I was floored when I first saw Chrisette Michele on MTV. I should point out I don\u2019t watch MTV regularly (in fact, I\u2019m not sure if I\u2019ve watched it since that day about three years ago); I happened to stop on the channel when Amy Winehouse\u2019s \u201cRehab\u201d video was playing. I was unfamiliar with Winehouse but had heard of her, so I was interested enough to finish the whole video. \u201cTime to move on\u201d was my thought after the video ended, but Michele\u2019s \u201cBe OK\u201d commenced. Her voice was clearly of the contemporary R&B variety but tinged with enough traditional jazz to remind one of singers like Billie Holiday. She had a beautiful down-to-earth look, not lean or overly glamorized. How did this woman get a record? The only thing that annoyed me about the song \u2013 and still does \u2013 was will.i.am.\u2019s innocuous guest appearance. <\/p>\n
Notwithstanding that I Am <\/i>as a phrase conveys next to nothing at this point (it\u2019s been the title of a more than a dozen albums), the cover of the album <\/i>says a lot. Michele is a bundle of positive energy. \u201cLike A Dream,\u201d a combination of R&B, soul, and jazz, is about a drummer she meets in a club, and Michele\u2019s elation is completely relatable. \u201cI put his digits in my phone \/ And I promised I\u2019d call\u201d and \u201cI smiled the whole to the crib\u201d are things that many of us \u2013 heterosexual or homosexual, male or female \u2013 wouldn\u2019t mind experiencing every day. So just listen to the damn song.<\/p>\n
\u201cBest Of Me\u201d is Michele at her smokiest. The song is the jazziest on the album with great acoustic guitar by Face, qualifying it as my favorite track. I also think \u201cMr. Radio\u201d is a sexy song in its simplicity: \u201cTalk about a man\u2019s lips \/ Talk about a man\u2019s hips \/ Talk about a man\u2019s eyes \/ Talk about a woman\u2019s lips \/ Talk about a woman\u2019s breasts \/ Talk about a woman\u2019s thighs\u201d (yes, the second \u201clips\u201d is just repetitive, not dirty). Michele goes from this to remarking how love travels beyond the physical, keeping her sophistication. \u201cWork It Out\u201d has a strong gospel vibe, and she seems right at home with that, undoubtedly due to her religious background and experience leading a choir in high school. \u201cYour Joy\u201d is a sweet song to her father, but I don\u2019t really care about it because I\u2019m a single man with no children. <\/p>\n
Alright, so at this point you can tell that she\u2019s a good girl. She hammers this point too much with \u201cGood Girl,\u201d which strikes me as typical posturing mainstream R&B. One might argue that it\u2019s another side of Michele, but it just bores me. A better track showing her strength as a woman is \u201cIn This For You\u201d in which she pushes her vocals to the brink while an intermittent double-snare keeps the song in high gear. <\/p>\n
I Am <\/i>could be a stronger album with fewer tracks and more cohesive production (it was recorded in several studios across the country), but I\u2019m simply thankful that Michele was able to make a record that challenges the cynics and moneymakers in the music industry. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":73,"featured_media":30563,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"artist":[8674],"rating":[5617],"class_list":["post-42231","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-chrisette-michele","rating-rating-b-plus"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/42231","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/review"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/73"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=42231"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/42231\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/30563"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=42231"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=42231"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=42231"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}