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Comfort Woman

$2.99 ... CD (€2.20 || £1.89 || ¥280) (approx.)

Another dazzling batch of tunes from Meshell Ndegeocello – an incredible songwriter and performer who may have peaked commercially a few years back, but she is still maturing in ways that stretch far, far beyond the chart singles she scored in the past! The woman has never put out the same album twice; she kicked our collective arse last year with the dense, sinister hip hop funk of Cookie: The Anthropological Mixtape. This time around she takes a celestial soul approach, with a lot of sweet and wispy, echoey flange guitar and vox organ in place of the gritty funk howl of the previous album. The album kind of comes of as a mix of sensual soul grooves, with all of the tripped out, drivingly mellow feel of our favorite forward-looking soul and jazz albums of the 70s and 80s. Still, this is an altogether modern and unique album that succeeds much more for the personality of the artist than it does for the bits of influence she's picked up throughout the years. Honestly, one of the very best soul albums we've heard on a major label in '03; we can only hope that the honchos at Maverick/WEA have an inkling of the depth of talent this woman carries around! Tracks include "Love Song (Pts 1, 2 and 3)", "Come Smoke My Herb", "Body", "Liliquoi Mood", "Fellowship", Good Intentions", "Faithful" and more.  © 1996-2013, Dusty Groove, Inc.