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Tag: Stevie Wonder

  • They Put Me In The Mix – Jam Slow

    My MHW brothers have been putting up mix tapes. I’m not really a big mix tape guy, except when it comes to slow jams. I think I’ve always connected better with slow jams. I’ve noticed that artists use slower songs to communicate real issues or possible heartbreak or happiness much better than in faster songs. I guess the reason to have faster songs is much different and when you’re making the crowd dance, they probably don’t care what you have to say. But with slower songs, it’s different. Artists emote biographically through their music as it is, and I think they do so more during slower songs.

    When I was about 20 years old, I started making mix tapes of slow songs. I especially enjoyed the love songs. Call me soft or whatever. But just singing about love is inspiring. The first tape I created was called Jam Slow. Yep, that’s the title on the old cassette tape. I didn’t want to call it Slow Jams, so I went the other way.

    I’ve always had an idea on what I wanted to do with these tapes. I never just wanted to throw a bunch of songs on a tape and go with it. I looked at how artists told stories with their songs. They fit into a few buckets. There are the courting type songs, the early love songs, the “we have a future together”songs, the marriage songs, and the most famous of them all, the break up songs. I put them in order, not by artist necessarily, but by what the content was in each song. The first songs would be the courting songs, and then next would be the early love kind of songs that would then segue into real relationship songs. After that, the break-up songs would come in, and then the “get back” songs, and usually at the end, I saved either the marriage songs or the songs about starting a family. I did this with all the impending tapes as well. Now before you start to notice how weird I am, I’ll get right to the music.

    Look At Those Outfits

    Jam Slow (circa 1996/97)

    1. Falling – Montell Jordan
    2. Knocks Me Off My Feet – Tevin Campbell
    3. For Your Love – Stevie Wonder
    4. Down Low (Nobody Has To Know) – R. Kelly
    5. Nobody – Keith Sweat featuring Athena Cage
    6. Stay Gold – Stevie Wonder
    7. I’m Still In Love With You – New Edition
    8. When Can I See You Smile Again – Bell Biv Devoe
    9. Can You Stand The Rain – New Edition
    10. Never Can Say Goodbye – Jackson 5
    11. How Could You – K-Ci and JoJo
    12. If You Think You’re Lonely Now – K-Ci Hailey
    13. Lately (live version) – Jodeci
    14. Everytime I Close My Eyes – Babyface
    15. The Lady In My Life – Michael Jackson
    16. Love U For Life – Jodeci
    17. The Day – Babyface

    Look At Bob Wear The Bandana Under The Hat

    You can definitely see what kind of music I was listening to at that time. Lots of Jodeci, Steveland, NE, and MJ. I can remember being done with a relationship right around this time (and possibly sooner), but I don’t remember that being a large factor in the songs that I chose to be on the tape, like would happen during other times in my life. Some thoughts on it.

    • Falling by Montell Jordan is really the only song I’ve been able to get into by him. Of course, everybody has heard This Is How We Do It, but Falling is the only place where I’ve been able to truly get into his voice.
    • There are two Stevie Wonder songs on this list but also two Stevie Wonder covers by other artists – Lately and Knocks Me Off My Feet.
    • Stay Gold isn’t really a relationship love song per say, but it’s sort of a universal love song that I’ve always thought was magical.
    • New Edition, BBD, New Edition – I’ve always dug Ricky Bell’s voice.
    • Never Can Say Goodbye is definitely the oldest song on the list, but somehow it sounds just as fresh (at least in 1996) as the others.
    • I probably OD’d a bit on Jodeci at the time, but it was what I was listening to.
    • The Day is the song that probably describes the feeling of immediate fatherhood better than anything else I’ve ever heard.

    Oh such tears of joy, I’ve never known
    I can’t remember
    It’s like a song, I’ve never heard
    I’ve never sung, but know the words

    I’ll be back soon with the next version of Jam Slow. I dropped the Jam and shortened it to J Slow.

  • Yahoo! Presents The Top 20 Albums of All Time…For Real!

    Yahoo!’s music coverage generally leaves a lot to be desired. Their writers are unnaturally obnoxious (even for music crit-types), and they are in the unfortunate position one of my least favorite music writers as one of their main contributors (and because I have a job to protect, I won’t mention his name in public. Besides, he’s not worth it). However, this list of the Top 20 albums of all time was pretty interesting, and I kind of like the method by which this list was created.

    Of course, everyone and their mother can make a list and call it “The Top 20 Albums of All Time” (hey, anyone been reading my list of the 105 Greatest Singles of the Eighties??), but the list compiled by Robert of the Radish (dude, you couldn’t think of a better name) is certainly one of the most scientific lists of this kind.

    Robert took personal opinion out of the equation completely, instead basing his list on several factors: critical acclaim, actual sales figures, Grammy award love (probably the weakest part of his argument, considering that there have been several bands universally acknowledged as the best at what they do that have never won a Grammy…Led Zeppelin and The Who among them, although it doesn’t look like that affected Led Zep too much), and the most interesting component to my eyes, staying power as judged by the average price and availability of used copies of the CD. I found this interesting mainly because I frequent more than my share of used record stores. I’ve shopped for used music in at least five states, and I can say with some authority that there are certain popular titles that you will see in abundance in just about every used record store in America (he mentions Hootie & The Blowfish’s “Cracked Rear View”. I’ll see him and raise him one Matchbox 20’s “Yourself or Someone Like You”, thank you very much), and some that you never see anywhere (ever seen a Beatles studio non-compilation album in a used record store for less than 8 or 9 bucks, if at all? Don’t think so).

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  • Friday Throwback – Part Time Lover

    My Stevie Wonder fanaticism started as a very young child. I can remember my dad playing songs off Hotter Than July and Original Musiquarium Vol. 1 on his record player. I remember that when it was my birthday, he played Happy Birthday. Years later I would learn that the song was created for Martin Luther King Jr. and it was Stevie’s way of saying that his birthday needed to be a National holiday. But it wasn’t until Part Time Lover did I start to seek out and find Stevie. I would listen on the radio and wait for this song to play and record it on my baby boom box. LL would’ve been so proud. I didn’t even know what the song was about. All I knew was that Stevie was cool, with the beads hanging from strands of his hair.

    • We are undercover passion on the run.
    • Chasing love, up against the sun.
    • Why would dude check out that skinny girl’s butt?
    • Is that Grace Jones with a wig?
    • Look at Steve in that hat.
    • I guess two can play the game.
    • I think Luther Vandross helps Stevie by singing back up here.
    • This version of the music video cuts off the beginning where the couple is watching an old movie and the phone rings, but neither answers. Foreshadowing~!
    • But the best part of the beginning is that dude is wearing moccasins with no socks.
    • This video was directed by Bill Parker. I bet he wrapped it up by saying, “Wham!”

    I think that song is something like 22 years old. And Stevie’s still making music today. If you asked me which album I would take on an island with me, it’d probably be one of Stevie’s (Songs In The Key Of Life?), and alongside MJ, he’s one of my two favorite artists of all time.