What’s The 411 Hun?
Making her debut in 1992, Mary J. Blige, with the help of then up-and-coming Uptown Records producer Puff Daddy put out one one of the best albums of all-time. The album, What’s The 411?, fused Blige’s rhythm and blues vocals with Puff Daddy’s hip-hop beats and became one of the major influencers for the contemporary r&b genre.
The album kicks off with “Leave a Message,” which has many of the the '90s biggest Hip-Hop/R&B musicians featured. The messages left are congratulations for Blige’s What’s The 411? album, yet it is the very first song on the album. Erik Sermon of EPMD, Kool DJ Red Alert. Heavy D, and C.L. Smooth are amongst the musicians who “leave a message” for Blige.
“Don’t you feel the magic? The mystery’s in the air,” Blige sings on “Reminisce.” The song truly has a bizarre beginning, it sounds as if Mary is singing alone in a room, and then pianos and bells drops into the track, giving it an eerie feel. During the intro, drums are introduced through a hard beat drop which carries out every four bars; this aids the song to becoming more uptempo and different than most R&B tracks from the early '90’s.
“Real Love,” is one of Blige’s best known hits to date, to no surprise why. “Real Love,” takes the concept of love which is universal and resonates with all of us. The song at the time was Blige’s highest charting record, as the song had and still has traits that make playback repeatable. The track’s drums are upbeat and are heavily influenced by new-jack swing, which was prominent at the release of What’s The 411?. Blige flexes her vocals over a beat that originally was rapped over by Audio Two. The piano on “Real Love” perfectly compliments the track, besides Blige’s singing, the piano is the only instrument that makes the song a fusion of genres and not just a Hip-Hop song.
The very next track is “You Remind Me,” this track shares a lot of the same element as the previous tracks “Reminisce” and “Real Love,” yet it shines in its own way. The chorus makes it hard to forget the name of the song, let alone what the song is about. Blige sings about how this particular person reminds her of a former lover and uses synonyms for the word “remind” to convey how she is feeling about this person. Blige uses the words “deja vu” and “memory,” to create the constant reminder through the song that she is also constantly reminded.
“Intro Talk” has Busta Rhymes from Leaders of The New School, giving Mary J. Blige a break and taking us “on a journey of overwhelming listening pleasure Hip hop oriented essence…” This track serves as the albums’ interlude, and to show how excited other artists are by What’s The 411? Busta not only gives Blige props on the album, but gets so excited that he starts rapping and has to calm himself down. Busta speaks on behalf of Blige and tells listeners that while the first half of the album was great, the second half is going be just as good.
Blige shows heart and plenty of skills when it comes to singing a cover of Chaka Khan’s “Sweet Thing.” The beat is pitched up and the tempo is slightly faster than Khan’s version, yet the vocals that Blige showcased are on par with some of the greatest singers of all time. Many artists fail at covering legendary artists’ songs, but Blige rising to the challenge only proved that she had her star potential.
Revisiting an earlier theme of love, Mary J. Blige sings “loving you… that’s all I want to do,” on “Love No Limit.” This song is one of the more traditional R&B songs on the entire album, barely utilizing any Hip-Hop aspects throughout its five minute duration.
Continuing with the love theme, K-Ci from Jodeci joins Blige on the slow jam, “I Don’t Want to Do Anything,” which has the signature Jodeci feel and sound to it, the echoes add a strong depth to the song. Both K-Ci and Blige have strong vocals and they compliment each other perfectly.
“Slow Down” continues the second half of the album showing how Blige is can be a pure R&B artist on top of the Hip-Hop fusion. The chorus on this song is special as Blige shows off high and low vocal pitches when holding notes, on each of the three choruses, Blige, hits/holds different notes.
Blige continues to show versatility on “My Love,” where she does a rap/sing combo. There is no doubt that this would fall under the Hip-Hop/R&B blend that Blige perfected. Mary’s lyrics are basic on this song, yet still effective, as she repeatedly asks “whatcha gonna do now that my love is gone away from you.”
“Was it that hard for you to show me some attention?” Blige asks on “Changes I’ve Been Going Through.” The instrumental has a lot of kicks, rapid shakes/drums in the background, and the uptempo beat makes for a solid new jack swing R&B infusion. Blige doesn’t show off much range here, she relatively maintained the same vocal pitch throughout.
Grand Puba of Brand Nubian asks “Yo what’s the 411 hun?” to which Blige responds “I got it going on hun.” “What’s the 411?” is the perfect cap to a great album, the album opens with congratulations and then the album ends with a gem of a song. Blige raps, sings, and wraps the album proclaiming her arrival. Blige answers Puba’s question by responding that she’s the 411.
What’s The 411? is an excellent album, and is even more impressive to me because it is a debut album, this album changed music and found a way to combine two genres so perfectly while maintaining a strong project throughout.
