After The Fact
Music is a soundtrack to life - ever changing, advancing, revising, revisiting, abandoning. I value initial impressions and early immersions, but more often I find insight and worth in considering music after it has been lived with and adjusted. Of course, all this could just be my excuse for not really reviewing or addressing "the album of albums" from last year - Outkast's Speakerboxxx/The Love Below. Now that I've had five months or so to break it in (oh, and it won some polls and Grammys and stuff in the meantime), I figure its as cooked as it will get (I mix metaphors like I'm melting Velveeta/Straight from the microwave, too hot to eat, yeah).
I really think most of The Love Below is shit. It's highs absolutely soar - the doubts amidst the joyous noise of "Hey Ya!"; the hopefulness of "Prototype" (which, to my mind, sounds like some sort of hybrid of Jeff Buckley and Cameo); the slutty near cha-cha grind of "Spread"; the (gasp!) skits "God" and "Where Are My Panties?" However, things go horribly, undeniably wrong. "Roses really smell like boo-boo"? I keep hearing comparisons to "Sign 'O' The Times", but I hear more eighties electro-funk like the aforementioned Cameo. "Behold A Lady" sounds like an outtake from She's Strange, but not in a good way. I just can't get into the spiral of narcissistic obsession and retro-retreads that is the second half of The Love Below.
Speakerboxxx isn't all gold stars either. However, for what I assume are thematic reasons, Big Boi's disc gets the one culture bomb concocted by the self-styled funkateers: "Ghettomusick". I brought this up in my singles post (which, excepting the Maroon 5, I stand by):
Speakerboxxx is another step on the trail blazed by Aquemini and Stankonia; perhaps not as big a step (seeing as it is one not two), but a further evolution. The Love Below is a step to the side, and in many ways a look back. If Andre can learn from the rich and mostly untapped heritage of eighties funk and soul instead of aping it (even if it is out of love), the slight change of paths may make the road ahead wider and richer.
I really think most of The Love Below is shit. It's highs absolutely soar - the doubts amidst the joyous noise of "Hey Ya!"; the hopefulness of "Prototype" (which, to my mind, sounds like some sort of hybrid of Jeff Buckley and Cameo); the slutty near cha-cha grind of "Spread"; the (gasp!) skits "God" and "Where Are My Panties?" However, things go horribly, undeniably wrong. "Roses really smell like boo-boo"? I keep hearing comparisons to "Sign 'O' The Times", but I hear more eighties electro-funk like the aforementioned Cameo. "Behold A Lady" sounds like an outtake from She's Strange, but not in a good way. I just can't get into the spiral of narcissistic obsession and retro-retreads that is the second half of The Love Below.
Speakerboxxx isn't all gold stars either. However, for what I assume are thematic reasons, Big Boi's disc gets the one culture bomb concocted by the self-styled funkateers: "Ghettomusick". I brought this up in my singles post (which, excepting the Maroon 5, I stand by):
The craziest single by a major artist that I can remember. At least three different songs are merged into this genre busting techno/soul/rapalicious spectacular. Nothing prepared me for hearing this song for the first time - Stankonia, masterpiece that it is, did not clue me in to this possibility.Yet Speakerboxxx keeps the bar fairly high, with "Unhappy", "Bowtie", "The Rooster", "Knowing" and "Reset"; all of which stand up well in comparison to best of The Love Below. It fails too - the tracks featuring guests outside of the Dungeon Family crew ("Tomb of the Boom" and "Flip Flop Rock") are particularly purge-worthy - but it fails by reaching out too far (see "War") instead of reaching in.
Speakerboxxx is another step on the trail blazed by Aquemini and Stankonia; perhaps not as big a step (seeing as it is one not two), but a further evolution. The Love Below is a step to the side, and in many ways a look back. If Andre can learn from the rich and mostly untapped heritage of eighties funk and soul instead of aping it (even if it is out of love), the slight change of paths may make the road ahead wider and richer.
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