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An interesting collection of ‘mid-rangers’ this week, as 3 of the 4 included artists are of the sort who regularly release material and frequently collaborate with big name artists, but don’t quite seem to have fully nailed down a spot in their respective lanes. There’s always plenty of talent floating around in that middle ground, and inevitably it’s where we find the next big stars: time will tell if any of these guys are to be that breakout artist.
2 posts to catch up on from the week gone by, with Mike Posner releasing his first project since his debut album, and The Weekend unleashing his first ever music video (I use that term loosely). Click below for this week’s goods.
→ Continue Reading R&B Fridays: Episode 128
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Better late than never eh? There are genuine reasons, but forget all of that rubbish: it’s here now, and that’s what counts.
No recap this week, so there’ll be none of your time wasted up here, and instead you can get to clicking below and grabbing new music from Akon, Lloyd and more.
To quote the mighty Brick Tamland, ‘OK, let’s go!’.
→ Continue Reading R&B Fridays: Episode 103
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Centenaries are a rare thing in many walks of life, so I speak for both past and present, writing and non-writing members of the OTU team when I thank you sincerely for your dedication to our online presence. Whilst various weekly serials have come and gone, this has stood strong for 100 weeks, so we genuinely thank you for your support here in R&B Fridays. Having been introduced in our very first week, this also marks our 100th week online, so thanks again for all of your support in getting us this far.
As it’s a milestone episode, it felt like the right decision to award Frank Ocean the honour of representing this occasion. I can hear your outrage: ‘why not a staple of the episodes, like Lloyd or Usher?’. Well, we like to look forward, and frankly (sorry) I feel he’s really going to dominate this series for the next 100 episodes, and deservedly so.
Click below for your regular weekly instalment: two days late, in keeping with tradition! I’ve also got a little extra something to celebrate the occasion coming shortly after this…
→ Continue Reading R&B Fridays: Episode 100
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Easily the best R&B artist in recent months, Tank comes through with visuals for his latest single from his fantastic Now or Never album.
If there’s one word I’d use to describe his music, it would have to be ‘mature’. The slow jam style is easy enough to do for most artists, but the maturity of the subject matter and vintage R&B stylings of his vocals gives this track that real ‘grown man’ feel, and as a result makes his music a great deal more relatable than the usual overblown/exaggerated style adopted by other artists.
The video fully represents that too, and as a result is incredibly captivating. I really couldn’t take my eyes off it, despite being a very simple video: the majority of it is centred around Tank being isolated and lonely, but it’s the minor touches that make the difference: the lighting, the facial expressions, colour schemes and much more combine to pull you right into the song and tug at the heartstrings. Superbly unfussy, and as a result any scenes of ‘impact’ (such as when the woman appears) are far more engaging. Simple yet fantastically effective all-round package. Audio can be grabbed here.
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To me, any time between midnight and 4am counts as the ‘night before’, so by my reckoning this is still a Friday night and hence on time. Don’t question it, just embrace it.
Short recap this week, with just the three noteworthy and relevant posts from the R&B/pop world: Tinie Tempah and Ellie Goulding’s collaboration got some visuals, a pretty interesting electro remix of Diddy-Dirty Money’s I Hate That You Love Me was liberated, and finally Musiq Soulchild came through with one of the better tracks of January, with his first single from his upcoming sixth album.
Formalities are now dealt with, commence your clicking as of right…now.
→ Continue Reading R&B Fridays: Episode 85
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To me, the early hours of ‘Saturday’ count as Friday, so welcome to the first on-time R&B Friday in a few weeks!
Not a great deal to recap on this week, with the only notables being another official remix to Lloyd’s Lay It Down, and an all-British collaboration from Alesha Dixon and Jay Sean. However, it’s more than made up for with this week’s episode: with almost 20 tracks from the likes of Trey Songz, Pitbull and many more, there’s lots to enjoy and keep you going until next week.
Want some? Come get some.
→ Continue Reading R&B Fridays: Episode 83
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Once again, it’s not quite a Friday. However, with the busy Christmas/New Year period over, hopefully these will be back on regular schedule from next week!
The past week has seen some pretty interesting R&B/pop pieces: Duck Sauce came through with a great remix of Chromeo and Elly Jackson’s single, the well-respected Jackie Boyz dropped off a mixtape, Marsha Ambrosius delivered an incredibly thoughtful video, Eminem remixed Dirty Money’s Hello, Good Morning, and we were also treated to two more Dirty Money remixes. Click below for this week’s instalment.
→ Continue Reading R&B Fridays: Episode 82
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Will R&B Fridays ever be on time? That’s the question.
I’ve more than compensated though, throwing in almost 20 tracks for you to enjoy this week. There’s no skimping on the big names either, as there are some strong contributions from some of the bigger stars in the R&B/pop world. No real recap this week as the music industry has all but shut down, though the Alicia Keys version of Devil In A New Dress is a must-download.
Click on for the first R&B Friday of 2011.
→ Continue Reading R&B Fridays: Episode 81
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Yes, I know it’s Sunday but better late than never eh?
I’ll not waste too much time up here, so here’s the catch-up: great video from Jamie Foxx and Drake, a great cover from Ellie Goulding, Tinchy Stryder’s latest single, the newest visuals from Dirty Money’s album, a mixtape of all-new material from Sammie, Chrome’s debut solo single, and a big collaboration from Keri Hilson and J. Cole.
Let’s go. Click below for episode 79.
→ Continue Reading R&B Fridays: Episode 79
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Flying ever quicker towards that milestone 100th episode, episode 78 stops off at many of your favourite artists, having already done so a few times this week: we were given the new Michael Jackson video, R. Kelly then covered one of MJ’s biggest hits (as well as turning back the clock with some live performances), and Tinie Tempah unleashed his latest video.
However, it’s been the upcoming names that have really shone this past 7 days, with Jesse Boykins releasing the highlight of this week’s R&B/soul and Theophilus London adding a modern spin to Tweet’s Oops, courtesy of a Lindsay Lohan assist.
Cast your eyes and cursors downwards for more meaty (or soya) chunks of music.
→ Continue Reading R&B Fridays: Episode 78
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This is the epitome of mature R&B. The song is driven purely by strong vocals and great lyricism, and the video follows suit with a very thought-provoking and engaging story.
Most of today’s R&B slow jam maker would have probably taken this song in a less meaningful direction for the video, but Tank really embellishes the audio with a well-thought out, yet simple visual choice. What’s also refreshing is that he’s evidently a slightly older man in comparison to the glut of babyfaced singers these days, and hence a little bit outside of the mould for the mainstream’s R&B favourites: this adds further to the maturity of the track, injecting it with even more depth, as well as making for a nice change.
Audio can, and should, be grabbed here.
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A more digestable episode this week, which makes a nice change for us all having had a few extended instalments in recent weeks.
Outside of this episode, it’s been a fairly quiet week for R&B, with just the three notables: a video for Rihanna and Drake’s collaboration, new music from UK upcomer Talay Riley, and the latest drop from Trey Songz’s upcoming mixtape.
Click below for the 75th instalment of R&B’s favourite weekly episodical.
→ Continue Reading R&B Fridays: Episode 75
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Lots of mainstream stuff this week, alongside a couple of surprise additions from the hip-hop world and the celebrity world.
R&B recap from the last week: Dirty Money’s new single, the first drop from Trey Songz’s new mixtape, Katy B’s latest video, Willow Smith’s television debut, Rihanna and Eminem’s latest collaboration, and Chrisette Michele’s new mixtape from earlier today. Also, soul heads should check out a great cover of Maxwell’s Pretty Wings, and a remix of Mayer Hawthorne’s No Strings.
→ Continue Reading R&B Fridays: Episode 73
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Plenty to recap from the past week: Behind-the-scenes with Rihanna and Drake, new visuals from Nicki Minaj, a video for Dirty Money and Drake’s collabo, three mastered tracks from Ciara/Usher, Akon and Nicole Scherzinger, and finally the finished version of Jamie Foxx and Drake’s fantastic Fall For Your Type.
Click on for this week’s R&B fix.
→ Continue Reading R&B Fridays: Episode 72
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I’m sure you can forgive me for this being a couple of days late: having no laptop sort of makes things a little difficult! Hence, I’ll not keep you too long out here in the cold and away from the R&B.
Whilst I’m told the pre-episode recaps are going down well, in the interests of time you can take care of it yourself for this week by clicking the R&B category at the top of this page, which should fill you in appropriately. Click on for this week’s episode.
→ Continue Reading R&B Fridays: Episode 68
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Full of big names this week, with contributions from Trey Songz , the new single from Akon and more. You already know what’s coming next…let’s recap on the last week:
A great new track from Gyptian, visuals from Rydaz-N-Rtist, a snippet of Chris Brown’s upcoming work, Kelly Rowland’s latest video, and finally a raft of performances from the VMAs.
I’m very proud of this episode. I’m pretty happy with almost every track, and as a result it’s reduced down to around 15 tracks. Very digestable, and hence easy for you to give most of it a shot. Click on and agree with me, all of you. Thanks.
→ Continue Reading R&B Fridays: Episode 66
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I want to watch this one but seeing as my laptop is still being temperamental with videos, I thought I’d save the laptop crashes (and countless restarts) for a couple of bigger video premieres coming tonight.
As I said, I would like to watch it though as the audio was really likeable. Hoping to catch more Tank material soon, the veteran definitely came with the goods on this one.
Audio can be grabbed here.
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18 tracks from 18 artists this week, with a bunch of the biggest names in R&B/pop/soul making the cut.
As per recent routines, I’d recommend checking over the R&B posts from the week gone by: Dirty Money want your love, Trey Songz is already taken, Lloyd has dropped 3 guest features this week, and Ciara recruited Andre 3000 for a Ride remix.
Next stop of the tour: click below.
→ Continue Reading R&B Fridays: Episode 52
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Some very good music from new upcomers in this episode, and I expect you’ll definitely find a new artist to latch onto in here. Some stuff from R&B Fridays favourites such as Bruno Mars too of course, and plenty of it with a total of 21 tracks making the final cut for this episode.
Click on for that weekly R&B fix you’ve been begging for. Don’t pretend like you weren’t.
→ Continue Reading R&B Fridays: Episode 46
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It’s late, but it’s here. This episode is stacked too, yet another contender for the best yet. Artists? Chris Brown, Rihanna, Ne-Yo, Sean Garrett and more. Number of tracks? Seventeen. Yeah, seventeen.
GOOD GRIEF MAN!
→ Continue Reading R&B Fridays: Episode 22
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