Still Ray, Ray.
London calling. From supergroups Tony! Toni! Toné! to Lucy Pearl, 'The Way I See It' listening to neo soul icon in this modern mainstream, Raphael Saadiq sparks nostalgia of catching a coach down to the Big Smoke in my twenties and just letting his playlist play on my shuffling iPod. As miles of motorway ended up joining big red double decker buses and black Hackney taxi cabs and Big Ben chimed in time. And best believe on what might be the last time visiting in London town for awhile this week as I say goodbye to some friends before teaching in Tokyo, I'll be playing it one more time, for old times sake. It may be because seemingly from about 2008 to 2011 he was almost all I listened to. Or because many of my gigging trips down to England's capital saw me seeing the guy himself in concert during this prolific primetime. Where I ended up meeting some of my dearest friends at his solo concerts and one supporting Lenny Kravitz on his 'Black and White America' tour (hey Olisa and Jazarah!). To even the man himself as Ray Ray told me "I saw you getting down in the front." Which if you had seen it (there's actually a YouTube video for the record...it's not pretty...trust me. I ain't showing you) roughly translates to something akin to someone nodding along in partially embarrassed hidden acknowledgement as the dad dancing is broken out at a family wedding. Hey, what can I say? With music like Ray's how can you not move your feet? From 2008's absolute game changing (actually...not in the clichéd way) classic, 'iTunes Album Of The Year' (remember iTunes? When it was the "new" thing?) 'The Way I See It' that took it back to the magic of Motown, all original, no cover. To the 'Stone Rollin'' 2011 release that went back even further to 50's rock and roll for your milkshake and drive-in movies. And after that unstoppable run of new classics based on a timeless time that let the good times roll, Raphael is back almost a decade later. Eight years removed with his most personal project yet that takes him back to the 'Instant Vintage' days of 'Ray Ray', showing us he's 'Still Ray' like over Dre piano, "coming home to you".
'Jimmy Lee' named after Saadiq's late brother is the singers darkest, but most profound album yet, marking yet another new chapter in his classic catalogue. Jimmy Lee died of a heroin overdose after contracting HIV and Raphael Saadiq confronts this trauma of losing his elder by writing about it and making the music we hear today. But looking back at his own past he doesn't just stop there as he also takes on Trump's America and the incarcerating problems that are scarring the face of his country aswell as his own troubles. On the anthemic 'Rikers Island' and the redux reprise, inspired interlude featuring the poetic wisdom words to the truth of Daniel J. Watts that follows, the soul man whose always had heart for real issues (see the 'Big Easy' New Orleans number that came out right after Katrina and subtlety behind the sweet sound plays profound) warns we could even be living in "Rikers Island" in our own mind as he sings, "the boy is shaking inside, he says it's something he didn't do/he's afraid to take that low ride, down Rikers Island avenue." And if you haven't seen this type of profiling pain in Netflix's groundbreaking 'When They See Us' serial, then "some of them are there for no reason/some will be there 'till they die" you'll see it now. On the sobering standout 'The World Is Drunk', over a fresh best and pure piano ivory, Raphael takes it to the gutter like a broken bottle as he vividly emotes, "eyes are black, black and cold" and "everyone around him sees the clown and they're laughing at him." All punch drunk for a hungover planet of aggravated anxiety that needs some soulful medication from this headache or at least a helping hand on the shoulder that says, "I feel your burden brother." But as he sings "I wake up a quarter man" on the Japanese flute beat of 'Kings Fall' (something we all learn from LeBron and the Lakers), there's still a sense of hope that runs through these songs struggles right through the 'Glory Of The Veins' featuring Ernest Turner that strains through the life of a dope fiend. The battle of addiction and even the temptation Saadiq faced, "I lost a brother to AIDS/But still he laughed everyday", Raphael mourns but with beauty for a life celebrated, even through the pain. Because through all the depths of darkness and spirals of substance abuse and addiction, Saadiq shows real soulful substance. Believing in a higher power than a narcotic. And that belief and power 'Belongs to God' on the Church recital with Reverend E. Baker's sermon service, that as a brief inspired interlude like 'Dottie's' before the glory goes back to 'Veins' serves as something that sounds somewhere between the Motown soul of 'The Way I See It' and the 'Stone Rollin'' rock of this rolling stone who deserves the magazine cover for this.
"GOD can I make it? GOD can we make it? GOD help me make it!" he pleads on the atmospheric opening of 'Sinners Prayer' which two hands together starts the proceedings this evening as we kneel by our bed before we lay down to sleep. There's no voice in this industry as distinct or definitive than Charlie Ray's and here as he prays through the pain we can still see the light for a man and his belief that refuses to be shadowed by shame or the sickness of the world. This unwavering essence keeps going over the foot tapping 'So Ready' like "I never come home at night/But still you stay by my side." Or the Rob Bacon assisted 'Something Keeps Calling' over guitars and the zoned out 'I'm Feeling Love'. Sizzling over speakers as he harmonises, "I've been feeling more than blessed/even though the hardest times" on this personal war on drugs and what they've took with God still on his side, two pairs of footprints in the sand. You can feel it on 'My Walk' if you take it with him too as he tells it like it is, "I've been moving keys and singing all day." Ying and Yang traversing through the good and bad like "if she takes me back I probably wouldn't stay," or "I've been taking backstreets just to feed my soul". And staring through the 'Rearview' like 'to pimp a caterpiller', or butterfly on the formidable finale, Pulitzer prize winning rapper Kendrick Lamar asks, "how can I change the world, but not change myself," as Saadiq fades out singing in a different Tony, Toni tone, "your life is in the rearview". The modern times legend with the black circle around his left eye let's us see with TLC like 'Different Times' a warning we really should heed as he and this musical journey disappears over the horizon as the sun falls on his latest set. But on 'Lee', Raphael doesn't leave his past behind, more moves on with it as he keeps marching on to a neo sound of an old soul he helped coin like a new stereo currency. Showing he can still afford more after giving us so much already. This is the type of raw but revelatory record all hearts can relate to. Looking up to the heavens as we feel it in our souls. For Jimmy. TIM DAVID HARVEY.
Playlist Picks: 'Sinners Prayer', 'The World Is Drunk', 'Kings Fall'.
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