MEET MY LATEST BESTIE, Melanie Fiona. She’s Guyanese-Canadian, because in the Obama era hybrid vigor is the new black.Melanie says everyone recognizes the beat from her first single, “Give It To Me Right,” but can't place it, so I’m proud to proclaim that I called the sample—“Time Of The Season”!—right away.
“Give It To Me Right” could be mistaken for a standard radio skank track, and while I think it’s more than that, I also bear no grudge against skank tracks. “Ill Na Na” is way more *empowering* than any India.Arie kandy korn. Or try Cassie’s “Me & U,” which pulls off the ultimate coup of being slutty yet sweet. The trick is maintaining your charm and your halo; Kelis taught me that, and she only charged 99 cents.
I would say “GITMR” manages the same tightrope act, but Andrea Martin, who wrote the song for Mel, declares that it's not about sex. Yeah no of course not. It’s just about like wanting people to keep it real and stuff. (Don’t tell the guys, but such eyelash-batting innocence is part of the trick.)
This introduction may paint Melanie as a sexpot temptress, but that’s just her radio persona. The slightest scratch at the album’s surface reveals the hopeless romantic underneath. “You Stop My Heart” is pure malt shop swoon. It pairs well with my running favorite “Johnny,” a song that is girl groupy (= Cleb catnip) and makes heartbreak sound somehow fun.
SOUL SINGERS are practically the only ones who believe in love these days. We are meant to worship at the altar of the sensible, antiseptic Relationship; that full-cardio arduous, hideous, glorious thing called love is too sloppy and impractical for any adequately-analyzed modern citizen. We speak ruefully of 'partners,' of 'making it work,' and are so wise to the perils of infatuation as to damn near eschew its joys. As diligently as we lecture about the grinding labor a Relationship requires, the A-student could come to view cohabitational partnership as one more over-achiever's trophy, and love as mere irresponsible folly.
It can be jarring, then, to hear naive Melanie singing, I'll walk these streets all night until I bring my baby home. You can just picture her enlightened friends raising one eyebrow, like, Giiirlheainworthit. Because today’s faux-strong woman doesn’t deign lower herself to “Ain’t Misbehavin’” on the happy hand, nor “Black Coffee” on the sad. And then we have the audacity to whine from our impenetrable towers about where have all the Lloyd Doblers gone.
We are comfortable instead in the To the left to the left/Everything you own in a box to the left mold, in which despair curdles straight to vengeful stiletto anger—a move we presumably cribbed from old-fashioned faux-strong men, and the insipid Sex and the City. (And who but ventriloquist dummy Beyonce would sing a song called “Irreplaceable” that means “Replaceable.” Still, I do enjoy singing it with my garden class girls. It’s pretty cute when fifth-graders say, Baby you dropped them keys/Hurry up before your taxi leaves.)
Melanie is also under the woeful misapprehension that hotness and tender-heartedness need not be mutually exclusive. Sorry, Mel: if you're hot you must be an evil temptress. It’s just that simple.
EVEN WHEN THE impression is flawless, it’s boring to replicate the old. Sharon Jones may be good, but she just makes me think, Hey, I could be listening to Mary Wells right now. Melanie--like Amy, like Leela--knows how to engage the authenticity of the classic but make it new. Hence the album's title, The Bridge.
“Johnny” mixes scratching with an American Bandstand sound, and she's dialing on her cellphone begging Johnny to bring her back her heart. (Wow, how contemporary and high-tech!*) “Cry Baby” samples the Vandellas' “Jimmy Mack,” which makes me very happy. It also uses cool distorted vocals and so sounds rather like that old-timey Fergie song "Clumsy," but with the merciful excision of Fergie. And just to flaunt her hybrid vigor, Melanie throws in some reggaeish tracks, and breaks out her Debbie Harry swagger for "Bang Bang."
*That was my inner critic teasing me.
OF COURSE, poetic injustice, “Single Ladies” bested Melanie’s “It Kills Me” for Best Female R&B Vocal Performance at the Grammys. What kills me is that the former, despite its goddamn stupid lyrics, actually is the better song, although Melanie is by far the superior artist. (Or even merely deserves the word.) Factory-farmed crap is sometimes tasty, I suppose.
“It Kills Me” is now making the radio rounds, and while she delivers the song with heart, I think Melanie's nature is more joyful than mournful. For a badboy lament, I’d sooner recommend Keyshia’s classic “I Should’ve Cheated.” And when you really need dark depths, put Amy on. Melanie is more suited to making the best of things.
Beware the evil temptress.
Cute real Melanie. Equally a threat.
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