Patrick Kane
Superstar
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/01/12/a...ingers-are-bringing-hip-hop-into-rb.html?_r=0
So much of hip-hop’s history has been about absorption and conquering. No other genre in pop has made so much mulch of its enemies and its obstacles. When it came to R&B, the dominant sound of prerap black pop, hip-hop was stealthy.
First it played nice by sampling the elder genre, making an intellectual argument for hip-hop’s place in soul’s legacy while also slyly removing its ancestor from the center to the fringe. Later, hip-hop birthed its own class of singers — tough talkers with smooth edges — who did the work of softening that the samples once did while serving up more simpatico subject matter. And, eventually, rappers just cut out the middlemen and began incorporating melody into their verses.
This long road ends at Drake, the biggest hip-hop disrupter of recent years, and also the genre’s biggest star. That the most important rapper of the 2010s is, if you look at him from a different angle, a completely credible R&B singer, is a radical shift and also not much of a surprise.
But something happened to Drake on his way to the top: He bulked up, and began emphasizing muscle over heart. His two 2015 albums were his least tender, suggesting that, at least for now, he’s renouncing his dual citizenship.
And that’s fine, because R&B is no longer taking hip-hop’s assault lying down. Male singers, in particular, are finding new ways to invigorate the genre, and in the case of Bryson Tiller, it’s by holding up a mirror to Drake and using his tricks in reverse.
Mr. Tiller’s debut, “Trapsoul” (TrapSoul/RCA), is perhaps the first truly post-Drake R&B album. Mr. Tiller is a loverman fluent in hip-hop gesture, a soul singer whose cadences privilege rhythm over croon. He even gives himself an alter ego nickname: Pen Griffey.
“Trapsoul,” which was released in October, is a logical response to the years of death throes R&B has been enduring at hip-hop’s hand. Mr. Tiller is thin-voiced but flexible, more in the vein of danceable early 1990s R&B than classic soul. To say he sings like a rapper is no insult — on “Let ’Em Know” and “Exchange,” he basically delivers his own guest rap verses for songs that don’t bother relying on bellow or shout or any of the old-school R&B tricks.
His nods to Drake are both literal and winking. On “Ten Nine Fourteen,” Mr. Tiller thanks him by name, remembering the importance of “the recognition from Drizzy alone,” then adds, “I remember when they slept on me — memory foam,” using the hashtag-rap rhyme pattern that Drake helped popularize. On songs like “502 Come Up,” Mr. Tiller sings and then pulls up short at the end of a bar, leaving a blank space — another Drake tic. And the production on “Trapsoul” is meticulously slurry, taking in the chopped-and-screwed R&B Drake dabbled in four or so years ago and smoothing it out, making it sound like hazy meditation.
These choices would seem to make Mr. Tiller an outsider, but in truth, he’s as close to a centrist as there is in contemporary R&B. His single “Don’t” has been a radio staple the last couple of months, in an environment generally hostile to R&B singers not named the Weeknd. One of the few other R&B singers leaving a similar mark is Jeremih, who released his second album, “Late Nights: The Album” (Def Jam), last month, five years after his first. It’s confident and impressive, and shows off some directions in which R&B can assert its individuality: namely, tempo and texture.
For example, “Pass Dat” could pass for experimental house music — unsurprising, given that Jeremih hails from Chicago, and also because he’s spent large parts of the downtime since his last album collaborating with dance music producers. And “Oui” showcases his uncommonly nasal voice, which, at a slow pace, feels ineffectual but sounds electric and percussive at quicker speeds. There are several songs like those on “Late Nights,” which is a relief, because on the first single from the album, “Planez,” Jeremih was phoning in an R. Kelly impression.
Mr. Kelly, a longtime incorporator of hip-hop attitude into R&B, recently released a new album, “The Buffet,” and when it sold poorly, recorded a video in which he griped that black audiences weren’t properly supporting his music. That may or may not be true, but it overlooks two crucial trends: First, lovers of R&B have been better served by hip-hop than by R&B in recent years, and second, Mr. Kelly is no longer the standard-bearer he once was.
Who’s taken that spot? Chris Brown, of all people. Once a teenage dance whiz and later something of a pariah, Mr. Brown is studious in his appreciation of, and fealty to, post-disco R&B, and some of his finest music has been in this vein. His new album, “Royalty” (RCA), includes “Zero,” an ecstatic song (though with a spiteful core) that’s the sort of lite-funk revival Bruno Mars usually traffics in. But Mr. Brown is, it turns out, a convincing classicist, holding down R&B’s old fort as the genre’s DNA mutates around him.
PND lost
So much of hip-hop’s history has been about absorption and conquering. No other genre in pop has made so much mulch of its enemies and its obstacles. When it came to R&B, the dominant sound of prerap black pop, hip-hop was stealthy.
First it played nice by sampling the elder genre, making an intellectual argument for hip-hop’s place in soul’s legacy while also slyly removing its ancestor from the center to the fringe. Later, hip-hop birthed its own class of singers — tough talkers with smooth edges — who did the work of softening that the samples once did while serving up more simpatico subject matter. And, eventually, rappers just cut out the middlemen and began incorporating melody into their verses.
This long road ends at Drake, the biggest hip-hop disrupter of recent years, and also the genre’s biggest star. That the most important rapper of the 2010s is, if you look at him from a different angle, a completely credible R&B singer, is a radical shift and also not much of a surprise.
But something happened to Drake on his way to the top: He bulked up, and began emphasizing muscle over heart. His two 2015 albums were his least tender, suggesting that, at least for now, he’s renouncing his dual citizenship.
And that’s fine, because R&B is no longer taking hip-hop’s assault lying down. Male singers, in particular, are finding new ways to invigorate the genre, and in the case of Bryson Tiller, it’s by holding up a mirror to Drake and using his tricks in reverse.
Mr. Tiller’s debut, “Trapsoul” (TrapSoul/RCA), is perhaps the first truly post-Drake R&B album. Mr. Tiller is a loverman fluent in hip-hop gesture, a soul singer whose cadences privilege rhythm over croon. He even gives himself an alter ego nickname: Pen Griffey.
“Trapsoul,” which was released in October, is a logical response to the years of death throes R&B has been enduring at hip-hop’s hand. Mr. Tiller is thin-voiced but flexible, more in the vein of danceable early 1990s R&B than classic soul. To say he sings like a rapper is no insult — on “Let ’Em Know” and “Exchange,” he basically delivers his own guest rap verses for songs that don’t bother relying on bellow or shout or any of the old-school R&B tricks.
His nods to Drake are both literal and winking. On “Ten Nine Fourteen,” Mr. Tiller thanks him by name, remembering the importance of “the recognition from Drizzy alone,” then adds, “I remember when they slept on me — memory foam,” using the hashtag-rap rhyme pattern that Drake helped popularize. On songs like “502 Come Up,” Mr. Tiller sings and then pulls up short at the end of a bar, leaving a blank space — another Drake tic. And the production on “Trapsoul” is meticulously slurry, taking in the chopped-and-screwed R&B Drake dabbled in four or so years ago and smoothing it out, making it sound like hazy meditation.
These choices would seem to make Mr. Tiller an outsider, but in truth, he’s as close to a centrist as there is in contemporary R&B. His single “Don’t” has been a radio staple the last couple of months, in an environment generally hostile to R&B singers not named the Weeknd. One of the few other R&B singers leaving a similar mark is Jeremih, who released his second album, “Late Nights: The Album” (Def Jam), last month, five years after his first. It’s confident and impressive, and shows off some directions in which R&B can assert its individuality: namely, tempo and texture.
For example, “Pass Dat” could pass for experimental house music — unsurprising, given that Jeremih hails from Chicago, and also because he’s spent large parts of the downtime since his last album collaborating with dance music producers. And “Oui” showcases his uncommonly nasal voice, which, at a slow pace, feels ineffectual but sounds electric and percussive at quicker speeds. There are several songs like those on “Late Nights,” which is a relief, because on the first single from the album, “Planez,” Jeremih was phoning in an R. Kelly impression.
Mr. Kelly, a longtime incorporator of hip-hop attitude into R&B, recently released a new album, “The Buffet,” and when it sold poorly, recorded a video in which he griped that black audiences weren’t properly supporting his music. That may or may not be true, but it overlooks two crucial trends: First, lovers of R&B have been better served by hip-hop than by R&B in recent years, and second, Mr. Kelly is no longer the standard-bearer he once was.
Who’s taken that spot? Chris Brown, of all people. Once a teenage dance whiz and later something of a pariah, Mr. Brown is studious in his appreciation of, and fealty to, post-disco R&B, and some of his finest music has been in this vein. His new album, “Royalty” (RCA), includes “Zero,” an ecstatic song (though with a spiteful core) that’s the sort of lite-funk revival Bruno Mars usually traffics in. But Mr. Brown is, it turns out, a convincing classicist, holding down R&B’s old fort as the genre’s DNA mutates around him.
PND lost
They ain't gonna drop those facts.
Really? I haven't heard any of The Dream's music after his 1st album. Maybe I should peep.