It's official!!!!! Mixtape Maestro and 90's R&B Junkie are making the move to Wordpress!!! I've already found a host and I'm currently knee-deep in designing the new digs. Give me a few days to figure out feed changes, importing business, and other blog-shuffling duties and it'll be up and running. Thanks so much for all the positive feedback within the past week. It's enough to bring tears to this lowly blogger's eyes. See you soon on the otherside!!! -Mixtape Maestro
Album: The Comfort Zone (Wing; 1991) Songwriters: O'Kelly Isley, Ronald Isley and Rudolph Isley R&B Peak Position: #3 "You might as well get used to me coming home a little late" Two years after raising brows with their 1971 covers set Givin' It Back (home to some amazing reconfigurations of tunes by James Taylor, Neil Young, Jimi Hendrix and Bob Dylan, amongst other surprising sources), The Isley Brothers capped off their four-year tenure at Buddah Records with [...]
Album: Tical 2000: Judgement Day (Def Jam; 1998) Songwriters: Samuel Barnes, D'Angelo, J.C. Olivier and Clifford Smith R&B Peak Position: #29 "You and I/ Until the day we die..." Though the late '90's reigned with Puff Daddy & Co.'s "shiny suit"-friendly, disco-sampling hip-pop, there remained a heavy hunger for rap's more rugged entities, most notably the anti-mainstream antics of the Wu-Tang Clan and it's many off-shoot solo acts. Focal member Method Man helped satisfy that hankering when he finally released 1998's apocalypse-obsessed Tical 2000: Judgement [...]
Album: New Beginning (Elektra; 1996) Songwriters: Tracy Chapman R&B Peak Position: #35 "This youthful heart can love you/ And give you what you need" Beyond hardcore fans, not too many people were checking for a new Tracy Chapman album by the mid-nineties. The folk/ soul singer-songwriter with the minimalist quiver of a voice and message-heavy songbook had become an industry sensation and college-age staple after the release of her 1988 eponymous debut and it's somber, poverty-themed breakaway smash, "Fast Car" . But while successive albums [...]
Album: The Brand New Heavies (Delicious Vinyl; 1991) Songwriters: Brand New Heavies R&B Peak Position: #3 "Evergreen.../ Growin up but fadin' never/ This is what our love became..." Formed in London, England in the mid-80's, The Brand New Heavies (drummer/ keyboardist Jan Kincaid, guitarist Simon Bartholomew, and bassist/ keyboardist Andrew Levy) was originally constructed as an instrumental unit who exercised in an intoxicating soul and dance fusion known as "acid jazz". After years of earning rave reviews in their native UK, the band turned their attention to impacting [...]
Album: The Brand New Heavies (Delicious Vinyl; 1991) Songwriters: Brand New Heavies R&B Peak Position: #3 "Evergreen.../ Growin up but fadin' never/ This is what our love became..." Formed in London, England in the mid-80's, The Brand New Heavies (drummer/ keyboardist Jan Kincaid, guitarist Simon Bartholomew, and bassist/ keyboardist Andrew Levy) was originally constructed as an instrumental unit who exercised in an intoxicating soul and dance fusion known as "acid jazz". After years of earning rave reviews in their native UK, the band turned their attention to impacting [...]
Album: Ain't No Shame In My Game (Epic; 1990) R&B Peak Position: #5 "Hard as rock, yes I'm no sucka/ The boots I knock make me one bad mutha..." R&B singer Betty Wright had everyone looking back fondly on their awkward "first times" when she zoomed up the charts in the fall of 1978 with the cherished losing-virginity ode "Tonight Is The Night". While it had originally premiered four years prior as a B-side, "Tonight" became it's most popular when it was re-released as an extended, eight-minute-plus live [...]
Album: Love Jones- The Music (Sony/ Columbia; 1997) Songwriters: Lauryn Hill R&B Peak Position: #2 (Airplay Only) "Excuse me if I get too deep" The success of The Fugees' remake of "Killing Me Softly" only strengthened the long-held opinion that star member Lauryn Hill needed to drop a solo album, pronto . It wasn't that her co-Refugees weren't as necessary as her, there just was this underlying feeling that if given the opportunity to express herself without the requisite interruptions of her groupmates, the results would [...]
Album: Yardcore (Delicious Vinyl; 1997) Songwriters: Salaam Remi R&B Peak Position: #60 "I send you my love/ With a dozen roses/ Make sure that you knows it's/ From the bottom of my heart..." Seamlessly fusing hip hop, reggae, dancehall and R&B, Born Jamericans (smooth crooner Notch and rugged voiced ragga MC Edley Shine) achieved international cult fandom over the course of two mid-90's albums with 'head-appreciated tracks like "Boom Shak-A-Tack" and "Yardcore" ). However, there would be less of a street-centric emphasis on their final charting single, [...]
Album: Q's Jook Joint (Qwest; 1995) Songwriters: Rod Temperton R&B Peak Position: #19 Today we have DJ Khaled and the like rounding up anybody and everybody on a single record; back in the '90's, the top posse cut maestro was Quincy Jones , the multi-award winning music legend whose personal phone book bulged with the names of the biggest and brightest of Hollywood past and present. For 1995's star-studded Q's Jook Joint , as he had done on '89's Grammy Award-winning Back On The Block [...]
Album: Da Real World (The Goldmind Inc./ Elektra; 1999) Songwriters: Missy Elliott and Tim Mosley R&B Peak Position: #30 "She's a bitch/ When I do my thing/ Got the place on fire, burn it down to flames" By 1999, Missy Elliott and Timbaland were mad. Since introducing their collaborative attack of Y3K urban-pop wizardy and oft-kilter lyricism only a few years prior, they had influenced nearly an entire industry of copycats. Suddenly it seemed like everybody was singing, rapping or rocking out to double-time beats and [...]
Album: Doggystyle (Death Row; 1993) Songwriters: Harry Wayne "K.C." Casey, Dr. Dre, Richard Finch and Snoop Dogg Peak Position: #13 "So what you wanna do? (sheeeit)/ I got a pocket full of rubbers and my homeboys do too" Ahhh...girl watching. To the dismay of girlfriends and wives everywhere, it's a favorite pasttime (Hell, "currenttime" and "futuretime) for men all around the globe. It also served as a theme for one of the biggest hits from late-'70's/ early-'80's soul/ funk masters Slave . Formed in Ohio in 1975, [...]
Album: Look How Long (MCA; 1990) Songwriters: Trevor Jacobs, Phillip Linton, Carl McIntosh, Kenny Nicholas and Sunay Suleyman R&B Peak Position: #10 "Don't be a fool/ Don't throw your life away/ Don't be a fool/ Don't waste your life away" Loose Ends, the London-formed trio of keyboardist Steve Nichol, guitarist Carl McIntosh and singer Jane Eugene, reigned on both side of the Atlantic in the mid-to-late-'80's with their unique brand of British-soul. After becoming the first UK band to top the American R&B charts with the 1985 single "Hangin' [...]
Album: Faith (Bad Boy/ Arista; 1995) Songwriters: Faith Evans Peak Position: #4 "I remember ttthhheee way/ You used...to love...meeee" Prior to being crowned as Bad Boy Records' "First Lady", Faith Evans had already made some headway in the industry behind-the-scenes, penning tunes and singing background on albums from Hi-Five , Mary J Blige and Usher . With her established songwriting chops, an enchanting voice that mashed influences from the worlds of gospel, soul and jazz and the Bad Boy hit-making team behind her, it [...]
Album: Portrait (Capitol; 1992) Songwriters: Portrait R&B Peak Position: #3 "Heeeeeere weeee gooooo/ Going through the same thing..." "New Jack Swing" birthed the careers of many, most of whom faded in popularity once the music fad had run it's course. One of these temporarily hot acts was Portrait, a male vocal quartet whose members hailed from all over the country. Signed to Capitol Records, Portrait might not have been the most distinctive R&B boy band out (though they did write and produce most of their own material), but a house [...]
Album: Azz Izz (Outburst/ RAL/ Island; 1995) Songwriters: Hami, MoKenStef, Prince and Roger Troutman R&B Peak Position: #2 "You may have had him once but I got him all the time" Los Angeles trio MoKenStef may have had one of the most unusual monikers in girl group history (it smashed together the first syllables in the names of members Monifa Bethune, Kenya Hadley and Stephanie Sinclair), but that didn't stop them from gaining some serious ground in the summer of 1995 with the memorable man-claimer "He's Mine". [...]
Album: Peaceful Journey (Uptown/ MCA; 1991) Songwriters: Kenny Gamble, Heavy D & The Boyz and Leon Huff R&B Peak Position: #5 "Now that we found love/ What are we gonna do...with i-i-i-t" Snuggled in between the powerful social and political commentary that made The O'Jays ' 1973 album Ship Ahoy a magnum opus of not only Philly soul and R&B, but rock & roll in general, album cut "Now That We Found Love" might not have garnered as much attention as it's LP [...]
Album: One In A Million (Blackground/ Atlantic; 1996) Songwriters: Missy Elliott and Tim Mosley R&B Peak Position: #12 (Airplay Only) "I'm writin' you...a love letter tonight/ You better keep watch cause the mailman's comin'..." The third release from Aaliyah's classic sophomore opus, "4 Page Letter" continued the subdued and slinky aural seduction that One In A Million 's previous singles, "If Your Girl Only Knew" and "One In A Million" , had satisfyingly forged. Opening with the singer's memorable vocal booth request to "turn [...]
Album: 112 (Bad Boy/ Arista; 1996) Songwriters: Arnold Hennings, Daron Jones, Michael Keith, Quinnes Parker, Marvin Scandrick and Courtney Sills R&B Peak Position: #2 "Cuuuuu-pid doesn't lie/ But you won't know unless you give it a try..." 112 might have ruled the summer of '96 with "Only You" and it's classic, Biggie-blessed remix , but, somewhat surprisingly, it wasn't the biggest single to emerge from the Atlanta quartet's eponymous debut. Instead that honor went to third single "Cupid", a pillowy-soft love ballad mostly remembered [...]
Album: Surprise (Mercury; 1991) Songwriters: Neal Conway and Crystal Waters Peak Position: #25 "La da dee, la doo daa/ La da dee, la doo daa..." Yearning for a socially-conscious message in your workout dance music? Philly's Crystal Waters had the answer in her debut single, 1991's head-scratcher of a hit, "Gypsy Woman (She's Homeless)". Matching a ridiculously catchy organ refrain with a hard-hitting club pulse, this house classic would've been given heavy recognition on it's instrumental alone. But Waters brought something quite unexpected to the table [...]
Mixtape Maestro Presents: 90's R&B Junkie
Lana Del Rey - Without You (Kill Paris Remix) [Dubstep]
Download: James Blake Live Album (Unofficial)
My Funny Valentines
Miike Snow - “Paddling Out” Jacques Lu Cont Remix (MP3 Stream)
Iron & Wine and Patty Griffin
