With a lush tone and assured attitude, Erykah Badu’s debut, 1997’s Baduizm (Kedar), which included the playful single “On & On,” made the singer the neo-soul movement’s Queen Bee. But that was more than a decade ago; despite some respectable stats and a fiercely committed following, Badu has never replicated her initial thrill.
But cool sometimes trumps commercial, and Badu is still flying her freak flag high. New Amerykah, her fourth full-length, is daring even for Badu, at times risky for risk’s sake and as alluringly unconventional as it is imperfect. Working with disparate collaborators like Madlib, The Mars Volta’s Omar Rodriguez-Lopez, and 9th Wonder (on the languid, tangy “Honey”), the album is challenging, fabulously out there, and, maybe sometimes, too hip for its own good.
The first of a proposed trilogy, it’s drenched in a ’70s acid-rock aura/afro-sheen vibe—a spacious, heady brew of trippy guitars, keyboards, and steady beats. Think New Birth, Funkadelic, an ankh, and a nickel bag. You can hear it on the atmospheric mélange of “The Healer,” its dashes of dub, Arabic tonalities and xylophones transforming what could have been convoluted into an otherworldly experiment. Dedicated to the late producer J Dilla, it sets the stage for the standout “Amerykahn Promise,” a remake of the 1978 Roy Ayers song of the same name that bumps with a fatback bass line. For Badu, some of this is familiar turf. What’s different is that her signature bitter-lemon jazzisms have been replaced by stacked, full-throated vocals.
Still, it’s not all love. Badu’s boho priestess shtick still sounds, if not calculated, at least labored-over (“Soldier”). And on “Master Teacher,” she confuses selfexpression with ego. For every exploration, there’s an unstructured vamp that goes, yes, on and on. It’s doubtful Badu worries her music is increasingly less accessible—indeed, New Amerykah might be what wanting off a major label sounds like. Not necessarily a bad thing.
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