In the 1970s, male artists such as Sly Stone, Marvin Gaye, Stevie Wonder and Curtis Mayfield ushered in a new wave of soul music: at once experimental and accessible, it was both personal and socio-politically aware.
More recently, it has been women - Mary J Blige, Jill Scott, Alicia Keys, Lauryn Hill and Erykah Badu - who have picked up the "conscious soul" mantle. Badu's fourth album, New Amerykah, continues that tradition just fine. Ostensibly part one of a series, it is as quirkily ambitious as its full title suggests; part state-of-the-nation address, part trawl through this visionary musician's brain.
You get a glimpse into what's on Badu's mind on the sleeve: crawling around her afro are foetuses, dollar signs, clenched fists, weapons, syringes, handcuffs and flowers. The music, aided by legendary jazz vibraphonist Roy Ayers and DJ/rapper/producer Madlib among others, is a similarly wild and free mix of laidback soul, horn-drenched blaxploitation funk, strange FX, and urgent, modernistic R&B, while Badu's lyrics have the feel of a coffee house poetry session and range from self-debunking autobiography to direct social commentary. New Amerykah is like a latter-day cross between Sly's devastatingly enervated There's a Riot Goin' On and Marvin's classic of hard-times positivity, What's Going On.
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