Shape What’s to Come is an online community for women to exchange blah, blah, blah — it’s a Levi’s promotion meant to target women using social media. I’ve seen far better corporate promo, even from Levi’s who laced us with a sweet Raphael Saadiq track in June. What does a women’s support group have to do with Metal Lungies? New Janelle Monae, son! On this track, Janelle skews slightly psychedelic for a jawn that’s secretly about female empowerment or something.
Quoth Jazz, “I’m a big Mayer Hawthorne fan, so when the chance came up to do the remix, I jumped at it. It made me feel like I was at a roller disco, so I went with the roller boogie feel… I had a blast doing it.”
There you have it. I was going to say it reminded me of the senior prom episode of Saved by the Bell (Zack sabotages Kelly’s date with Matt Wilson while Slater and Jessie get locked in the boiler room), but roller disco works too.
Check after the jump for some quick footage of Mayer and Jeff performing/working on the remix.
So what’s an Amy Winehouse/Mark Ronson song doing on a Quincy Jones album? Q Soul Bossa Nostra consists of reinterpretations of Quincy Jones songs. Quincy explained his role in the project in a recent interview,
These weren’t like sessions where I’m there producing the records. I’m just observing, really. I was just there for them if they needed me. I’m never in my life going to do a record that’s a tribute to myself. I don’t need it. A lot of people have misunderstood that. This is not a tribute to myself.
Of Amy’s track, Quincy said that she was originally going to cover “You Don’t Own Me,” but she settled on “It’s My Party” — both are Lesley Gore songs. “It’s My Party” works, but I think the slightly darker “You Don’t Own Me” would have made more sense for Amy.
So many names you’d think it was pieced together by a mixtape DJ. I remember when Chris Brown was that kid who had a song with Juelz Santana.
Update: A month later, here’s the final, full, dirty version of the remix. Chris Brown released an EP today with five different combinations of the remix’s guest verses, so you can choose which douchebags you want to listen to.
Master producer Salaam Remi only pops up sporadically, but when he does, it’s always something extra special. Chrisette Michele’s tribute to Audrey Hepburn comes straight out of Amy Winehouse throwback soul territory. Miss Michele’s upcoming mixtape, Love Thy Brother, is all unreleased material and leftovers from previous albums.
Some big, lively R&B from Oliver Daysoul, produced by Oddisee. Oliver also lent vocals to Onra for the amazing 80s throwback “Long Distance.” The EP is four songs plus instrumentals, a capellas and a remix featuring Von Pea. You may remember “In The Now” from Odd Spring.
The CMJ Music Marathon is upon us next week. New Yorkers have an endless supply of shows (“showcases,” they call them) to chose from, so ML filtered out the interesting ones. If you know about something we don’t, let us know. Check back because we’ll be updating this post as more comes to our attention.
Here’s the new single from Jessica Kaya, who is actually the sister of Toronto rapper Eternia. On “Heavy,” Jessica murmurs to a neosoul beat courtesy of Rich Kidd who also contributes a verse.
The video for Raheem DeVaughn’s “The Greatness” showcases the lovely ladies of DC. Sharp-eyed viewers will notice ML’s DJ01 rocking a limited edition Washington Capitals fanny pack.
