R. Kelly's 'Black Panties' drops to mixed reviews
The reaction to R. Kelly's latest album Black Panties is all over the map. On the one hand, Pulitzer Prize-winner Wesley Morris showered the album with paragraph upon paragraph of adulation. On the other hand, SPIN applied it's "Worst New Music" tag to the album.
I think the divided reaction comes from Kelly having two wildly disparate fan bases: hipsters and young folk who came to Kellz via his campy Trapped In The Closet videos and (sometimes troublingly) see the Pied Piper as an entertaining joke, and genuine R&B fans who connect with Kelly's ability to strip away the pretense of pop music and get down to what we're really all talking about.
Since I consider myself a bit of a bridge between the two groups (I own a copy of 12 Play, but it's on vinyl), I've gathered up a few varied opinions to help you decide whether Black Panties is for you.
You believe in Black Panties because R. Kelly does. He loves, loves, loves having sex. With you. And you. And even you. You're a woman with a vagina, and he adores that. You could be built like Nia Long or built like Mo'Nique - for all the specificity in an R. Kelly song, the woman could be anyone. There's pathology there, for sure. But the music isn't pathological. These are growlingly, mellifluously, purringly sung serenades over mid-tempo, quiet-storm beats. And the woman in his bed - or on his floor, his car hood, or kitchen sink - is neither object nor mere penis receptacle. She is something to live for, something to do, something that, like Kelly himself, needs to be done.
(Seriously, go read Morris' review. It's one of the most excellent pieces of music writing I've seen in 2013.)
After two albums of elegant, old-school stepping music, R. Kelly is back doing the raunch. "Black Panties" (RCA) is a musically detailed, sonically rich porn soundtrack.
The onslaught of bawdy imagery eventually grows tedious, but there's something compelling about witnessing one man's psyche laid so completely bare, a crazed prophet whipped into a frenzy by the ecstasy of his own sin.
...he's less joyous - listless when he'd normally be questing for uplift. Little chemistry bubbles up with guests like Kelly Rowland and Ludacris. Not even 2 Chainz can brighten the somber (if self-assured) ''My Story.'' Of course, it is R. Kelly's story. He just sounds wearier explaining it these days.
Musically, Kelly has never been much of a slouch, and Black Panties is one of his finest works. From the off, the synthesised soul harks back to the glorious TP2.com album (an overlooked masterpiece in itself) and again, Kelly is showing everyone just what he's capable of, mixing the sacred and the profane like no-one else. In 2000, 'Feelin' On Yo Booty' and 'The Greatest Sex' took sex to a near spiritual level, whereas in 2013 he's actively trying to tie the knot with a woman's junk in the he-must-be-taking-the-piss 'Marry The Pussy'. As ever, it's Kelly at his most flippant that gets the headlines - 'Marry The Pussy' and 'Cookie', where we hear a bewildering array of vaginal metaphors, complete with a Cookie Monster impression - when actually, the wealth and depth of Kelly's craft is found elsewhere.
Blunt and crass, 2013's Black Panties is all about selling nostalgia for a bygone age of hard-body sexist black machismo... I have never been more humorously aware of [Kelly]vas a fraud. He just happens to be a skilled and talented one.
Have you heard Black Panties? What do you think?
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