Whatever happened to... Maxwell?

"Help Somebody" and "Stop The World" are fantastic.

i like this record a lot — the second half sounds way less composed/arranged, and i kind of wish at least one of those was stretched out a bit more — but it's hard not to like it, still. particularly when he asks the girl to call the president. that is sweet.

i love pretty wings but he sings in *just* high enough of a register that i cant quite hit all the notes when i sign along, its pretty annoying

god if i judged R&B based on what notes i can actually (pretend to) hit!

sudden weird insight into why people like records w/bad singing

Haha

Seein' him and Common at the Hollywood Bowl tonight.

Pretty f-in' pumped.

ive heard incredible things about his live show

Expect lots of wangs, tbh.

This might be my album of the year.

yeah man its up there for me too

ive heard incredible things at his live show

def in my top 3

Got drunk. Wish I hadn't. Made for an interesting morning. Now at office, wishing I were still at Hollywood Bowl, last night, before the wine started flowing. Ugh.

Uh...but was the show any good?

The show was phenomenal. Highly recommended.

This record is amazing but I have next to nothing to actually say about it. Still, this is the shit.

50 quid for a london ticket.

i cant go :(

the musicians on this album are so fuckin good

like it is such a pleasure to hear session dudes in a non-sucky context just doing their thing

I feel as if this is the most slept-on universally acclaimed album of 2009.

yeah i think the length and the fact that it's an unusually understated "comeback" album cause that, tho i can't decide myself whether it's more "great" or more "really fucking good"

I never felt like Maxwell's critical rep was that high, though. Certainly not compared to D'Angelo or Badu.

im still not sure what happened to his sense of melody (sounds much more radio R&B influenced) here but this album is great. didnt blow me away as a 'comeback' album when i first got it, but its a solid grower. and yeah, the playing on it is fantastic.

everyone i work w/ loves it but the joke going around the ballpark is that the song is secretly called 'chicken wings.' big lols

― butthurt (deej), Monday, August 17, 2009 4:35 AM (1 year ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

lol forgot abt this

this album doesn't have a sense of melody?

wtf

...?

Another argument for having year-end polls in like August of the following year.

i love whatever instrument it is thats used at the start of pretty wings.

i believe it's an instrument called the gamelan, from indonesia (where i'm living) they're kinda like tuned mini gongs, usually grouped in 8 or 10 and lined up in a scale. it sounds to me like maybe it's the javanese brand of gamelan (as opposed to balinese or sundanese, which have slightly different microtunings) me and some indonesian rap dudes i hang with have sat around several times trying to determine if it's a loop from a gamalan cd or a producer playing it on a sampler - on one hand that intro sounds very much like the instruments are generally played live to me, but listening closely i can hear melody lines with just one gamelan playing coming in and out later on in the song, so i guess it's probably just samples. but i'm thinking the guy playing them has heard a gamelan record or two, he's got the style down well enough to have fooled me at first, and i listen to shitloads of gamelan.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6ZAumC4JP3o&feature=related

man pretty wings is just so damn... pretty! and serious staying power, in this age of easy all-you-can-listen-to downloads 99.9% of everything i download only gets a single listen from me, maybe 2 if it's my favorite artist or something... but this one keeps popping up on my stereo a LOT. hell, i just listened to it 4 times in a row reading this thread!

just re-listened to this recently. the first four tracks are so amazing and i think "why don't i listen to this all the time?!" then the second half is like "oh yeah, huh".

i'm so ready for a new album from this band, but it seems like his momentum has slowed down a bit?

isnt this meant to be part of a trilogy?

"this album doesn't have a sense of melody?"

his sense of melody has *changed*, not disappeared.

iirc he had 3 albums' worth of material in the can over the long break, although I dunno if that means the other albums are totally done or if he's continued to work on them. the 2nd was initially going to be released less than a year later, but i think the 1st did so well that he's just riding it out with as many singles and tours as he can and it looks like the next one's pushed back to 2011.

i haven't listened enough to his earlier stuff to really compare, but the last album's melodies didn't sound especially different from before, or closer to other stuff on the radio.

if anything, i feel like there's ~more~ of a focus on melody than on his previous albums

^^^ yup

I listened to the album this morning thanks to this thread, and, yup: it's still my favorite album of 2009.

"pretty wings" is really good but when he goes into his slurry soul-man vamps it sounds like "pret-ty WANGS" and i laugh every time...

― flying squid attack (tipsy mothra), Monday, August 17, 2009 1:07 AM (2 years ago) Bookmark

Whatever happened to....Samwell?

http://answers.encyclopedia.com/question/did-robert-maxwell-die-296910.html

evan r. linked this to me on twitter just now

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=62c2oTTSLJM

How're those other two records coming, Maxwell? And don't pretend you don't follow this thread.

Maxwell duets w/Alicia Keys on her new LP... http://stupiddope.com/2012/11/20/alicia-keys-maxwell-fire-we-make-new-music/

god urban hang suite is ridic

hear hear

embrya is the greatest thing in the world

i've literally only listened to maxwell over the past few days...

i'm digging embrya but now is a bit better i think. the criticism that people levy against voodoo (too focused on grooves at the expense of songs) is something that i think actually applies to embrya to an extent, but that's still a raw record. "drowndeep" def has to be one of his best songs.

there's a dearth of writing about maxwell... i want to read a fucking tome about these albums right now

i hope when he comes back he goes thru w/ that full albums tour

I endured a Maxwell phase in September and came away thinking Embrya was my least favorite, although "Cococure" is one hell of an aural bask.

Now's "Changed" is my new favorite.

i've listened to "whenever, wherever, water" like 40 times in the last 24 hours