who are your favorite singers/rappers?
i talked about this before but only briefly. i didn't really take a moment to dissect the art that i claim to treasure so much. music has always been a little different for me. i played the piano for eight years so my ears pick up way more than rhyme schemes. i hear cadences and b flats, i hear chords, saxophones, cymbals. i feel like i can hear the pulse of a song even when i'm not searching for it. this exposure to the insides of a melody makes it hard for me to like just anything. my ears demand more than mainstream, they demand a respect for the craft of music, for the fingers that pound into the ivory of the keys, for the lips that kiss the saxophone so long that the burning in someone's cheeks feels like butterflies. i'm as demanding to my music as i am to my lover. we have to go so deep that our hearts beats like drums, because honestly making love is the equivalent of a messy melody. someone has to hear us and when they do, it has to be so distinct, that they can't remember what life was like before those sounds.
because the person who asked me this question is admirable because of his own respect for his craft i'm divulging all my senses to answer his question. as per his blog, i'm listening to John Legend and the Roots' new single Let It Shine on repeat. it's one of those songs where i can hear the piano, the trumpet, the cymbals, the snare drum and the vocals. in combination, the title of the song makes sense - in music and in love, LET IT SHINE.
i can start with singers since i can bring them anywhere. sometimes with a four year old, i just can't let tupac rock. my first musical memories are whitney, before bobby, mariah before nick, celine dion before she could speak english and toni braxton. whitney, i've always been a fan of her. she always reminded me of my older sister who i wanted to be like so bad, until i realized i was. but what i genuinely love about whitney, mariah and celine dion was their ability to sound the same on a cd as they did in person. their talent never needed accompaniment. as a little girl, their performances taught me that a woman should never be afraid to stand alone and if she had to, she must be as fabulous as if there were a whole orchestra behind her.
celine dion taught me how to love. her feature with frank sinatra - 'all the way' will always be the song i want played at my wedding. and what's so ironic is that she recorded her vocals after mr. sinatra passed away which only reinforced the idea that celine will love you to a point that not even death could part. and it only reflected in her real life when her husband of now sixteen years was diagnosed with throat cancer and she halted her career to be by his side.
toni taught me five things about relationships. 1. it's ok to love and be vulgar about it [i love me some him, how many ways] 2. it's ok to be mad. [love shoulda brought you home, seven days, another sad love song, there's no me without you, unbreak my heart, in the late of the night] 3. it's ok to have expectations from your partner and be disappointed when they don't meet them [talking in his sleep, just be a man about it, he wasn't man enough] 4. it's ok to leave [breathe again, i don't want to] when 2 and 3 occur and 5. it was probably because of a white woman [how could an angel break my heart]. and if you went to see her perform in the Broadway musical, Aida, consider yourself favored by the stars above.
whitney. oh whitney. my favorite. whitney taught me that it was never ok to just be skinny and beautiful, b.tch have a talent. she never settled. she never stopped working. and even when her talents were divine, she never stopped being human [still had a battle with cocaine, that we're not sure she won yet]. she's just so real even when she's wrong. i have so many favorites from her but saving all my love for you is probably in the number one spot. the song is about her in love with someone's else's man. again, being pretty and skinny doesn't guarantee anything. have a purpose, even if it is 'making love the whole night through.'
and mariah carey can sing seven out of the eight octaves on a piano, actually so can the rest of the women i already mentioned. but one thing about mariah is that you could always hear how happy she was when she was singing. it's one thing to respect your craft but it's a beautiful thing when you enjoy it. i imagined that losing my virginity would reflect the lyrics of her hit song, 'my all.' it didn't but i still love the song.
lauryn hill was not included above only because of the generational difference but we all should know that she is a walking legend whose life interrupted her career or maybe her career interrupted her life. either way, what's an ipod without the 'miseducation of lauryn hill.' every mom loves the song 'zion' but 'forgive them father' is my life's work. and don't forget her unplugged performance. i walk around with her lyrics in my mind like a Bible in my hand.
mary j blige. all the money in the world and she's still mary. i don't know how many people can turn struggle into a melody, in nine studio albums. she said 'i'm going down' but did she really?
i went through puberty with monica, aaliyah and craig david, my first break up with heather headley and vivian green. john legend and anthony hamilton brought me through those relationships. in high school, i adored alicia keys, still do. also had an unplugged moment on mtv. sade, corrine bailey rae, adele and amy winehouse get me through these writing spells. beyonce has been a growing favorite for some time although i usually get blindsided by the glitz and the glamour. but little sister, solange, well i would marry her. john mayer can play all day through my speakers. raul midon, after seeing him on jay leno one late night, has been a favorite since. definitely saw lyfe jennings on the apollo and haven't taken my eye off of him either. maxwell has all those instruments i love. i fell in love with melanie fiona, i wish everybody else would notice her gift. beres hammond has been a favorite probably because i'm west indian, and love sounds different in our accent. amel larrieux, usher, chrisette michele all are so vulnerable. who doesn't love that? and i definitely can't forget luther vandross, playing through the speakers of my dad's white chevrolet. hmm. yes luther. oh and i get it, chris brown knocked that girl around but music and morality sometimes have nothing to do with one another. that young man is talented and his career will last longer than any bruise.
as for rappers, oh man. i was born in the south bronx, raised in the south bronx [mostly], hip hop is like my older sister, all six of them. it's always doing something different but the blood runs through its veins so either way, it's all the same. hip hop used to scare my mother, she was used to steel pans and sunshine and hip hop was all about gunshots in the dark. i used to run the track back for her so she could pick up what the lyricist was saying but cliches don't sound the same in different dialects. but my relationship with rappers is a strained one. i spent every summer overseas so i missed the summer hits playing through boom boxes on the shoulders of men with dreams bigger than the hood itself. so when i returned in the fall for school, i was the absentee lover to hip hop. i had a lot of making up to do. but the first single i ever bought was 'it's all about the benjamins' with biggie, lil kim, the lox and of course diddy when he was puffy. i was so new to the game, my sister made my buy the edited version. do you know what that song did to me? first of all, when i was in kindergarten i asked my father for some lunch money, he gave me a $100 bill. so anytime i would ask for money, i would ask for it by the name of the face of the man who was on it. 'lemme hold a benji mommy.' can you imagine a little girl knowing the name of every president on the money she wanted? that was me so when this song came out, i knew it was for me. and lil kim talking about 'what the bloodclot, wanna bumble with the bee huh?' she knew my culture? she knew we existed? and even then i didn't learn to appreciate the queen bee till much later. i followed the bass of biggie's voice into Get Money, Hypnotize, Juicy, Who Shot Ya and my personal favorite, Warning. i can't deny that what biggie was saying was something i understood, guys on the block from sun up to sun down, girls running around. i got it. listening to him was like looking out my window. but for me, he got me with his delivery. his voice sounded intense ALL the time. you couldn't help but move your head to his vocals. it was like he was saying, whether you understand him or not, you're gonna listen. but then somehow, there's no way you can know biggie without knowing tupac. and though biggie is a favorite, i am a fan of tupac. with thug life tatted on him, 'the hate you gave little infants, f.ck everybody', tupac had a story, actually he had a lot of stories. complete with plot, characters and climaxes, every song tupac gave me felt like a novel. and as a writer, i respect biggies delivery but the endless content tupac brought was gritty, hopeful, it entertained nearly every aspect of life. Hail Mary. come on, 'i ain't a killa but don't push me.' isn't that the damn truth? tupac recognized humanity in us all. we can't all be drug dealers and we can't all be rappers but we can all be killers if the event called for it. i could go on forever about his talent and the relevance it has to life after him, but i'd rather tell you where he took me. any search for prophecy over a melody will lead you to nas. on a smaller scale i feel for nas like i feel for tupac which would only lead me to feel for jay-z like i do biggie. the only difference is that jay-z has had the opportunity to have more lyrical content than biggie. content that i enjoy. but nas. not even to compare the two, i am a fan of nas. my favorite song of his being 'rewind,' that man surely does have the gift of storytelling, even backwards. i have a special place in my heart for jay-z's 'meet the parents.' and because of who i've dated, i can spit hov lines with the best of em but i'd rather just kick back and throw on illmatic. somewhere between high school and college, i started having an affair with common and lupe fiasco. for common, his verse on 'retrospect for life' and on talib kweli's 'the truth,' his own song, 'testify' and his appearance on kid cudi's make her say remix, common is versatile, consistent and smart as hell. and lupe is a young man doing old things. i was sold on 'intruder alert' where each verse told a different story. i guess by now you know i love storytelling. and kanye was definitely one of the first cds i bought to break the hiatus i felt hip hop took when i was still in high school. i don't know anything about celebrity kanye but i know the kanye from 'college dropout' who evolved into '808s and heartbreak.' his mind is different and he makes no apologies for it, so yes i'm a fan of him too. and no i didn't forget about lil wayne. i'm deadass a fan. now granted, lil wayne is now a brand with a whole damn gang/band behind him but back when his locks were just growing out and he was growing up, i was with him. Fireman, 3 peat, 500 degreez, Shot to the Heart, i was there for all of it. listening to his voice change, and watching him change into skinny jeans, i was there. whether he's high or not, he shows up to work everyday and i love that.
now i'm sending prayers up to heaven hoping that i didn't miss anyone but i probably did. so instead, i'll send my humble apologies to the gods of music and to the artist(s) my brain couldn't remember. ::insert anxiety attack here::
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