo through the billowing red curtains @_@

good excuse to relisten here.

Listening to it last week, I relished how she sounds out of breath singing each word clearly when she gives the chorus a second pss: "If. I. was. your girlfriend. the. things. I'd. do. to. you."

this poll is going to give me the immense gift of listening to a lot of janet albums for the first time so thank you eric. like i hadn't heard "doesn't really matter" or seen the video and it instantly made my weekend so i guess it's going to be that x 100 for a few weeks if not months. yay!

the song ended! i didn't even get to come!!!

lmao "trust a try" is so fucking amazing

very aaliyah s/t-core

also i know i repped for "trust" earlier but "feels so right" may be even better. all for you: a great album

Just found out that Whoops Now didn't even get into the R&B chart in the US (was it even a single there?) and um what!?

uh i started damita jo and maybe it was a bad idea, bc now i have to figure out where "strawberry bounce" places in my already-full ballot

the fabled strawberry bounce to the top

Damita Jo is such a chilled and gorgeous album. I just listened to the whole thing and apart from the last track which really seems out of place, it sounded glorious. R&B Junkie should have been a single. I Want You, SloLove and Truly all need to be on my ballot as well. Even the opening interlude is really lush. So underrated.

Oh wow, I didn't realise the last song (Just a Little While) was actually the lead single. Weird choice.

yet it was so promptly forgotten. Fuck Justin Timberlake.

To read the Wiki on Damita Joe is depressing as fuck.

Damita Jo is such a chilled and gorgeous album. I just listened to the whole thing and apart from the last track which really seems out of place, it sounded glorious. R&B Junkie should have been a single. I Want You, SloLove and Truly all need to be on my ballot as well. Even the opening interlude is really lush. So underrated.

― kitchen person, Tuesday, 7 July 2020 23:23 (yesterday) link

the best parts of the album (i.e. the above, but also stuff like "The One" as well as "Strawberry Bounce" obv) make it seem like it could have been Janet's Last Train to Paris avant la lettre (to the extent that The Velvet Rope wasn't that already) if it was a bit more consistently in the pocket and expansive. But in particular the run of "Like You Don't Love Me" --> "Thinkin' Bout My Ex" --> "Warmth" --> "Moist" just kind of makes the horizons of the album seem smaller than perhaps they are (though lol I just realised that the "standard" version of the album excises those last two songs - was that a post-Superbowl decision?).

More generally that sense of foreclosing horizons is what puts everything post-The Velvet Rope (and pre-Unbreakable) at varying rungs below what came before. I mean most of The Velvet Rope is very bedroom-focused but stuff like the title track, "You" and "Free Xone" help to create this sense of Janet operating with a broader vision and having "something to say" (even if most of that time that something is along the lines of "your coochie gon' swell up and fall apart").

lol also "all nite (don't stop)" aka my favourite song from the album

someone to call my lover is really fun. like a better version of jordan knights give it to you but with the ventura highway sample built in.