The great blues master Willie Dixon himself created the phrase “blues is the root, and everything else is the fruit”, but who can guess that in the following years, this type will become difficult to identify to some extent.
Rhythm and blues have experienced many changes that reflect social, political and emotional values and the innovation of old and new music. As time goes on, this type has been recreated. At the end of the 21st century, this type entered a low ebb. An example of this is some groups in the late 1990s, such as Boyz to men and En Vogue. After absorbing their own style from the song groups in the 1940s, they disappeared commercially. It’s just that rhythm is replaced by heavier music. This kind of music is not very similar to the original form. Hip hop is becoming more and more popular
It is in the process that RnB is more accessible to writers and producers through the mass music media that his identity has changed. But what happened in the past 10 years or so is that we now have two very different styles. One belongs to the title of “Contemporary RnB”, and the other is not so popular, but more in line with the more ancient and primitive characteristics of this school. Mainly “the influence of blues and jazz”. If you like, you can regard it as RnB Asian culture.
From the beginning of this century to the present, the organic changes of rhythm and blues have once again become the focus of attention. Once again, the artists made interesting arrangements. In addition, from the emotional content of romantic love to the broader theme covered before RnB, the lyrical content is diversified again, and Marvin Gay’s What Happened is subject to this theme.
A good example is the first time Gregory Porters heard “Liquid spirit”, which contains an interesting metaphor. The word “liquid” is used to describe the freedom of spirit and culture, how to be manipulated and isolated. In addition, his later hit song Take me to the Hutong also got inspiration in the year when his mother and the Pope visited the village. He wrote, “Show integrity to the rich and show mercy to those who cannot.” This represents a deeper quality of the human condition. The image described in the lyrics. The role of the song is “king”, who bypasses the prosperous areas of the city to the hutong where the poor live.
After listening to the “Power of Nina Weeping” by Huo Sears, there are also lyrics that metaphorically express all the souls, blues and great folk figures with a common vision. The rhythm sounds like an old gospel tune, which is really new with modern production technology.
Other interesting artists, such as Shakespeare of Alabama, sounded like taking Sister Rosetta Tulpe into the marsh, selling well and changing the face of this genre.
Here are Zara MacFarlane’s words “Peace starting in in” and the recent words “D ” and “Unshaken of angelos”. While telling about the spiritual growth of inner and outer development, representing the broader theme of lyric poetry, the old style timbre that people still want to hear is adopted.
In a word, some people may have differences on what is RnB and not RnB, but what is more intelligent is that contemporary artists such as Karid, Jordan Lakai, Ella May, and the artists mentioned above just fall under a big umbrella(not Li Hanna’s pun). In other words, all these artists can drill in. But equally important is that RnB is much more present than in RnB charts. Therefore, when searching for RnB on Google, draw your route on the chart and enter undiscovered waters. Because there are more.
