Music is supposed to inspire…

A few weeks ago I got the debut album from Janelle Monae. Compared to most  women in contemporary popular music, I found her to be a breath of fresh air. She made me think of other female artists that had that effect on me and one name stood out: Lauryn Hill.

Remember her?

I can’t imagine anyone forgot about Lauryn Hill. I don’t think anyone took The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill off their top-albums-of-whatever list. I still listen to it regularly. And every time I do, I feel a little nostalgic and a little sad that she didn’t release another fantastic album.

Recently NPR named Lauryn Hill one of their 50 Great Voices. They even managed to interview the notoriously reclusive singer. One of the things that struck me most in the interview was the importance of her rap career. Lauryn is a female MC, which was rare then and still rare now. And what an MC!  She sounds dirty and raw when she raps. She doesn’t miss a beat. She manages to hold her own with the boys in the Fugees without being vulgar. And she can sing too! She sounds like old school Motown: real and soulful. Lauryn was the undeniable star of the Fugees. You have heard Killing Me Softly, right? I still get chills from that song.

I can go on and on about how fantastic Lauryn is as an artist. But this post isn’t just about Lauryn’s ability as a singer or rapper. It’s certainly not about her role in the Fugees. It’s about how much I love the Miseducation of Lauryn Hill. It seems this album is always around. And when I put it on, it’s really difficult to stop listening. I consider it one of the top albums of the 90′s.

The majority of the album was written and arranged by a 23 year old Lauryn Hill.  The first single was Doo Wop (That Thing). The song seamlessly swings between 90′s hip hop and 60′s soul.  Her singing is sweet but her rapping is fierce and biting. She tells it like it is and you can’t help but listen and take notes.   It’s no surprise that most people I know still have the lyrics memorized.

The rest of the album follows this lead. She blends black music from different eras beautifully. You can hear elements of reggae, gospel, soul, funk, R&B and rap throughout.  What gets me is how effortless it all sounds.  Even with the mix of genres, the album sounds cohesive and personal. The themes  are personal as well, which is where Miseducation‘s real strengths lie.  She sings an ode to her first born son in  To Zion. She waxes philosophical on the breakup of the Fugees in I Used to Love Him. Every Ghetto, Every City walks us through her history while treating us to the funkiest of grooves.

My favorite song on  Miseducation shouldn’t surprise anyone that really knows me. Nothing Even Matters, a duet with D’Angelo. I love D’Angelo about as much as I love Lauryn Hill. It’s the most simple of love songs, on an album full of heartache and hurt. I’m not usually a fan of R&B love songs, but this one is different. It reminds me of something older, kinder and more intimate.

I got the bombs to make you blow. I got the beats to make you bang.

MIA stole my idea.

I had this fantastic idea for a music project years ago: I wanted to MC over homemade beats even though I couldn’t rap or make beats. I had my schtick all worked out too. I was going to write songs about politics in third world countries. And since I’m brown and originally from a war torn country, I could totally pull it off.  With me it was always a joke, but in the early 2000′s MIA showed up and completely OWNED it.   She could barely rap or sing, the beats were clunky, the lyrics were off, her politics shaky…but somehow it all worked together.

Arular, her first full length, was released in 2005. That was a big year for me. That was the year I moved to metro Detroit. It was the year I realized “Holy crap, I’m in engineering school now”. It was also the year I got my first “real”  job. I would work full time during the day and take classes at night. And even though MIA wasn’t from Detroit, 6 years later I still connect Arular to my beginning in that city.

While I have sentimental reasons for loving this record, it’s really just collection of fun (to me) music. Every track is an ass-shaker. Yes it is a dance record. But it’s also a hip hop record. And a pop record. And a punk record. I love music that blurs the lines between genres. I also love music that’s just a bit “difficult” to listen to. I imagine a song like Galang isn’t suited for someone who just wants to dance at the club.  It’s got chants, and assaulting beats and an amateur touch in the production. The whole record sounds like this.  But that’s what I find so appealing: every listen reveals something new.  In my opinion, this quality gives music longevity. Because this record isn’t easily consumed, it’s not easily discarded.

Arular is also associated with one of my favorite early Detroit memories.  One cool fall night, my sister and I decided to skip our night classes to check out MIA in concert at Saint Andrew’s Hall.  Saint Andrew’s Hall is a 1000 capacity historic music venue in the city. Anyone that mattered has performed there, national AND local acts: Nirvana, The White Stripes Eminem. MIA had a good turn out but barely filled the venue to half it’s capacity that night. The quality of the audience? That’s what mattered. She managed to bring in people from every segment of Detroit’s population into that small room: Hip hop heads, white boys who loved indie music, South Asian kids, punks, art school nerds, old people and young people. Detroit is  a very segregated city, but somehow all these people found themselves in this small venue on a Tuesday night…DANCING. Together. I don’t think anyone left that night without a huge smile on their face.

I’ll have what she’s having.

In my introduction I invited my friends to share their favorite albums with me. I’m happy to report that my friend Jonathan Lee took me up on the offer and has decided to contribute to the site. Check out his take on the When Harry Met Sally Motion Picture Soundtrack. If you’re interested in writing about a favorite album, drop me an email.

When I was in the 6th grade, my parents bought me a Sony Hi-Fi system as a Christmas present.  It was large and utilitarian and featured two tape decks, a tuner, and a CD player.  No fancy digital equalizers, and you couldn’t even turn the damn thing off with the remote.  To turn it off, you had to walk over to it and press the button.  It didn’t resemble any of the sleek, silver models that flood the market these days — no concessions to space were considered during the design.  It didn’t have any flat speaker panels and the whole monolith took up an entire quadrant of my bookshelf-slash-entertainment system, the speakers sagging on the top shelf.  A miracle the bookshelf never broke under its weight.

It had 2 tape decks that allowed for recording from the tuner, which was the most exciting feature for me.  I didn’t really know what CDs were at that point; they were a new technology, but I received most of my music fix from the radio — the top 40 station, mainly, and eventually the “alternative rock” station (94.5 the EDGE!).  I listened intently every night to the top 5 countdowns and recorded the favorite songs of my youth by untoggling pause at the right moment, as to capture only the song, and no pre- or post-DJ blabber.  My first CD purchases/gifts were embarrassments.  Hootie and the Blowfish, August and Everything After by the Counting Crows (which really isn’t an embarrassment as it is still a fantastic album), The Bodyguard soundtrack — they were played more for novelty sake than anything else.  Oooh…a shiny disc with clear, almost TOO clear fidelity sound!  Don’t touch the shiny part or you’ll scratch it!  Carefully extract the CD from the case carefully or you’re scratch it!  Don’t expose it to air for too long or you’ll scratch it!  In fact, anything would scratch it.  I didn’t understand at the time that music is art and reached beyond the object itself.

And then, choir and puberty happened.

My voice was changing, and I started to get all these strange, new feelings about girls.  It was much easier to hide my emotions behind a row of my peers than talking to a girl one-on-one.  My choir teacher placed me in the baritone section, and I took great pride that my creaky, changing voice could be turned into something deep, oaky, and confident.  What my choir teacher didn’t know was that I was practicing at home, developing a deeper sound by singing along at home with my Sony Hi-Fi.

The album was the When Harry Met Sally soundtrack by Harry Connick, Jr., and as with all things fateful, how it arrived in my CD player was both coincidental and random.  It was a soundtrack and thought, “Hey, the one soundtrack I had isn’t so bad.”  I borrowed it from my aunt, who was part of that wretched Columbia Records CD Club, knew nothing about the film, drew parallels from the cover to my own burgeoning love life, and as soon as track 1 started — It Had to be You — my young, fertile musical mind underwent a revolution.  Jazz?  Big Band?  I knew nothing about those genres at the time, but all I knew was that those bold horns reached into my soul, I wanted to sound like Harry, and those syncopated rhythms kicked around in my head even after the CD stopped.  I never viewed music the same from that point forward.  Listening was enjoyment, it was pleasure, it was happiness, it was sadness — music became EVERYTHING.  Harry Connick, Jr. was my wise teacher, and I was crooning along with him, hoping to match my voice with his.

When my crush ignored me during math class, I would listen to But Not For Me, comforted by the fact that Harry knew what I was going through, how I was feeling.  When I was in a goofy, puppy-dog sort of stupor, Let’s Call the Whole Thing Off matched my whimsy, despite the lyrical dissonance.  And Where or When, mimicked my sexual frustration as a young adult male (the build-up, the climax, the regretful post-coital haze?), but also imbued in me crystal fragments of romance that I still don’t know how to outgrow.

So, even years later, middle school is just a distant memory.  I don’t even remember what the girl’s name was, but this album has stayed with me.  When Harry met Sally…and also me.

We’ll use the one thing we’ve got more of – that’s our minds

Remember when MTV played music?

Neither do I. I grew up on MuchMusic, the Canadian version of MTV. I don’t know how American kids did it, but I discovered new music primarily through MM. It was how I learned of the Brit Pop Invasion ™ of the mid 90′s. Brit bands like Oasis and Blur got the bulk of media attention during that time but I had an unlikely favorite: Pulp.

My first exposure to Pulp was the video to the middle-class anthem Common People. Seeing that video was the first time I connected music and style.  I never related to the baggy pants and flannel of the grunge movement.  Pulp’s look was …. sexier.  To 13 year old me, at least. A tall, skinny, bookish front man in a too-small suit? I still have a soft spot for that look. The sound was full of sex too: a mix of disco and rock while Jarvis Cocker whispered “you wanna sleep with common people? like me?”

It took me years to finally pick up the full length Different Class, and it’s still in regular rotation. Cocker croons about sex, drugs and being an outsider. But this isn’t just a fluffy album of catchy pop numbers. It’s one of the smartest albums I own: full of cheeky commentary and a glam-pop sound that still feels fresh, 15 years later. It’s difficult to pick a favorite song. I like to listen to albums as a whole and this one is solid from start to finish. The opener,  Mis-shapes, about a group of “mis-shapes, mistakes, misfits”, encourages kids to revel in their weirdness.  AFEELINGCALLEDLOVE is the most romantic and realistic ode to love I’ve ever heard, without sounding sappy or contrived. “But this isn’t chocolate boxes and roses” he coos
“It’s dirtier than that”. This record is full of songs like this- sly, sophisticated and perfect.

Pulp has since broken up, but Cocker is still making music. I haven’t had a chance to listen to his solo efforts, but I’m sure he’s still making music for unabashed nerds like me. I’m sure his music is still smart and I’m positive he’s still one the sexiest men in music.

Introducing….My Favorite Albums

Somewhere in the last 2 years I became one of those people.

The ones that still listen to the same music they listened to growing up. The ones that think all these new bands look silly with that funny hair and those skinny jeans. The ones that complain that it all sounds the same. How it’s already been done, 20 years ago, by a much better band.

I’m not saying there isn’t any good new music out these days. Not at all. I just lost interest somewhere along the way. I used to read Stereogum, daily. Right now I don’t even follow a single music blog. I don’t even read music magazines. I used to care what Pitchfork rated a new release, whether I agreed with their assessment or not. I would get really excited when I discovered a band, or if I got my hands on a leaked copy of a new album before its official release. When I lived in Detroit, I would never miss a show at the Magic Stick. NEVER.  I love live music, I just don’t have that kind of energy anymore.

I still listen to tons of music. I have about million favorite albums that I  consume on a regular basis.  I feel like most music blogs are only focused on hyping the next big thing.  With this project, I want to do the opposite.  I want to reintroduce people to their old favorites: the go-to’s. The ones that remind you of a certain time in your life. The plan is to write about a favorite album every week, in no order. I want to share the reasons why I love a particular piece of music, and I want to invite my friends to do the same.