Ty Dolla $ign & Future - Darkside

Artists: Ty Dolla $ign & Future feat. Kiiara
Song: Darkside
Album: Bright: The Album
Genre: R&B
Language: Strong

One of the tracks on Bright's soundtrack that I also loved was Darkside.  While there was a cool Middle East style vibe to Crown, and a forlorn pain to World Gone Mad, Darkside brings it down with a heavy dose of loneliness.  Kiiara does a fantastic job at setting the mood right off the bat, then Ty comes in and keeps it rolling in a strong way with his verse.  I don't know what it is about the line "die for my respect" at 1:18, but it just resonates with me for whatever reason.

I saw a lot of comments talking about how they hate Ty and Future's verses for not rolling with the song, but I'd have to disagree heavily.  I get maybe people who aren't familiar with Future's style disliking his heavy use of autotune, but I think the harsh, heavily processed aspect of his voice really works well here.  And as I already said, Ty keeps the song rolling in a great way.

I honestly would be hard pressed to find a song on this album that I love more than this one I think, though Broken People is great for introducing me to Rag'n'Bone Man.

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Camila Cabello & Grey - Crown

Artists: Camila Cabello & Grey
Song: Crown
Album: Bright: The Album
Genre: R&B

You know what, we're gonna hit up the Bright soundtrack for a couple days here.  It's some really good stuff, but more importantly it's a soundtrack with heavy variety in it.

This song has a cool eastern vibe to it that I really get in to, the synth lines are just really tight, ya know?  I enjoy it a lot, such a good song.

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R. Kelly - Ignition (Remix)

Artist:  R. Kelly
Song:  Ignition (Remix)
Album:  Chocolate Factory (2003)
Genre:  R&B

This dude is full of crap.  I just found out that he wrote the remix to Ignition before the original.  What the hell dude, that's not how it works.

There's no real reason I should be mad about this, but I'm still incredibly peeved by it.

The reason I'm giving R. Kelly the time of day is because I managed to snag the job of music guy at school.  I found out how to play music through the system and as such have been giving the authority to make the playlist.

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Ty Dolla $ign - Blasé

Artist:  Ty Dolla $ign feat. Future & Rae Sremmurd
Song:  Blasé
Album:  Free TC (2015)
Genre:  R&B, Hip Hop
Language:  Strong

A girl at school is on Tinder, and she connected with this dude named Blaze.  One of the other girls saw his name and dubbed him Blazé after this song.

That's about the only story I have to associate with the song honestly, but it's a really cool tune and worth listening to.

Fun fact about Ty Dolla $ign though.  Although most people consider him a rapper, he considers himself a singer.  I don't think he's resentful about it, but he does remind people from time to time.

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Post Malone - I Fall Apart

Artist:  Post Malone
Song:  I Fall Apart
Album:  Stoney (2016)
Genre:  R&B
Language:  Strong

So there's this girl at school who loves Post Malone.  He's on her snap story, he's on her facebook, and if she had a Twitter I'm sure he'd be there too.  I got her for our secret Santa that we did and I actually found a Post Malone prayer candle on Etsy.  It was a very good time.

But yeah, cause of stuff like that, as I may have mentioned before, I've started to listen to this dude a little more.  I'm not a super huge fan of Stoney as a whole album, but I'm a heg fan of his newer singles so far.  We'll see how mister Malone continues his career.

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Justin Bieber - Love Yourself

Artist:  Justin Bieber
Song:  Love Yourself
Album:  Purpose (2015)
Genre:  R&B

So I'll be fair here, I'm a big enough guy to admit that I can change my opinion about artists.  I remember saying a few years ago when he started coming out with more mature material that I would probably be enjoying his music within the next 5 to 10 years.  Didn't really think it'd go anywhere, but I was willing to acknowledge that if he kept up that direction I wouldn't be opposed to enjoying what he had to say.

Took me long enough, but I finally heard the song that loads of people back at my last job talked about.  Turns out I had heard it before and I had thought it was an Ed Sheeran song.  This is mostly because Ed actually wrote the song and had planned to have Rihanna sing the chorus (originally making it f*ck yourself).  I love this song though, it's really smooth and a good direction for Justin.  It really highlights his vocal abilities a little better than some of the other stuff he's done in my opinion.

All this being said, I'm still not a huge fan of the rest of the album this is on.  I don't care for his usual style too much so he hasn't quite hit the point that I can enjoy him fully yet, haha

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Post Malone - Rockstar

Artist:  Post Malone feat. 21 Savage
Song:  Rockstar
Album:  Rockstar (Single, 2017)
Genre:  R&B, Hip Hop
Language:  Strong

An artist I wasn't really ready to get into would probably be Post Malone.  I couldn't really think of an actual good reason to avoid him, but the couple songs I came across I just wasn't a huge fan of.

Honestly though, the dude is amazingly good at his job.  We listen to the radio at school a lot and as such I've managed to hear a lot of the dude's music.  His vocal work, while not something I'd usually listen to much of, is solid for the genre.  Plus on this track he teams up with one of my favorite rappers, so that's doubly good for me.

Check it out even if you don't think you'll like it, I've found him to be really smooth and easy to listen to.

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P!nk - So What

Artist:  P!nk
Song:  So What
Album:  Funhouse (2008)
Genre:  Pop, R&B
Language:  Strong

Well here's what I was gonna post yesterday till the whole Ghost thing threw me off course.  I've realized more and more that P!nk is a vocalist I've heard all over the place, but I never knew it was her songs.  Not a bad thing, just not an observant thing on my part I suppose.

I dunno, it's just good music, ya know?  It's stuff like this that makes me glad I managed to get out of my Metal Elitist faze so I could start to like music again.

Edit:  Sorry that some of these last posts have been going live late.  I have them set to go live at midnight, but sometimes it auto corrects to when I actually finished them.  It's something I just need to look out for better

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Travi$ Scott - Drugs You Should Try It

Artist:  Travis Scott (stylized Travi$)
Song:  Drugs You Should Try It
Album:  Days Before Rodeo
Genre:  Rap, R&B

Everybody loves those super sad depressing songs just a little bit, right?

A friend of mine has tried to direct me toward Travis Scott for ages now and I'm gonna be honest, I'm not a huge fan of most of his music.  His recent album may be one of the best produced things, but his other stuff isn't super great in my opinion.

But this album is freaking dope.  Days Before Rodeo, while not all the tracks are great, a good few of them are solid as all crap.

I find this song to be special since most of the beat is a guitar line.  It's kinda haunting, I love it.

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A to Z 2K17: R is for Rick Ross

Artist:  Rick Ross
Song:  Smile Mama, Smile
Album:  Black Market
Genre:  Rap, Hip Hop, R&B
Language:  Strong

Every now and then you need a fun little R&B style tune.  Now while this song is about regretting not telling his family things when they were alive that doesn't mean it can't be a fun song still, yeah?

Discovered this song recently right around when I was making a playlist of melancholy music so I'm pretty happy with it.  It's not like it's a sad beat though, it's a really groovin' song; It's just that the lyrics are sad.

I apologize that I don't have much to say today, I'm really under the weather.

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The Weeknd - Starboy

Artist:  The Weeknd feat. Daft Punk
Genre:  R&B
Language:  Strong

I'm rather happy with the new songs that The Weeknd has put out so far.  False Alarm is a cool deviation from what I would have expected, but since I'm going for a more reaching post here I'm gonna post the more popular song for now.

Hey, instead of talking about this though we're gonna talk about the last week of October.

Got a 2 year tradition going of having it be the "Week Of Evil" and I don't plan on changing anything anytime soon.

Long story short I'm willing to take some suggestions for it.  I've got a couple days still open that I haven't planned for yet, so fire away either in the comment section or on Facebook.

Cool, catch ya.

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Adele - Rolling In The Deep

Artist:  Adele
Genre:  R&B

I've really been hating on Adele a lot recently, but I think I realized that it's mostly Hello that I'm really sick of.  Adele is a rather impressive vocalist, even if I think she's a little overrated.  I know, I know.  "Noah, don't judge other people like this.  You can't even sing like her, how can you say she's overrated!?"

Well I think people talk her up a lot more than she needs.  I like her music, but realistically it's way overhyped.

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Bruno Mars - Grenade

Artist:  Bruno Mars
Genre:  Pop, R&B

I hate this song.

I'm literally making this post just to declare my hatred for this song.

I had somebody singing it right behind me tonight and while it may seem petty I really just need to announce this.

Don't get me wrong, Bruno Mars is a fantastic performer, I just hate this song.

Ok, continue with your life.

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Kwabs - Walk

Artist:  Kwabs
Genre:  Soul, R&B

So when I was going to post Walk by Pantera the other day I accidentally found this song.  It's really good though, I'm glad I accidentally found it.  It's a nice smooth song that I feel like I can really get into, I'm gonna be checking out more of his stuff to see what's up.

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A to Z Challenge: U is for Usher

Artist: Usher

Genre:  R&B

I personally don’t care much for Usher.  His style of music, while well executed and by no means bad, is just not something I’m really into.  Still, I can’t think of a reason not to include him in the U position of the list.

Honestly I’m amazed at the lack of bands I’m familiar with in the lower letters of the alphabet.  I would have thought that I’d know at least a few more then I do, ya know?

Eh, whatever though.  This post is about Usher, not me complaining that I don’t know any U artists.  We gonna use this song cause it's one of the few I'm kinda familiar with because of a show I watch.

A to Z Challenge: O is for Outkast

Band:  Outkast
Genre:  R&B, Rap, Hip Hop
Language:  Some, Strong

You know who knows a lot about Outkast?  Not me.  Not at all actually.  I chose them because I actually had a different band planned today but I didn't want to flood everybody with a pile of Nu-Metal since I realized a significant percentage of this stuff was that genre already.

Oops.

But hey, this is some catchy music, ya know?  It's bouncy, it's smooth, it's basically all good.

I'd heard their song Hey Ya before, but most of what I know about the band comes from the skit Key & Peele did.  It amused me and did not educate me on the band at all.

Good music though, and it introduced me to a group I'd love to get to know better.

A to Z Challenge: C is for CeeLo

Artist:  CeeLo Green
Genre:  R&B, Hip Hop
Language:  Strong

In case you live under a rock like I did in 2010 and missed this song, here it is!  This was the theme song of a friend of mine for quite a while, he had dance motions and everything.  Mostly it just involved flipping us all off, but it was still fun to watch.

CeeLo was one of the judges on The Voice for a while till he got in some legal trouble for being charged with rape in 2014.  It was decided that he was not at fault (look it up for the deets) but afterward he took to Twitter and said some rather stupid stuff.

He lost a lot of his credibility in the industry after that and is still trying to recover from that.  After all, this is not a subject to be spoken of lightly.

But let's pull back from dark topics, this is just a music blog.  Enjoy the tune, think of who you can apply it to, and have a wonderful day.

Robin Thicke - Give It 2 U Remix

Artists:  Robin Thicke, 2 Chainz, Kendrick Lamar
Genre:  R&B

Despite what your personal thoughts on Robin Thicke may be, this song is really catchy.

Yeah, he's a d-bag, yeah he's made a pile of terrible decisions, but he at least has made some decent music.

Honestly my favorite part of this song is all the other people on it, so I guess I can't really talk about how I feel about him.  Whatever.

A TO Z STARTS TOMORROW.  BE READY.

The Drifters - White Christmas

Band:  The Drifters
Genre:  R&B, Doo Wop

I don't really care for snow.  Erie has some really crappy weather in the winter that I just don't enjoy dealing with.

For Christmas though I feel like there should be some, ya know?  Because of that, I feel I should share this song with you.  The first time I heard this I was watching The Santa Clause (the first one was the only good one) and I've really just loved it since then.  The original is great, but this one is probably my favorite.

You know what though?  It doesn't matter.  Merry Christmas everybody.