Motown US Vinilo y CD

Review: Although it received a lukewarm reception on its initial 2003 release, Erykah Badu's third studio album, Worldwide Underground, has subsequently become something of a fan favourite - in part thanks to its' partially improvised nature and undeniably impressive fusion of classic hip-hop and soul elements. As this reissue on striking purple vinyl, the album has lost none of its sparkle in the 19 years that have passed since its' release. The multiple highlights include sweet, retro-futurist head-nodder 'Bump It (Part 1 & 2)', the nostalgia-seeped 'Back in the Day', Dead Prez hook-up 'The Grind' and the block party-rocking hook-up with Queen Latifah, Bahamedia and Angie Stone, 'Love of My Life Worldwide', a club-ready update of the Sequence's early rap classic 'Funk You Up' (which, of course, Stone featured on and co-wrote).

Review: Erykah Badu tops up her patented purple vinyl reissue series, which she's slowly been building up over the last few years. Taking influence from hip-hop, jazz, R&B and art rock, the album 'But You Caint Use My Phone', originally released in 2015, dealt with the challenges of dealing with quiet-storm emotion in an isolated digital age. Prescient for the post-COVID era, this remaster and reissue is just as well-received for missed Zoom calls as it is for missed Nokia bells.

Review: Erykah Badu remains one of our favourite all-time artists and one of the greatest voices in neo-soul even though these days she never actually releases much music. Along the way from the 90s onwards though she dropped a superb run of albums including the still astonishing debut Baduism and New Amerykah series. This part, part one, subtitled Fourth World War, gets the reissue treatment courtesy of Motown and features plenty of Erykah's dark and trippy vocals, smoky soul sounds, candle-lit atmospheres and thought-provoking lyrics.

Review: Motown presents Eddie's 'Girl You Need A Change Of Mind', a mind-blowingly anthemic number, the kind of cut that burnt up dancefloors
when it first came out, and which has continued to please countless generations, through house, hip hop, funk, and beyond!