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 0853 - Butterfly

Mariah Carey "Butterfly" (1997)

For album number 6, Mariah dialled back her usual vocal acrobatics and explored some other genres outside of her pop ballad sound with the help of a bevvy of collaborators, including Puff Daddy, Missy Elliott and Q-Tip.   Those names don't diminish Mariah's own role in her creative path though.  She had been slowly pulling away from the influence of her controlling husband, Sony Music executive Tommy Mottola (who she broke up with around this time) to take a few creative risks and court the hip-hop/RnB market a bit more.

There is still straight ahead-diva pop like the choir-backed title track, but there's also the RnB of "The Roof (back in time)" and "Baby Doll", the collaboration with the brilliant Bone Thugs-n-Harmony "Breakdown" and even a stonking rendition of "The Beautiful Ones" from Prince's "Purple Rain" album.

Mariah's not an artist that I spent a lot of time investigating in the 90s, and this is still not my favourite style of music, but this is a strong album, and obviously she has an incredible voice.

Day 0840 - Supa Dupa Fly

Missy Elliott "Supa Dupa Fly"(1997)

Another musical 'lifer', Missy had been performing since she was a child, then formed a musical group called Fayze (later 'Sista').   She recruited her friend Timothy Mosley AKA Timbaland to help them get some demos together.

They caught the attention of a member of the group Jodeci who got them on board to work on music for Jodeci while they also worked on their own material and songs for other artists including superstar Aaliyah.

Puffy Daddy/Diddy tried to sign Elliott to his Bad Boy label, but she took control of her own destiny and created her own imprint 'Goldmind Records' to release her debut and (as with her future records) got Timbaland on board for production duties.

It's not hard to see why Missy Elliott was lauded as revitalising hip hop.  Entering what was primarily a male-dominated and often misogynistic genre; taking on writing, producing, rapping and singing, and bringing fresh, sparse arrangements, and well placed (though again, not cluttered) rhymes.   Single "The Rain" is probably my favourite track.