Day 0945 - Under Construction

Missy Elliott "Under Construction" (2002)

Missy continued her collaboration with Timbaland, bringing a lot of classic hip-hop sounds into the mix and reminiscing on the 'good old days' a bit with "Back in the Day" featuring Jay Z.   

The album has a few guests and collaborators, but Missy easily rules the roost.   Ludacris guests on "Gossip Folks" but Missy again is the centre of attention, completely changing her vocal style for the track and still busting some great rhymes.

Single "Work it" has a fairly simple arrangement of skeletal beat and synthline with a synthy hook that swings in now and then.  Most its appeal then comes again from Missy's vocals.  She manages to make a dirty-as song where half of it dances around its subject, but you know exactly what she's talking about.   Sound effects and clever use of reverse sounds complete the picture.

Beyonce shows up on "Nothing Out There for Me" one of the albums more melodic moments.   

The spoken word parts at the start and end of the album could easily have come across as a bit cheesy, but again Missy manages to make them work.  The opening speech reflects the World Trade Centre attacks and show that (thinking back a few entries to Bruce Springsteen) this was a hurt being felt by artists across a range of genres.

Day 858 - Urban Hymns

The Verve "Urban Hymns" (1997)

The Verve reformed a year or two after breaking up (where's the commitment to the quitting?) and started working on new music.  Initially they were joined by Simon Tong in place of guitarist Nick McCabe but McCabe was convinced to rejoin.

While there is still some of the swirly, psychedelic rock  of "A Northern Soul" in tracks like "The Rolling People" and album closer "Come On" (featuring Liam Gallagher on backing vocals), the album's strong points are more in its subtler melodic moments like morose ballad "the Drugs Don't Work" or Orchestra-sampling, lawsuit-courting album opener "Bittersweet Symphony" that borrowed a little too obviously from an old Rolling Stones song.

I remember when this came out in the late 90s I didn't really care for it at all.  I kind of liked the track "Lucky Man" but I found the other singles to be quite grating.   I'm not sure if I was just being contrary, if my tastes have changed or these songs just needed time to percolate because coming into this listen I was really looking forward to hearing "drugs don't work" and other tracks, and just enjoyed listening to it all.

Day 0650 -The Sensual World

Kate Bush "The Sensual World" (1989)

I preferred Bush's earlier, weirder, more eclectic offering "The Dreaming", but this is still a strong collection of songs.  Kate creates mature pop without losing all of her adventurousness of sound.

The songs manage to work in elements of world music in an unobtrusive way.   Including a lot of backing vocals from Trio Bulgarka, a Bulgarian vocal ensemble and the inclusion of some Celtic folk instruments.  These elements are used to serve the songs rather than dominate them.