The Lost Art of R&B
Take a look at me
Tell me, do you like what you see?
Do you think you can
Do you think you can do me?— Bell Biv DeVoe, Do Me!
Listening to R&B today, there is no camaraderie or the melding between opposite genders. Instead of using funk and disco from the 70s molding into new jack swing and smooth R&B, today’s R&B has lost its soul of the past. As I listen to SZA, Giveon, Summer Walker, or Daniel Caesar, something is missing. Even though they’re pleasant sounds, I never find myself going back to them. Instead, if I want R&B, I immediately go to the eras of the 70s, 80s, 90s, and early 2000s. Why?
My immediate attraction to R&B is groove — the ability to bop with a mixture of a sexual groove, swaying in motion to appease the opposite sex. For example, songs such as “Do Me!” By Bell Biv DeVoe and it doesn’t necessarily have to be strongly sexual; they can be sad like “Can You Stand the Rain” by New Edition. Nevertheless, these songs, although opposite in their context, create the same mixture of sexual grooves to appease the opposite sex. There is a sense of attraction bringing together the two sexes, even if it is a sad song. Songs like Luther Vandross’, “If Only for One Night,” where he yearns just to have one night with the woman he wants, still have the same sexual groove. This is lost today.
This same groove was carried into the early 90s, even if it was sexually vulgar. “Freak Like Me” by Adina Howard is a perfect example of this. Using the G-Funk synth in the background, while the drums clap, she sings smooth vulgarity — simply groovy.
“I want a freak in the mornin’
A freak in the evenin’, just like me
I need a roughneck nigga
That can satisfy me, just for me
If you are that kind of man, ’cause I’m that kind of girl
I got a freaky secret, everybody sing
’Cause we don’t give a damn about a thing”–Adina Howard, “Freak Like Me”
It’s not simply about the messaging; it’s about bringing the two sexes together through groove. Even if it was bashing men like “No Scrubs” by TLC, or bashing women like “Return of The Mack” by Mark Morrison, there was still a groove. Going into the early 2000s, the same sound persisted. Songs like “Be Your Girl” by Teedra Moses, “Be Without You” by Mary J. Blige, “Into You” by Tamia, etc., all had this groove. I could go down the list. The point is that all these songs, no matter the era, have the same bop and sexual groove that is lost today. Most importantly, through 30 years of R&B, they brought the opposite sexes to a similar sound.
Today, this is not the case. The issue with today’s R&B is that it has separated itself from its roots. Unlike rap, where people say it has gone away from its roots, this is not true. If anything, rap has stayed more firmly in its roots. For example, people used to rap on the break part; the break has now turned into beats today. During the break part, rappers would freestyle at parties. Now, when rappers go in, they just go in, just like they used to do during the break part in the late ‘70s.
R&B is not just about dreariness and sadness, and that’s mostly what I get from this music today. It’s sad, lonely, and depressing with no type of bop orientation involved. It’s just dreary and flat. But R&B has fallen completely off from what it was originally. R&B wasn’t always about being sad, and even if it were about being sad, there was a beat that expressed the yearning. You even get songs like “Baby Be Mine” by Michael Jackson. Even though he’s expressing how much he wants this girl, there is still a sense of upbeat prosperity involved. But then you get songs like SZA’s “Good Days,” and it’s boring, sad, and flat.
Flatness is the most important issue because soul is what brings the boring and sad elements alive. When artists sing on flat beats while conveying sadness with a monotonous voice, it creates a double issue. Not only are you listening to something dreary, but there’s also no hope or lightness to lift you out of the sadness. For example, “Like I Want You” by Giveon is a very good song, but it’s problematic when most of his music sounds like that — dreary and sad. Aaliyah had songs like that too, such as “Street Thing,” which was sad, but she also had other songs with a bop, like “Back and Forth” or “Age Ain’t Nothing But a Number.” Giveon doesn’t have anything like that, and R&B is supposed to be soulful, not flat.
Artists like Giveon, H.E.R., and Daniel Caesar are good, but once again, their music is sad. It doesn’t have the variety that R&B had in the 70s, 80s, 90s, and 2000s.
It is lost in the remnants of history, ironically the sadness of R&B today is the yearning for what it was in the past.
It has no soul, and soul is uplifting out of the dreariness that ensues in one’s life, which in R&B is love. There is no hope about love; there is just dreadfulness, flatness, and boringness.
There is an artist that I believe brings the grooviness of R&B — Ari Lennox. Songs that I think do a good representation are “BMO,” “Whipped Cream,” “Static,” “I Been,” and “Pressure.” It has that groove and bop. It brings back soul, funk, and disco fusing it into the perfect blend of her neo-soul aesthetic. But bringing her spin, rather than sounding too much like Erykah Badu. All these songs listed even if they are about heartbreak from another, she consoles herself in the music — it is soulful. To have “soul” in R&B means to be alive and hopeful. For Ari Lennox, she still keeps this up with “Bussit.”, “POF.”, and “Pressure.” — she gets it.
Baby, where you at? (Yeah, yeah)
Never had it quite like that (No, no)
Hour sessions on the mat (Said, baby)
And it’s tatted on my back (It’s tatted) — Ari Lennox,“Tatted.”
But few artists today have the masterful blend of Ari Lennox, she takes you where R&B was and is supposed to be. She’s in the same talk as Aaliyah in regards to the ability to hone the sound of the 90s and bring it to the 2000s. For Ari Lennox, she blends the 90s and 00s into the 2020s. Instead, R&B artists today keep a dreary and flat sound that has not evolved — it has no soul.
