Tuesday, December 09, 2008

My father's favorite group by far is the Temptations. He has all of their music on vinyl and cd from their first release back in 1964, up until their release in 1998. As original members died and left the group, and they were replaced with new members, he began to fall out of favor with the new group. In fact, he barely acknowledges the Temptations from 1998 to now, because as he puts it, "They are the Temptations by name only". So he is perfectly content to play the old cds, which bring a smile to his face no matter how many times he's heard the songs. When my late grandmother was sick, and my father and I had to drive out to Cleveland, we had to listen to the Temptations there and back, and that's it. 5 hours there, 5 hours back, nothing but Temptations. But I respect that.

During that 34 year span that my father was buying their work, there were some releases the Temptations had that my father really was not feeling. He would like one or two songs on there, and the rest he'd just ignore and never play again. I asked him why he still bought the records without knowing how good or bad they were, and he would say, "They are the Temptations, I am a fan, so I bought it". I remember thinking to myself now THAT is dedication holmes. You stick by your group even in the lean years, because they've been good to you in year's past, and you have full and complete confidence that they will emerge from slump they are seemingly stuck in(sorry for ending the sentence in a preposition). Why do I mention this?

My main man Common released a new CD yesterday, and I bought it because I am fan. I've been listening to this man rap for over 16 years, and I buy all of his music without thinking. He's had some cds that I really wasn't feeling, and he's had some cds that I play start to finish over and over again. So last night, I sat down after dinner and listened to all 10 tracks from his new cd, and I only loved one. The rest I found myself saying aloud, "What the hell is going on here". It was as if he made the songs, then put them on the cd without listening to them again, without running them by any type of quality control person. Its the equivalent of someone writing a novel and publishing it without any editor looking it over for errors or making suggestions for improvements. And I can already tell that this is the type of cd, that absolutely will NOT get better with a second listen.

Common is on that short list of artists (Terence Blanchard, Michael Jackson, OutKast, Lalah Hathaway, The Roots) whose music I buy regardless of whether I've heard it or not, and he's the first out of that group to let me down like this. Because of that, he gets a pass for this bullshit I purchased, and since there are rumors that he is reuniting with some of his old producers, I'll keep him on my good list for now. But I can't stress how bad this cd is...

And now here's Common when he was still in my good graces.

Nag Champa (Afrodisiac for the World) - Common

6 comments:

Neil MacLean said...

that's funny, I kind of like it, except for a couple of tracks. What was the one you did like?

rashad said...

i only liked universal mind control. there are others like announcement, inhale and punch drunk love i'm on the fence about.

Jazzbrew said...

Great post. I've got a select few artists that I treat that way too. Terence Blanchard and The Roots - no doubt.

How about that Q-Tip joint? Tribe fell into that category for me before they retired - all of their releases were banging.

rashad said...

jazzbrew,
the Q-tip cd is solid, i suggest picking that up

Anonymous said...

I love universal mind control..i also liked electric circus so eh go figure..

rashad said...

theradleyfiles,
i loved electric circus too..this new one just isn't moving me