How D’Angelo became a superstar to the mainstream with ‘Voodoo’, and then retreated from it soon after
Looking back on one of the greatest albums of the 2000s in its 20th year of existence
In the mid-1990s, R&B took a big shift into the mainstream. Its soulful sounds were being merged with the grittier Eastcoast hip-hop inspired sounds. This new subgenre was termed as contemporary R&B and it helped bring hip-hop and R&B to the masses. Mary J Blige’s My Life (1994), Mariah Carey’s Daydream (1995), and R Kelly’s R. (1998) were all major successes on the charts, with each getting multiple platinum certifications.
During this period, a young D’Angelo was working his way through the R&B scene. After impressing record executives through a demo tape, D’Angelo (born Michael Eugene Archer) signed a publishing deal with EMI Music in 1991. His first success came in 1994 when he co-wrote and co-produced the song “U Will Know” for R&B supergroup Black Men United, which featured the likes of Usher, R. Kelly, and Boyz II Men just to name a few. The single was not only featured on the soundtrack to the movie Jason’s Lyric (1994) but peaked at number 5 on the Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Singles & Tracks and number 28 on the Billboard Hot 100. The success of the single created a buzz around D’Angelo.
“The thing about writer’s block is that you want to write so fucking bad, [but] the songs don’t come out that way. They come from life. So you’ve got to live to write.” — D’Angelo
That same year D’Angelo began working on what would become his debut album. A year later, D'Angelo released Brown Sugar in 1995. The album was a success, earning a platinum certification and a few hit singles in “Lady”, “Brown Sugar” and “Crusin”, a cover of a Smokey Robinson song. The success put D’Angelo in the spotlight and his Brown Sugar album brought the neo-soul movement recognition. The sky seemed to be the limit for D’Angelo, and many would have expected more music to come soon.
But something else happened. D’Angelo took a four and half year absence from the music scene. After a two-year tour promoting his debut album, D’Angelo found himself suffering from writer's block. D’Angelo would later comment on this period saying “The thing about writer’s block is that you want to write so fucking bad, [but] the songs don’t come out that way. They come from life. So you’ve got to live to write.” However, he did not stop making music, he just didn’t write it.
Instead, he produced a series of covers of songs by his musical heroes such as Marvin Gaye and Prince. During this period, fellow neo-soul artists Eryka Badu and Maxwell would release the albums Baduzim (1997) and Urban Hang Suite (1996) respectively, and find commercial success too.
“He’d get angry and start breaking shit. The audience thinking, ‘Fuck your art, I wanna see your ass!’, made him angry.” — Questlove
D’Angelo also sang the duet “Nothing Even Matters” with Lauryn Hill for her debut album The Miseducation Of Lauryn Hill (1998). The album was a huge success, selling 8 million copies in the US, and 19 million worldwide. The album even won a Grammy for album of the year. Like D’Angelo’s Brown Sugar, it brought neo-soul to the mainstream, but on a much bigger scale. Her album almost singlehandedly propelled neo-soul to the forefront of popular music and turned Lauryn Hill into an international superstar.
However, much like D’Angelo after his album release, Lauryn Hill disappeared from the music scene not long after hers. She, like D’Angelo, completed a tour for her album and then moved away from the spotlight, never to fully return as many had hoped. However, this would not be the end of neo-soul’s popularity, and a young and inspired man from Richmond, Virginia would soon go back to the studio to record his second album.
Not long after beginning to record his next album, D’Angelo gave birth to his first child Michael with his then-girlfriend, R&B singer Angie Stone. This birth proved to be an inspiration for him to write music again. He traveled back to his hometown and emersed himself with the African American music that inspired him to be an artist. He would also release his first live album Live at the Jazz Cafe (1998).
D’Angelo would collaborate with a wide variety of musicians whilst recording his next album, with The Roots drummer and producer Ahmir “Questlove” Thompson being D’Angelo’s “co-pilot”. Both men were also members of a group known as the Soulquarians, an experimental neo-soul, and hip hop collective that featured artists such as Erykah Badu, Common, Q-Tip, and Mos Def. Recordings of the album took place at New York’s Electric Lady Studios, a recording studio commissioned by rock musician Jimi Hendrix in 1970. Production of the album was fairly lax, with fellow Soulquarians Erykah Badu and Common working on their albums Mama’s Gun (2000) and Like Water for Chocolate (2000) at the same time as D’Angelo’s album.
The sessions for D’Angelo’s album brought guests not only from the Soulquarians but outsiders such as producer Rick Rubin, comedian Chris Rock and British blues-rock guitarist Eric Clapton. D’Angelo previewed songs for them, and all were impressed. On January 25, 2000, D’Angelo would release his second album, titled ‘Voodoo’. The album included a loose grove and jam-based funk-soul sound that also incorporated hip-hop sounds.
The album was a commercial and critical success, debuting at number one on the Billboard 200, selling 320,000 copies in its first week. The album’s first single “Devil’s Pie” was featured on the soundtrack to the 1998 movie Belly. The second single “Left & Right” featured rappers, Redman and Method Man. According to the song’s producer of its music video Rich Ford, Jr., the single and its video received little attention due to MTV’s refusal to put the music video in rotation.
The album’s third single “Untitled (How Does It Feel)” was a hit on the charts. The single’s music video featured a shredded D’Angelo naked, lip-syncing to the track. The video received considerable attention and airplay on music video networks and turned D’Angelo into a sex symbol and superstar. Paul Hunter, director of the music video, would later comment and say that the video was made for women. But the success of the single and D’Angelo’s new image would soon prove to be a living nightmare for the artist.
Following the album's release, D’Angelo would embark on a tour promoting the album. Beginning in March 2000, the tour became one of the most viewed tours of 2000. While the tour started well, the repercussions of the “Untitled (How Does It Feel)” music video was beginning to show. During the second half of the tour, screaming female fans would disregard his musical prowess in favour of his physique. They would often call for him to take off his clothes, wanting to see the body he had shown months prior. Some even tossed their clothes at him as he performed. It was Beatlemania on ecstasy, and D’Angelo hated it. Producer and drummer Questlove later said “He’d get angry and start breaking shit. The audience thinking, ‘Fuck your art, I wanna see your ass!’, made him angry.”
This affected D’Angelo both physically and mentally. He didn’t want to be seen as a sex symbol, he wanted to be seen as a musical artist. Early dates of the tour would be cancelled due to D’Angelo suffering a throat infection. Later dates were cancelled due to D’Angelo simply refusing to perform. Questlove would later go into detail about D’Angelo’s insecurities during the tour and say that he had to play cheerleader to D’Angelo.
Shows would take up to an hour and a half to begin if D’Angelo wasn’t physically or mentally prepared. The success of Voodoo, the “Untitled” single and the tour that followed sent D’Angelo into hiding from the public as he had done four years prior. But this second stint would prove to be longer and more severe.
Instead of writer’s block, D’Angelo went into a downward spiral of substance abuse. Following the suicide of a close friend and MTV-affiliate named Fred Jordan in April 2001, D’Angelo started to develop a drinking problem. Plans for a live album and studio album for his backing band Soultronics was scrapped, and executives for Virgin cut funding for what would have been D’Angelo’s 2004 album.
By 2005, his girlfriend had left him, his attorney became upset with him, and most of his family were not in touch with him. D’Angelo was later involved in a car accident and an arrest on DUI and marijuana possession charges. D’Angelo would also leave Virgin records in the same year.
In 2006, Gary Harris, an A&R man who’d first signed D’Angelo in the early 1990s, checked a reluctant D’Angelo into Eric Clapton’s Crossroads Centre rehabilitation clinic in Antigua. However, during this whole period of turmoil, D’Angelo would work on music on and off by himself.
After several rumors and leaks, D’Angelo would finally return by releasing a surprise album at the end of 2014, Black Messiah, 14 years after the release of Voodoo. The album received critical acclaim, as well as commercial success, peaking at number five on the Billboard 200. Not too long after this release, D’Angelo announced plans for a companion piece to Black Messiah.
If there’s one thing we’ve learned about D’Angelo over the years, it's that he works slow, but carefully, and the results are usually worth the wait. Fans were delighted by D’Angelo bouncing back from his personal demons after Voodoo. The question now is, when will D’Angelo release a follow up to Black Messiah? Here’s hoping we don’t have to wait another 14 years!
