Top Five Records © High Fidelity

Lets back away from fine shoes for a moments and return to my other obsession, music. I'm a list monger and circumlocuter. I figured I'd join these seemingly incompatible sides of myself to decide upon my favorite five records by my favorites groups and artists. Let us begin.

These are all in particular order. Let's also pretend that all these songs are snuggled in comfy and mechanically correct quotation marks.


De la Soul
1. Buddy (Native Tongues remix)
2. Oodles of Os
3. Bitties in the BK Lounge
4. I Am I Be
5. Declaration





MF Doom (including aliases)
1. Doomsday
2. All Caps
3. I Hear Voices
4. A Dead Mouse
5. Hoe Cakes






Donny Hathaway
1. I Love You More Than You'll Ever Know
2. Giving Up
3. Lord Help Me
4. I (Who Have Nothing) w/ Roberta Flack
5. Sack Full of Dreams







Bobby Brown
1. Don't Be Cruel
2. On Our Own
3. All Day All Night
4. Rock Wit'cha (remix)
5. Roni






Raheem DeVaughn
1. Mo Betta
2. You (remix)
3. Where I Stand
4. The Idea of Falling in Love
5. Love Drug







Radiohead
1. The Tourist
2. Idioteque
3. Everything In Its Right Place
4. Jigsaw Falling into Place
5. Lucky






TV On The Radio
1. Wear You Out
2. New Health Rock
3. A Method
4. Wolf Like Me
5. Ambulance






Aceyalone
1. Makeba
2. Mr. Outsider
3. The Hold
4. Tweakends
5. Fortitude








Bobby "Blue" Bland
1. Little Boy Blue
2. If You're Gonna Walk on My Love
3. Members Only
4. Stormy Monday Blues
5. Cry, Cry, Cry







Bjork
1. Unravel
2. Bachelorette
3. Hunter
4. I Go Humble
5. Pagan Poetry







Luther Vandross
1. Don't You Know That
2. Better Love
3. Superstar
4. Wait For Love
5. I Can Make It Better







Sam Cooke
1. Bring it on Home to Me
2. That's Where it's At
3. Lord, Remember Me (w/ The Soul Stirrers)
4. I'll Come Running Back to You
5. A Change is Gonna Come







Alexander O'Neal
1. What's Missing
2. All True Man
3. A Broken Heart Can Mend
4. (What Can I say) To Make You Love Me
5. Hearsay

It's Marriage Season

School's almost out, which means a number of things. First, I'll be relaxed sometime in the near future. Second, I'll probably have time to pack on some much-needed pounds. Finally, I'll be blogging again. (Confetti! Sparkling Lights! Silly String! Heavily Oiled Gentlemen in Thongs!) Yes, everyone, the excitement is palpable.

To kick off my return to the webiverse, allow me to pay homage to wedding season. Just a week ago, Afenya, the sister of a high school friend, tied the knot. It was a nice wedding, sweet and all that. Later this summer, another friend, Rachel (shout out!), will be making the big step. All of this has me thinking about wedding songs, tunes perfect for making major commitments, and I came up with a list of epic proportions. Luckily, I'll only include a small slice of that list here.

"Mo Betta" Raheem DeVaughn

This is a relatively new song, but it may be eligible for all time status; only time will tell. Some months ago I raved about Raheem's latest CD Love Behind the Melody. Well it is that same album that contains one of the most moving declarations of r&b love ever. The song is "Mo Betta" and, honestly, it doesn't get much better.



"Can't Go Wrong" O.C.

The year was 1994. Everybody was on Nas's jock, especially my friend Rachel (not the same getting married Rachel mentioned above). I, however, was singing the praises of another Queens rapper, Omar Credle AKA O.C. (People don't name their sons Omar anymore; that's too bad.) I Looooooved Word ... Life. Jewelz, which came out about three years later, was his follow-up and criminally slept on cuz there was this hip hop witch hunt that sought to figuratively hang any rapper who appeared to be going commericial. "Far From Yours" did not help the cause. Too bad, Jewelz was and is damn good and contains one of the best hip hop love songs of all time, "Can't Go Wrong."



"Let No One Separate Us" The Deele

Boy did I love The Deele. Yep, I knew "The Deele before Babyface went solo" © Ras Kass. I even had a crush on Kayo (see: first verse of "Two Occasions"). Anyway, most people don't know that their slow jamming repertoire extends past that and "Shoot 'Em Up Movies." "Let No One Separate Us" is a wonderful concoction of sweet n' sappy 80s.



"Lullaby" Omar Lye-Fook f/ Syreeta

I once had friends. We used to ride around at odd hours of the night doing things octogenarians enjoy like hitting up the 24-hour Super K-Mart, eating at the Squeez (Baker's Square), or hitting up the suburbs just because. On these journeys, we'd listen to tunes on top of tunes. See, at the time, I worked at a slightly snooty, but customer friendly independent music store (Crow's nest employees, stand up!). My friends were music elitists, so our driving soundtracks were allways on point. One particular artists we all enjoyed was the the Brit soulster (that was menat to be funny ... soulster) Omar. Dude had jams. One such jam is "Lullaby," a duet with Syreeta Wright (yes, Stevie's ex) which appears on his 1997 album This is Not a Love Song.

Lank

"My Heart Belongs to You" Jodeci

Man, sometimes you just gotta break out the leather vests with matching pants, get down on both knees, and wail like you're auditioning for the Ebenezar Baptist Church choir. Jodeci is one of my top five male groups of all time. I love those dudes. "My Heart Belongs to You" is simply that shit.

Lank

"Orange Moon" Erykah Badu

Other times, you gotta don a head wrap and burn some nag champa and as you clutch your lover's shea butter-soaked locks in your silver and turquoise encircled fingers. ASHE! yeah, mickeyfickeys are extra sometimes, and when Erykah Badu first dropped, I was annoyed as hell. With Mama's Gun I momentarily relented on the hate and enjoyed the ride. I'm still not sure what the hell she's singing about, but "Orange Moon" is great, so I kinda don't care.

Lank

"Stay This Way" The Brand New Heavies f/ N'Dea Davenport

Once upon a time, I was a weird youngster who dressed funny. I've since changed. Now I'm old and dress funny. Back in the day, though, I was very close to idolizing a lady by the name of N'Dea Davenport. She and The Brand New Heavies were so ill to me. They had fun and funky songs that I danced aroung to in my room. "Stay this Way" is one of my all time favorites. It's such a happy, optimistic love song.



"Love Ballad" L.T.D.

No explication; if you're in the know, you know. A straight classic



"You Make Me Feel (Mighty Real)" Sylvester

No list, in my eyes, is complete without at least one disco tune. I have a weird infatuation/obsession with Sylvester James. S/he epitomized the perfect combination of diva and gospeldelics and raw 70s energy. "You Make Me Feel (Mighty Real)" is perhaps one of my favorite songs of all time, regardless of genre. Every time I hear it, I have to get loose. I'm so enamored of this song that I've committed myself to singing a rendition of this tune at Rachel's wedding later this summer. I'm gonna need a lot of vodka cranberries to get the job done, but I'm sure I'll be fantastic.

Raheem "dervaughn" DeVaughn

Yeah, okay so I haven't blogged since whenever. So what? Get off mine.

Anyway, I have inspiration today. I finally got around to getting Raheem's new album (Love Behind the Melody for the slow and google-less) and cutesy witty shit aside, this is it. It's my album pick for 2008. Can't nuthin' top this. (Double negatives are needed to express my pleasure.)

Now never mind that I have this ... thing, for him. (I'm carefully avoiding being nasty here.) That falsetto is no punk but barring my perversions, this shit knocks. Fellas? You will have no problems with ladies, not no mo'. Ladies? Turn this shit on and go for delf (as Meth would say). It's that good.

I've completely lost my need to ramble and do written flips and shit. This is all I got. Buy the damn album. Eleven tracks deep and not one dud, not a one. Me? I bought it on iTunes and I'm getting a "real" copy.

A few teasers for the people.





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In other news, I've hella papers to grade for grade entry and CPS is treating me like I gave her mama a pearl necklace on film. I live to serve. So what's new?

I'm Broke

Right now, I am the brokest I have been in years. My "daddy money" has run out, I had to pay rent last week, and I have a shopping problem. These things combined makes for a bank account that is dangerously close to being in the red. Luckily (and because of my shopping habit), I had hella shit to sell to the good people on Ebay. Not so luckily, I have to wait three to four days before my PayPal funds will transfer to my bank account. Fiddlesticks!

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As some sort of pick me up, I guess I'll regress to eleventh grade and post about smokin' hot members of the opposite sex.



Raheem DeVaughn (or Raheem Dervaughn as Schmoses calls him) looks like a sea creature, but that's not meant to be an insult. Well ... it kinda is. There's no way around a sea creature comment, but that's not the point. The point is that despite the whole sea creature thing, he's hot. Enjoy his chick-friendly falsetto.



If you know me and have not heard my diatribe on how hot Pharoahe Monch is, you don't know me very well. It all happened around 1997 when Organized Konfusion dropped their third (and my least favorite) album. Up til then he was just the really ill one in the group (though Prince Po was certainly no slouch) and out of nowhere comes this slim and toned Monch in the "Somehow, Someway" video. Let me tell ya, I was floored ... and smitten. Since then, OK has broken up, both Po and Monch have released solo efforts, and I have wished, over and over, that these two would find their ways back to each other. This wish may never be fulfilled, but the pure hotness of Troy Jamerson (and his skill, of course) will have me at the local Best Buy for his latest release Desire on June 26, 2007. (Dontcha just love his neosoul fro?)



I love Stephen Marley. For some reason, chicks sleep on him as the cute Marley son. Monica prefers (or preferred) Damian. Ziggy got props back in the day. I hear some give it up for Kymani. And Lauren went for Rohan. Stephen man, Stephen. Plus, he's got those production skills.





Now this is a big one. I have a full-fledged, school girl/stalker crush on this man. Meet Isaac de Bankole, an actor who hails from the Ivory Coast and loves to star in difficult-to-watch films--you know, about racial injustice and stuff. Lucky for him, I'm a diligent fan and will watch him be emasculated, murdered, and generally disrespected by every manner of white folk just to get a glimpse of his sweet ass. He's also lucky that I'm too prideful and lazy to be a stalker; otherwise, he'd have to file some serious restraining orders. He was once married to Cassandra Wilson, which means they both have mutually fantastic taste, but I hear they're no longer together. Too bad; I really liked the idea of them. I've watched many a depressing movie just to stare at him. Take for example Chocolat, not the light-hearted French film starring Juliette Binoche, but the older (1988 I believe) film about racial objectification and emasculation in 1960s (or something) Cameroon. Total anger fest, but Isaac was nekkid in this film, so I'd watch it again and again. (His cheekbones could cut glass.)

Well that's it. I've exhausted my pervert reserves for the day. For those of you who like slightly off-kilter looks and huge lips, enjoy.