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People will write about the element of surprise in the album drop, but make no mistake - this has been a long time coming. Questlove, who worked closely with the singer on Voodoo, continuously suggested that the album was close to done.Īnd now it’s done: Questlove debuted it at a listening session in New York City. (A tough predicament to be sure, but a predicament that plagues every female performer every day, and they somehow manage to keep putting out albums.) He went into rehab. He struggled with his new status as a sex symbol after the “Untitled” video. The rest of the D’Angelo story has been well documented.

The man never wanted to be out front on his records, so it’s not a surprise that he struggled with a world that wanted to put him on the top of R&B’s pyramid. In a way, these vocals also foreshadowed D’Angelo’s disappearance. Done correctly, this has a tantalizing, bewitching effect, and Voodoo’s influence is still rippling outward you can hear it on Frank Ocean’s Channel Orange, Beyonce’s “Rocket,” and Jessie Ware’s “Kind Of… Sometimes… Maybe.”ĭ’Angelo’s ‘Black Messiah’ Out at Midnight Tonight: Track List Revealed & Title Explained

Unlike Marvin Gaye, Al Green, or Luther Vandross, this artist favored layers of vocals stacked in subtle, unpredictable formations. Voodoo came out in January of 2000, and it stretched and expanded his palette - emphasizing guitar and horns courtesy of a loose-knit, funk-heavy band full of all-star players.Īt the same time, D’Angelo submerged his voice, shrinking away from the powerful lead vocal that distinguishes the classic soul-men. After that, the singer holed up in New York City’s Electric Lady Studios for five years. He released Brown Sugar in 1995, an album that mingled keyboard-driven soul with hip-hop’s powerful beats. It’s hard to think of any artist whose release schedule has been more infrequent: the man has put out just two albums in close to 20 years.

Is D’Angelo Finally Releasing a new Album? Singer Announces Listening Session for ‘Black Messiah’įew singers are as mercurial as D’Angelo, and few singers attract the same level of reverence.