Jaded, My Tummy

I haven't gone to bed yet (it's 7:37AM right now); just reading and thinking and reading and writing and more thinking. So, I decided I will post my top albums of 2016 up. Why the fuck not? I've been working on it and finalized it earlier this morning. My list reminds me that, despite having expanded my tastes in music over the last 10 years beyond just hip hop, jazz, and R&B, I still am pretty much beholden to that holy trifecta of contemporary black music. My list. In order. For your eyes (all 10 of you, LOL):

1. Solange - A Seat at the Table
2. Radiohead - A Moon Shaped Pool
3. Jack DeJohnette/Matthew Garrison/Ravi Coltrane - In Movement
4. Kaytranada - 99.9%
5. Beyonce - Lemonade
6. Kendrick Lamar - untitled. unmastered.
7. Jeff Parker - The New Breed
8. ScHoolboy Q - Blank Face LP
9. Josef Leimberg - Astral Projections
10. Common - Black America Again
11. dvsn - SEPT 5TH
12. Anderson .Paak - Malibu
13. James Blake - The Colour in Anything
14. Elzhi - Lead Poison
15. Maxwell - blackSUMMERS'night

Honorable Mentions:
Esperanza Spalding - Emily's D+Evolution
Theo Croker - Escape Velocity
Vince Staples - Prima Donna EP
Vijay Iyer/Wadada Leo Smith - A Cosmic Rhythm With Each Stroke
Rihanna - ANTI
Yussef Jamaal - Black Focus
Jamire Williams - /////EFFECTUAL

I really, really wanted Emily's D+Evolution in the list instead of in HMs, but I guess it was not meant to be. Lead Poison might be the most slept-on album of 2016.

Last note: I may do some write-ups for these and post them over on my Medium page. Please check that out.

Arguably one of the greatest writers of our generation, Ta-Nehisi Coates recently tweeted this statement:

Ok. So I'm gonna take the year to try my hand at this fancy book writin' stuff. See y'all in '18. Take us out, Queen... pic.twitter.com/kLISnrMJE9

— Ta-Nehisi Coates (@tanehisicoates) January 2, 2017

Exciting! Does this mean we could be getting another book within the next year or so from the author of the brilliant Between the World and Me (2015)? There has not been any other book in recent memory that I can enjoy each and every single time from re-reading random passages. In the form of a letter to his only son, the book can be difficult to go back and navigate after reading it. But when I do, I get lost, engulfed in his prose — the beautifully crafted, poignant, assured, politically exigent, intellectually biting, bold prose. I don’t need to make the lofty comparison to that great American writer, because another one, Toni Morrison, ever the authority, does so for me and for us, unequivocally: “I’ve been wondering who might fill the intellectual void that plagued me after James Baldwin died. Clearly it is Ta-Nehisi Coates.”

The pursuit of knowing was freedom to me, the right to declare your own curiosities and follow them through all manner of books. I was made for the library, not the classroom. The classroom was a jail of other people's interests.

Jamire Williams is my favorite jazz drummer, bar none, and I'd say he's arguably in the Top 3 of jazz drummers in America. Truly exceptional.

The first time I discovered him was on Christian Scott's Yesterday You Said Tomorrow (2010). His drumming on there, especially on album opener "K.K.P.D.," really cements together on the LP Scott's musical ideas. Williams' imaginative use of his drum kit and his myriad senses of rhythm—unorthodox syncopation, gutter boom-bap kicks, diffusive cadences, malleable fluctuations of space-time—drew me in. But what made me a fan and convinced me that he become my favorite was hearing him perform as part of pianist/composer Robert Glasper's trio. Recorded live at the Village Vanguard in December 2010, Williams sounds like art. And that is no mere trope—he is captivating. Every lick, every brush, every roll, every hi-hat tap, every strike of his calibrated snares feels like the masterful deliberation of a painter's impressionistic brush strokes, ethereal beauty in motion. I can palpably sense the three-dimensional space he's creating inside the Village Vanguard, and my mind. So, when I read this recent interview with Bandcamp where Williams states, "It’s high art to me. I look at myself as a painter on the drums," it strongly bolstered my thoughts on him.

A lot of time has passed since Solange's A Seat at the Table was released in September, and much has been said about it already. However, ASATT is near the top of many year-end lists, including being #1 on Pitchfork's Top 50 of 2016. So, maybe we'll start talking about it again. Anyways, I want to review individual songs from ASATT here, as many as I can, to get myself back into the exercise of reviewing music. The reviews will be more whatever-the-fuck-comes-out-of-me type writing, because I really need to get these ideas out of my head. I haven't reviewed any music in probably like 3 or 4 years. I didn't intend for this to sound so "English major-y," but here we go:

Rating:

Fall in your ways, so you can crumble
Fall in your ways, so you can sleep at night
Fall in your ways, so you can wake up and rise

Solange repeats this chorus three times to open ASATT. Its drum work understated, its bass cradling Solange's every word, "Rise" is meticulous, a soft preparation for the journey Solange has for you. Her empathy conveys thoughtfulness, tenderness, and her motives are sincere, galvanizing, compelling. She's like a wise, warmhearted mother tucking in her loved one, comforting you, telling you that failing and falling down are inevitable. The foundation Solange sets is preparing for the quiet storm to come. Using the song's calming tone—single-strike, closed hi-hat, atmospheric synths, delicate keys—to soothe your inner scars and bruises, Solange wants you to be attentive and pensive in mood. "Rise" is the salve before you even start. She empowers, encourages, and pushes us from the nest to explore on our own, to "Walk in your way, so you can wake up and rise," with our identity, our blackness, our humanity in tow but laid bare in front of us. It's what a mother does. And it's what Solange does, bracing us all for A Seat at the Table.