Day 0955 - Cee-lo Green...is the Soul Machine

Cee-lo Green "Cee-lo Green...is the Soul Machine" (2004) - got it

Like a few people, I was introduced to the immense talents of Cee-lo Green via his duo Gnarls Barkley, also featuring producer Danger Mouse. 

I immediately began investigating the back-catalogues of both members and discovered Cee-lo's solo albums.  "...Soul Machine" is a heavyweight of an album.   The last track on the album asks "Damn 'lo, what DON'T you do!" and it's an appropriate question as Green mixes speedy, clever raps in "Childz Play", electronic/dance elements in "I am Selling Soul" and beautiful singing in "Let's Stay Together".  There's jazz in "Living Again" and huge stacked vocal harmonies in "Soul Machine".

The album is possibly a tad long, and do prefer Cee-lo's next solo release "The Lady Killer" where he leaned on his singing/soul side a little more.   But as with all of his material, this one has some great backing tracks, huge vocals and clever lyrics.

Day 0913 - Like Water For Chocolate

Common “Like Water for Chocolate” (2000)

I seem to remember Common becoming kind of a big deal in the 00s, so I was quite surprised now to find out that this was his fourth album and that he’d actually been active since the late 80s and recording throughout the 90s (with the first two albums released under the name Common Sense).

“Like Water for Chocolate” was Common’s first major label release and his first with production team the Soulquarians, a loose collective of musical collaborators including Erykah Badu, D'Angelo, Mos Def and members of the Roots.

As might be expected from that combination of musicians, the music is inflected with soul, funk and jazz with a through-line to 70s funk over which Common lays his rhymes.   He shows a healthy humility too in collaborating with various other MCs and vocalists throughout instead of trying to make it all about himself.

I did enjoy some of the grooves here, but not always being the biggest lyric person, and with a runtime of nearly 80 minutes, my attention was seriously starting to lag by the end of it all.