Minaj’s ‘Pinkprint’ delivers grown-up complexity

lifestyle

WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 17, 2014

Music & Movies

Green Day marks rock's new generation in Hall of Fame

Latter-generation punks Green Day won spots in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame yesterday, joining older legends in the band's first year of eligibility. Other 2015 inductees into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame include Bill Withers, the soul singer best known for his 1972 song "Lean on Me," and hard rockers Joan Jett and the Blackhearts. Three deceased artists round out the new entrants: the avant-garde Lou Reed whose Velvet Underground was already inducted as a groupalong with electric blues guitarist Stevie Ray Vaughan and blues singer Paul Butterfield.

The winners mark the 30th round of artists to be inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. The artists, or suitable substitutes, will perform at a ceremony on April 18 in Cleveland. Green Day was nominated for the first time. Artists are eligible once 25 years have passed since the release of their first single or album. A decade after punk rock's heyday, Green Day released its first album in 1990 featuring the band's combination of energetic guitar chords and raw lyrics that often reflected frontman Billie Joe Armstrong's social anxieties.

The Northern California band scored a worldwide commercial breakthrough four years later with "Dookie" despite the album's personal subject matter in which Armstrong reflected on mental illness, and his bisexuality. A decade later, Armstrong won wider artistic acclaim and controversy with "American Idiot," a searing indictment of then president George W. Bush that the Green Day frontman turned into a rock opera. Armstrong, 42, said that the honor was "incredible"

This photo combination of file images shows musicians from left Lou Reed, Joan Jett and Billie Joe Armstrong, of Greenday. -- AFP

and called being a rock performer "the most liberating thing in the world."

"For me, rock and roll is not an outdated term. To me, it means freedom," he told Rolling Stone magazine in an interview timed for the Hall of Fame announcement. The honor comes a year after another newly eligible band, Nirvana, was inducted into the Hall of Fame. The ceremony led to an unannounced, one-off reunion show as celebrated rock singers

took turns on vocals in place of the late Kurt Cobain.

Major figures in rock history The Paul Butterfield Blues Band is probably the new inductee that is least-known today, but the racially-integrated Chicago group had a major influence by combining rock and blues influences. The band played back-up during Bob Dylan's legendary first electric performance in 1965. Joan Jett and the

Blackhearts in 1982 scored a global hit with "I Love Rock `n' Roll"-a song that will presumably feature prominently at the induction ceremony-as she helped carve out a role for women in the male-dominated world of hard rock.

Vaughan won wide acclaim after playing the Montreux festival in 1982, with some calling the Dallas-bred blues guitarist one of the instrument's all-time masters, but his career was short as he died in a plane wreck in 1990. Withers also had a relatively brief career. He did not perform professionally until he was in his 30s and out of the Navy and left the industry after major hits including "Lean on Me" and "Ain't No Sunshine."

The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductees are decided by a vote of more than 700 music experts including artists and historians. Fans also played a small role through a public vote that counted as one ballot. Artists who were passed over this year for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame included Kraftwerk, the German pioneers of electronic music, and The Smiths, who won an impassioned fan base drawn to Morrissey's brooding, introspective lyrics. Other artists that missed the cut included politically-charged gangsta rappers N.W.A. and perennial nominees Chic, the disco outfit whose song "Le Freak" was a global sensation in 1978. -- AFP

Minaj's `Pinkprint' delivers grown-up complexity

This CD cover image released by Young Money/Cash Money/Republic Records shows "The Pinkprint," by Nicki Minaj.-- AP

Maybe we knew - even in 2010 - when Nicki Minaj released her debut set,that beneath the fluorescent wigs and zany accents, there resided a real-life grown-up. On some level, we surely understood that the now 32-year-old rapper had complex emotions and a past, and all the things that make stars more like regular people and less like characters. But not until now, with her third release, "The Pinkprint" - which includes production from Boi-1da, Zaytoven and Dr Luke, among others - has Minaj conveyed that message so clearly. The set's first single "Pills N Potions" captures the heart and soul of the album, even with songs like the Drake and Lil Wayne-assisted "Only" and "Anaconda" (along with its bootylicious music video) drumming up considerable buzz.

Throughout her latest set, Minaj oscillates between boss and broken. "Who had Kanye (West) saying `she's a problem'?" Minaj boasts on "Want Some More." She lives up to the compliment with sharp storytelling on the sinister "Four Door Aventador," which has

her name-dropping everyone from designer Donna Karan to actor Shia LaBeouf. She's bold on "Favorite" featuring Jeremih, and cocky on "Feelin' Myself" featuring Beyonce, but it's Minaj's aching that is endearing. She laments changing family ties and the death of a relative on "All Things Go," adding "my child with Aaron, would've been 16" in what, for most listeners, is a surprising revelation.

Minaj also refers to a decade-ago marriage proposal on the song - a tidbit that lines up with rumors that the rapper's hypeman Safareee Samuels had for many years been her romantic partner, and is now the subject of songs alluding to hurt and betrayal, including "The Crying Game," featuring UK singer Jessie Ware and the pop-friendly "Bed of Lies." It seems as though the gap is closing between Minaj's on and offstage personas, and so far, that's a good thing. -- AP

Lawyer: Free speech at stake in anti-Muslim film

In this April 11, 2000 file photo, singer D'Angelo walks backstage at the VH1 special concert "Men Strike Back" Madison Square Garden in New York. -- AP

D'Angelo challenges

Alawyer for Google told a federal appeals court Monday that free speech is in jeopardy if a ruling stands forcing it to keep an anti-Muslim film that sparked violence in the Middle East and death threats to the actors involved off its YouTube service. Attorney Neal Katyal argued that if a ruling stands allowing a bit player in "Innocence of Muslims" copyright privileges, it could extend to minor characters in blockbusters such as "Titanic" and "The Lord of the Rings," shatter copyright law and ultimately restrict free speech because anyone unhappy with their performance could have it removed from the Internet.

"The ultimate effect is to harm the marketplace of speech," Katyal told a 10-judge panel of the 9th US Circuit Court of Appeals. Chief Judge Sidney Thomas said the court would rule later on Google's request to reverse a decision forcing YouTube to take down the film that inspired rioting by those who considered it blasphemous to the Prophet Muhammad. A divided three-judge panel of the court ruled in February that actress Cindy Lee Garcia had a copyright claim to the 2012 video because she believed she was acting in a much different production than the one that appeared.

Cris Armenta, a lawyer for Garcia, said the extraordinary circumstances justified the extreme action of a court injunction against YouTube. "She is under threat of death if she is not successful in removing it," Armenta said. Judges peppered the lawyers with questions mostly focused on copyright law and how Garcia's performance compared to those of other actors and musicians. --AFP

In this March 10, 2014 file photo, rapper Lil' Boosie, whose A$AP Rocky poses backstage at the MTV Video Music real name is Torence Hatch, appears at a news conference Awards in the Brooklyn borough of New York. in New Orleans. -- AP

Buku 2015 music fest lineup released

Urban radio hit-maker A$AP Rocky and national electronic music stars Passion Pit, Bassnectar and Porter Robinson are scheduled to take the stage in New Orleans for the Buku music festival in March. The fourth annual Buku Music + Art Project lineup was announced yesterday.

Also on the roster is Louisiana native Torence Hatch, the rapper who went by the name Lil Boosie until changing it

to Boosie Badazz after being released from prison this year on a 2009 drug conviction. Buku will be his first major postprison performance in New Orleans, where he has a strong fan base. More than 30 acts are slated to perform at Mardi Gras World March 13-14. Tickets go on sale Friday. -- AP

New `Annie' movie less about `Tomorrow' and all about today

Forget the curly red hair and Depression-era orphans. The hit musical "Annie" moves firmly into the 21st century in a new film version where the star is a street-smart African-American foster kid who rides New York buses, and her savior is a black cell phone billionaire who will stop at nothing to become mayor. "Tomorrow" is still the signature song, but the "Annie," produced by a team that includes rapper Jay-Z and actor Will Smith, is all about today.

Quvenzhane Wallis, 11, who two years ago became the youngest person to win a Best Actress Oscar nomination, plays the foster kid living a hard-knock life in the multiethnic version of the Tony-winning 1977 Broadway musical that opens in US movie theaters on Friday. Oliver "Daddy" Warbucks is transformed from a 1930s industrialist into the workaholic telecoms tycoon Will Stacks, (Jamie Foxx), while

actor Bobby Cannavale adds a topical, satirical edge as his scheming political campaign adviser.

The musical's famous songs get a pop music makeover, sprinkled with the sounds of street jackhammers and trash can lids, and Annie's fake parents are found in mass reality TVstyle auditions. Cannavale said the updates bring the beloved musical "to a contemporary American audience which is one of many different colors, shapes, sizes and ethnicities."

"It is really exciting that kids can go and see themselves now in this movie in a way they were not able to before," Cannavale told Reuters Cameron Diaz plays mean foster mother Miss Hannigan, as a pill-popping, failed pop star. "This is a woman who thinks that to be loved she has to be famous, which is kind of an epidemic in our society right now," Diaz said.

Wallis made a big splash as an enigmatic child survivalist in the 2012 independent movie "Beasts of the Southern Wild." But like much of the rest of the "Annie" cast, she had little previous experience as a singer and dancer and said she had not seen the stage musical or any of its many TV or film remakes. "I saw the musical after (filming) because they didn't want it to interfere with the way I filmed it," Wallis explained. The way director Will Gluck filmed it, however, has won scant approval from US movie critics. The Hollywood Reporter called the film a "toxic mess," while Variety deemed it "overblown and undernourished." -- Reuters

with `Black Messiah'

After a wait of nearly 15 years, D'Angelo is making a Second Coming of sorts with "Black Messiah," a hardcharging attack on racial injustice that challenges listeners both musically and lyrically. Released as a surprise Monday, the long-anticipated album moves D'Angelo beyond his R&B roots to embrace the passions of protest rock at a time that demonstrations have swept the United States over police killings of unarmed African Americans in New York and Ferguson, Missouri.

D'Angelo, whose career was launched as a teenager during an amateur night at New York's famed Apollo Theater, won acclaim for his funk-infused R&B and soul on his two previous albums, 1995's "Brown Sugar" and 2000's "Voodoo," but he retreated from public view after a global tour.

"Black Messiah" defies easy categorization but shows clear similarities to his sometime mentor Prince, with the now 40-year-old D'Angelo powering his funk beats with a strong dose of electric guitar and an impressive falsetto. Bringing into focus the album's messianic overtones, D'Angelo starts the song "1,000 Deaths" with a snippet from a fiery African American preacher who rails against white presentations of Jesus Christ-a blond-haired, blue-eyed "cracker Jesus," in the pastor's words, using a derogatory term for unrefined white person.

D'Angelo builds off the sample with a heavy beat and a guitar solo. His lyrics deliver a message of stridency, with the chorus, "A coward dies 1,000 times / But a soldier only dies just once." In a song co-written with the producer and DJ Questlove, D'Angelo again questions the nature of struggle on "The Charade," singing, "All we wanted was a chance to talk / `Stead we've only got outlined in chalk." D'Angelo stays experimental musically throughout the album even when the subject matter turns from politics to romance. On "Really Love," D'Angelo starts off gently with flamenco guitar before the funk beat breaks through.

Releasing a statement at a listening party for the album in New York, D'Angelo acknowledged that he was courting controversy with the title "Black Messiah" but insisted he was not portraying himself as some R&B Jesus. "It can easily be misunderstood. Many will think it's about religion. Some will jump to the conclusion that I'm calling myself a Black Messiah," he wrote. "For me, the title is about all of us. It's about the world. It's about an idea we can all aspire to. We should all aspire to be a Black Messiah," he wrote. "It's about people rising up in Ferguson and in Egypt and in Occupy Wall Street and in every place where a community has had enough and decides to make change happen."

Director Will Gluck, far left, poses with the cast of "Annie", from left, Bobby Cannavale, Quvenzhane Wallis, Marty the dog, Cameron Diaz and Jamie Foxx during a photo call at the Crosby Hotel. -- AP photos

This photo released by Colombia Pictures - Sony shows, from left, Jamie Foxx as Will Stacks, Quvenzhane Wallis, as Annie, and Rose Byrne as Grace, singing "I Don't Need Anything But You" in a scene from Columbia Pictures'"Annie."

Return to roots for Nicki Minaj The surprise release by D'Angelo came on the same day as a much more expected album by hip hop star Nicki Minaj. "The Pinkprint" marks a return to the roots of one of the most successful female rappers, whose career has soared in the past several years through more mainstream pop songs and collaborations with superstars such as Justin Bieber. Minaj, 32, goes intensely personal on her third studio album. On "All Things Go," Minaj speaks of coping with the violent death of a cousin and hints at coming to terms with a past abortion, rapping: "My child with Aaron would have been 16 any minute." The Trinidadian-born New Yorker also defends her rise to fame, rapping: "Let me make this clear / I'm not difficult / I'm just about my business / I'm not into fake industry parties, and fake agendas / Rock with people for how they make me feel, not what they give me." Despite the introspection on the album, Minaj initially made headlines for a very different reason-what critics saw as Nazi overtones on the video for her single "Only." On the video, Minaj appears as a dictator on a throne with red-and-white banners bearing the letters of her Young Money label. Minaj apologized, saying she had not intended the slightest Nazi association. -- AFP

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