It's funny, for years I've seen all of the hoopla of hip hop being dead but I rarely if ever see anything about R&B being dead...and trust and believe, the R&B that I came up on is definitely dead. It's crazy that the freakiest song back when I was in college was R Kelly's "12 Play" or " Sex Me" but then fast forward 20 years and now we've got R Kelly's "Marry The P-ssy" which in some communities is actually looked at as a love song. In fact, one of my teens actually told me "well at least he wants to marry the p-ssy Mr. Kil" which brings me back to the fact that R&B is DEFINITELY dead. See, back in my days, even the "bad boys" of R&B had romantic songs about falling in love. I mean, BBD's "Tell Me When Will I see Your Smile Again" is STILL one of my fave slow jams to this day! And cats love to throw Jodeci into the freaky category but don't forget these are the same dudes that gave us "Forever My Lady", "Stay", "My Heart Belongs To You", "U & I", etc. Hell, when I first started dating my wife "Come And Talk To Me" was the song that would pop in my head whenever I got around her like it was my theme music! But nowadays EVERYTHING is about f-cking. Not just having sex or making love but f-cking! Which is beyond disheartening for this generation of kids cause they have absolutely no idea what falling in love is but they do know ALL about getting some head tho. But love? Naw...no haps with that one.
Which brings me to the new Jagged Edge album "JE Heartbreak 2." One of the reasons I always rocked with these dudes was because even with the timz and jerseys hip hop steez, they always had dope love songs on tap from "Gotta Be" to "Walked Outta Heaven." These dudes even provided me with the perfect soundtrack for me to propose to my wife with "Let's Get Married." So when I heard that they had something new about to drop, as strange as it may sound I knew these dudes would have sumthin' on tap to bring some love back into game and with that being said I'm all ears. "Heartbreak" sets off with an intro that basically cosigns most of what I just got finished saying about the state of R&B and from there you go into "Future" which is a banger that's EXACTLY what I was expecting from these dudes, "when I look into your eyes, I see my future in you/just like a new born child, I see my future in you" and over the drum break from Marvin's "Sexual Healing" you've got these cats droppin' jewels about how the club ain't the best place to get into a shorty's ear on "Familiar." "Hope" samples Ralph Tresvant's "Do What I Gotta Do" and has them talking about restoring hope for woman in the way they see men, "I hope she just don't see a thug when she sees me/hope she sees all this love that I'm feeling/all I wanna do is, all I wanna do is/came up with this little plan put her hope back in a man", "Things I Do For You" is dope and on "Love Come Down" they flip the classic Al B. Sure's "Rescue Me" sample into another classic JE slow jam.
"It's Been You" breaks down how it is when love's been in front of your face the whole time that you've been looking for it, "Wanna Be (Romeo)" has the fellas wanna be their woman's everything, "I wanna be your romeo and casanova, or settle for being just the one you really know/I wanna be your superman in everything, or settle for ain't that the dude she's messing with" while "Ready" is about coming to grips with the fact that you're ready to be in love. "Make It Clear" has JE letting their women know that they're here for the long haul, "I ain't going nowhere, I stand and deliver/I touch your soul damn good I make you quiver/I'm not the man who's gonna be here til the morning, I'm gonna be here forever and ever, I hope I make that clear", "No Half Steppin" is about steppin' up to the plate and being 100% committed in a relationship and "Posters (We Stay On One)" ends the album on a dope note but the stand out cut of the album for me is "Gettin' Over You." This song is the sole reason that it took me two weeks to listen to the rest of the album after track 9 cause this jawn stayed on repeat for days...not hours, but days! And the funny thing is, it's just JE singing over a chopped up soul loop but damn does this jawn sound good! Sometimes the most minimalistic ish is the stuff that stands out the most and "Gettin' Over You" is a PERFECT example of that! But at the end of the day those JE boys did exactly what I thought they would do which was bring some love and passion back to R&B. Now the trick is gonna be me trying to get my teens to listen to them and not whoever's in the top 10 over at 106 & Park. Yeah, wish me luck on that one...
4 outta 5 mics
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