Music Monday | Missy Elliott

Howdy!

When I was thinking about doing the series, I know I wanted to keep it diverse, not because my love of music is all of the place, but it is very important to say that there are women music producers out there. In fact, I decided to talk about two of them that I knew were important to my life and musical journey. However, if you know and love of any other women producers out there, please tell me about them in the comments. I would love to learn more about why you adore them, and of course check out their music too!

A couple of years ago, Missy Elliott was awarded by MTV’s VMAs (Video Music Awards) with the Lifetime Achievement award. Back when MTV did play hours and hours (boy, do I miss those days!) of music videos, you probably saw one or if you were really lucky two Missy Elliott videos within 20-30 minutes of each other. I’d say from 1998 to 2004 is when she was just creating all kinds of stuff. A lot of them included dancing, but she was very known for her crazy antics and style in those days. They all looked fun every single time they appeared on your television screen. I’m sad to say I haven’t seen any of her previous videos, but remembering her others, I know she would continue going down that way for as long as she is allowed.

Missy is most known for her songs and friendship with Timbaland and Aaliyah, but I think it’s important to say that she has worked with all kinds of acts throughout the years! In 2004, when the R&B artist Ciara appeared, especially after watching her first music video for “Goodies” you probably hoped that she’d work with Missy one day. Dancing played a big part in the two artists, but it also just seemed like a great combination because Ciara has that same soft voice that Aaliyah was known for–even though nobody could ever be as good as her–you still hoped that they would work together. So, by the time “1, 2, Step” came out on the radio, it was like the music gods were really hearing our prayers and then it happened again in 2004 with Missy’s track “Lose Control” with Fatman Scoop. It was an awesome sequel to the story of these two big female singers.

Since we’re on the subject of girl power, I think we should discuss the remake of Patti LaBelle’s “Lady Marmalade” of the film Moulin Rouge in early 2002. Instead of having one singer do the entire song, she produced and worked with four powerhouses of the popular genres of that time. You had the R&B artist Mya to start off and then we move on to Pink, who at the time was a mixture of pop-R&B at the time. Brooklyn’s own Queen rapper Lil’ Kim lended a nice section and gave the song an added flare, and finally Christina Aguilera graced us at the end. I still think this is where she began weaning herself out of the cookie cutter bubblegum pop music. The song itself went on to win lots of awards but I think a lot of people either don’t know and/or forget that Missy Elliott was a huge part of making this happen. I mean, think of it as like the first time The Avengers assembled. Yes, I just did that and I’m not even sorry about it either!

Are you a fan of Missy Elliott? Do you have a favorite music video from over the years? Is there any other artists that you think she should consider working or maybe not collaborating with next? Please give me your thoughts about that down in the comments.

Music Monday | Timbaland

Last month I started this new series; essincally talking about the two people who were at the heart of my decision of wanting to go off to college for Audio Recoedings ten years ago. The first was Dr. Dre and I discussed my love for him and the influences between him, Eminem and 50 Cent that made me want to explore the world of hip hop when I was a teenager. A week later, I talked about Rick Rubin and how much I respected him for not sticking to one genre, he experiments with various genres and musicans. The work he has done with Linkin Park really struck a cord with me because it made me realize that it was perfectly fine to love all kinds of music.

This time we really start at square one. I know I should have started it out this way, but in a way both people were the beginning although there were many years between them. I was introduced to rap music when I was like four or five years old, so early 90’s so for the next couple of months I will take you through the other music producers that have kept me entertained and inspired throughout my life.

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As you can see above in the banner, May is going to be about Timbaland and Missy Elloitt. So, we are moving on to the later part of the 1990’s and easily into the early 2000’s.

Timbaland is a very unique indivdiual. He has been able to be around for a lot of the ups and downs in the music insturdy. He has worked with a lot of various people, some of them have put him at the forefront of their music for a time. He and Missy Elloitt have worked together for a very long time. He has written and produced a lot of her music. He has even been featured in her wacky music videos too! These two had a great time in the late 90’s with R&B artist Aaliyah. They quickly became the dynamic thrio in a way, because they just dominated the charts. Unfortunately, when she died in 2002, of course it was sad. It still makes me upset everytime they make a comment about her on her birthday or anniversary of her death.

As you go into the 2000’s though, you see him working with newly solo boy band member Justin Timberlake on his first record “Justified” and honestly, I don’t think it mattered that he was the favorite of N’Sync, I just think that the two of them worked so well together was insane! In 2005, they came to work with Nelly Furtado and those next three years were really interesting because almost every track that was released I was totally into, and it was just like a steady stream and I kept falling into it everytime. However, I don’t think nothing could have prepared us for the introduction of OneRepublic in 2008. Once the song “Apologize” came out we were all gone. I know I wanted more and thankfully, we didn’t have to wait that long until the band released their second track “Stop and Stare” a few months later.

By 2009, I wasn’t really watching what was going on with Timbaland. Although, when Justin Timberlake released his second album, I took notice because I hoped that they teamed up again, which they did and everything was awesome, I started growing out of both pop and R&B, as this was the time I was officially introduced to Linkin Park and I immediately went rock bottom. However, I recently found out that a song I have been enjoying lately that was remixed by Timbaland. I’m pretty sure you have heard of it. The original track has Dolly Parton, which is awesome too, but I love Of King & Country’s version of “Only God Knows” with Echosmith is amazing! I think it’s a interesting track because with both singers and their styles, it allows the song to be played in two different radio airways: country and pop.

I am curious to see how farther Timbaland can push the boundaries in music. How many other collabrations he can create with new and older acts. It will be interesting if he can get back to leading the charts in R&B and/or pop again like he has done in the past. It’ll be fun to see what else he has up his sleeves in the next year, I mean think about this, summer is quickly appoarching so he could surprise us all with a new track that could be your new anthem. You never know these days, but you know I’ll be keeping my ears and eyes open to the music.

Are you a fan of Timbaland’s music? What decade do you think he hit his peak? Which team do you side with as being the best too?

Top 5 Favorite “Into The Unknown” Covers!

Howdy!

I love Frozen! I only decided to watch it after seeing the SacconeJolys on YouTube. The elder children: Emilia and Eduardo were first obsessed with it and something about them dressing up as Elsa and Anna, just reminded me of my own childhood and how much I still love Disney Princess movies. Afterwards, I had so much joy inside of me and now I am as obsessed as they were, and love knowing they have influenced their younger siblings Alessia and Andrea.

Unfortunately, I haven’t seen the second film and I’ve been really jealous of every and anybody that have seen it. I’ve done the same things I did before watching the first film, which is only knowing about a couple of the characters’ backgrounds and learning one song from the soundtrack! The main theme: “Into The Unknown” sung by the beautiful Idina Menzel, who plays Queen Elsa and Norwegian singer-songwriter AURORA.

I have been thinking about doing this post since the end of January, which is significant because at that time I had found my third favorite cover of the song! In all, I have picked out a good mixture and wanted to share them with you. However, I do not include the band, Panic! At The Disco’s cover because it is on the soundtrack.

1.) Claire Crosby

So, this was the first I found and it started on this mini adventure! Little Claire is seven years old, and at this age she loves everything, especially Disney films! She and the rest of her musical family created a version of their own and I was stunned on how fast they were able to get things together to create this amazing footage!

The video is absolutely adorable as you have Miss Claire walking around this beautiful landscape of broken trees and this eerie lake that definitely gives you those Frozen vibes! She is dressed as both Princess Anna and Queen Elsa throughout the video.

Since this was my first time ever hearing Claire sing before, I was in shock on how much control she has in her voice at such a young age! Of course, she has the help of her parents to keep her voice in a way that will hopefully help ease and make her vocal chords stronger as she continues in age.

2.) Malinda Kat

So, when I found this next video, I actually wasn’t looking, I just stumbled upon it when I was in the mood for choir music inside abandoned churches or Cathedrals because sometimes I enjoy listening to them while I read, and I did find an artist who has two different videos and her name is Malinda. I just fell in love with her voice.  I’d say she has definitely had singing lessons in the past. I found out she had recorded an acoustic version of the Frozen track with some friends Hannah and Tobias and I was just like, “okay, let’s check this one out too!”

This video feels more casual, almost coffee house inspired. Sometimes I like acoustic music, but when it is mixed with a song that is supposed to sound so powerful with Idina’s voice and the orchestra in the background, to see it basically strip down to only an acoustic guitar and what looks to be like a speaker that Hannah is tapping on to sound like drums was really interesting! Another part that I enjoyed was that even though it was so chilled, they kept on belting out the high notes throughout the song and I was surprised on how much it worked together, because I didn’t think it would sound that great keeping that in with this new tone, but like with most things, I was wrong!

3.) Connor Engstorm

This one pulled me as I was busy listening to Malinda’s reindintion, but I think the main reason why I wanted to listen to it is because the title of it said “symphonic metal” and I thought to myself, “this is going to be awesome” and after my first video was over, I switched it to this one.

This video is cute, it really is. It takes place at Grant Central Station in New York City at the beginning of December so there are Christmas lights up all around and everyone is bundled up in heavy jackets and have mittens over their hands and you hear a little bit of heavy metal blaring through your speakers as these two characters are playing cat and mouse on screen! The vocals featured on the song are Anthony Niccolo and his wife Val while Connor is in charge of everything else.

As someone who absolutely loves symphonic metal, I felt as both a critic and lover of this cover. I didn’t know how it was going to sound like at first and I will say, I did not love it right away. This didn’t happen until I actually finished. Anthony and Val have two different styles in their voice. Anthony definitely has that almost glam rock tone about him but Val is more demure to him but not where they are belting out those high notes, that’s when she really shines! I was a bit wary of this transition but ultimately I ended up really enjoying it!

4.) Acapop! KIDS

For this video, you have a fairly large of kids that are singing in acapella, which means there really is no music in the background, but for this performance the kids are creating the beat along with singing; they take turns in the role of singing and becoming the various  instruments. I thought it was very cool to go in this direction, because they made it into a very clear pop song and I think that was the main reason why I liked it so much because they managed to completely change the genre of the song!

5.) Musicality

This cover is the newest to be released to the world, and it resembles the previous video because of the amount of people involved in the project. Here you have teenagers instead of children, so they’ve probably already went through their puberties and their voices have changed and sound older.

One thing that I liked about the video is the look of the space they’re in, it looks as though they are in a newly painted warehouse in all white and they are dressed in winter colors of white, grays, and baby blues. It looks so dreamy and lovely! I think fashion helps bring out the mood of the song especially in the way of the previous group, where they are singing in acapella. The phrase of “less is more” really shines here!

So, I think that is it! If I find any more or you have a cover or video that is not featured above, please send me the link to check it out! Most importantly, you should definitely check out the other videos that everyone I have featured in this post too. Before I go, I’d also like to know your overall thoughts of the new Frozen movie too, just don’t spoil everything for me, okay?

How I Became A Music Blogger

Howdy!

I’ve been trying to figure what to blog about for a few days and I thought about some advice posts; I like them but I’m also one of those people who doesn’t feel the need to follow the same set of rules of others. These will be things that I do that might be useful to the newbies or somebody who would like to experiment every once in a while.

What does it mean to be a music blogger?

I started writing reviews back in 2011, probably four months after I actually created this blog. I will say, those first few reviews are really bad. I have the worst grammar and I cannot describe what I hear for the life of me! I will say though, since I’ve been doing them and the fact that I try to get out of my comfort zone, I feel like I am getting better at it.

In the beginning, I wasn’t really thinking about what could come out of the review itself, I just knew that I needed to express myself about what I hearing inside of my headphones. Towards the end of 2012, I’d say my music choices started to go in a darker direction and since I was already listening to tons of international music, I knew I wanted to share it with more people, whether it be my Twitter followers, friends and/or family. Everybody wants new music, so why shouldn’t I help promote these artists and groups?

What can you talk about on your blog?

Well, that’s up to you really!

I think it’s important to establish what kind of music blogger you want to be from the very beginning. To me, there are two ways you can go about this, you can be like me and only focus on the music itself–that means you discuss nothing about anything else but whatever you’re presented. Second way is you talk about that artist’s personal life, which is something that I do NOT participate in because I think it’s absolutely rude!

There are a lot of bloggers out there that only review new artists, which is good because they need all of the promotion they can get from people. However, if you do put your email address on your about or contact page, be aware that you may not always get to talk with that particular artist or group, majority of the time you’re talking to a third party. It has its ups and downs, because honestly the artist will make you feel welcomed and allow you to have time to listen and get your words figured out, but the third party does not. At least, from my own experience, they haven’t made me feel like I was going fast enough to reply back to them about anything.

Besides the new artists, you can talk about your favorites, but in reality you’re really closing up opportunities to get to know other musicians. Thankfully, when I started blogging about music, I was already in the thick of international music, so I was listening to stuff all over the world and it didn’t really matter if they were singing in English or not.

There are different ways to review music:

• Albums/EPs – These are pretty much the only way I review anything to do with music at the moment. However, I do have my own limit. I do discuss an album that’s over 20 tracks. It just puts a lot of pressure on me to stay open enough to speak my thoughts and I never want the number of songs to change my mind about a particular track. 
• Single – If you’re going to write about a single, be prepared for that post of yours to be pretty short. I think I always had two or three paragraphs whenever I’d review just a single, but on the bright side, I always thought it would be fair to release two single reviews in one day!
• Music Videos – Music videos are pretty easy to talk about, as you can just find it on YouTube’s recently added and go from there, but you also need to think about something else. Are you going to only discuss the song, the content of the video itself, or both? I always found it to be easier to do both, but whenever I would listen to the heavy metal music, I wouldn’t review the actual video in fear something creepy would pop out and scare me! 

What kind of ways to listen to music to review?

I mostly only use Spotify to listen to my music. They are convenient, because they have the new music on their browse tab. Once you start using it a lot, and you “follow” more and more artists and bands, then it’ll create a “release radar” playlist for you of the music and you basically go from there. After I’ve found an album or EP, or even a selection of them, I’ll create a playlist of each one and save them for later until I’m ready to work on them.

If you can’t use Spotify, then YouTube is my second option. Unfortunately, you will have some issues going in this direction. Musicians and record companies will not always upload a full album onto the artist or band’s main page, it’ll just depend on the circumstance honestly, so if you’re unable to find all of the music on the record, you’re going to need to hope another fan has put it up without tampering with the sound too much and of course YouTube has taken all of them down!

My last suggestion is whether or not, you want to purchase the album on iTunes. I mean, all your doing is reviewing the album, and in case you’re not sure about the genre or if you’re going to like it in general, you’ve just spend $11.29 or $14.99 that you now have to keep in your library. So, everything is up to you on what you want to do.

Here are some tips on what I do before I start the reviewing process!

1. Have a notepad nearby! It’ll be smarter to write or type out the song titles and date of when the record came out. Something else you should look into, is some information about the artist you’re talking about, you have to remember that you are not only selling the album, but the musician too!
2. Trust your gut, and I mean this in the nicest way possible. If you are not comfortable talking about a certain subject, do NOT push yourself to write about it. However, on the flip side, if you can’t figure out how to describe the song and how it sounds, go with your next best option. I’ll usually say whatever I’m feeling at that moment. I’ve described song(s) as “driving around in a small town while the sun is setting!” So whatever comes to your head first, then say it!
3. Don’t rush the process, if you need to take a break in between a group of songs, then do it! I have started reviews in the mornings and finished them at night, and I’ve even spread them out over a couple of days since I usually schedule them at a later date.
4. If you’re unable to find the album cover on the artist’s social media accounts, then I recommend you making a banner for your future review posts. I’ve used Paint to create mine, but I’m sure you can make really clever ones using your own photos!

I think that are all of my tips and tricks that I can share with you today! If you are thinking about starting on music reviews, or reviewing anything such as books, movies, etc, it’s a fun experience for you as a blogger but it also helps promote the musicians you’re talking about too!

Tune Tuesday: United Kingdom Week 2

So this is it!! The last of the UK trip and end of the whole music travels. What country was your favorite? I think I liked both Ireland and Poland. Basically for the fact I had help from my friends who live in those countries. They did what I originally wanted for these posts was to find people in the countries I was planning on talking about on here and they would bring in different people for me to focus on instead of me trying to find different artists and bands that I probably talk about too much on here. Just wait until the next theme I’m changing it to next week. If you read last week’s post, I said I’d give you a snippet of what the theme will be and I’m so excited to say that it’s about the queens of music. We’ll start out talking about the Queens of different music genres. If you are hooked up to my Facebook, I’ll be posting the Queens of movies. Too bad I can’t make it for Wednesday, or this would have been the best idea ever, but this works too! I’m open to suggestions for different Queens and Princesses of different genres. I’m highlighting every genre, blues, jazz, rock etc. I can’t wait to reveal the new TT banner. I got it done three weeks ago, it’s really cool! Before we can go into that though, we gotta live it up with second part of UK! I hope you’ve enjoy and join me next for the Femme Fatale edition.

Fire Breather by Laurel

To The Hills by Laurel

Strong by London Grammar

Recovery by Frank Turner

I Want Out by Young Guns

Bones by Young Guns

Only Love Can Hurt Like This by Paloma Faith

Don’t by Ed Sheeran

Paradise by Coldplay

Viva La Vida by Coldplay