Song of The Year-Jayraymecofasol​a by Jill Scott

by Dan-O

While it is true that I’ve never known Jill Scott to be a monster charting force (or even the center of the soul narrative the way Badu has been) I’ve also never known an artist who didn’t love her music. Being an artist doesn’t increase the amount of art you love it kind of decreases it, because the entire middle section of content that isn’t great but isn’t terrible becomes more frustrating. You pick apart the flaws in construction and delivery, fixing it in your mind the way you would your own work and by the end you can’t even look at it without thinking “this clearly wasn’t finished!” Jill Scott’s art is always safe and comfortable for an artist. The songs are structured and sequenced; the poetry she works in isn’t throw away stuff, its good work.

Listening to her new album Woman, I couldn’t help but picture my weeded out writer associates rolling up and nodding their heads. Her words aren’t just sharp. The voice is weaponized and unstoppable creating moments like Jahraymecofasola that sparkle and glimmer in captivating ways that feel more like the magic of soul than the intellectual force of a poetic mind.

I really think that Jill hasn’t been bigger(she has won grammy’s and been successful) because her music isn’t damaged enough. We all want our songstresses like Holiday or Winehouse, suffering in front of us, out of control. Jill Scott always sounds like a normal person. A gifted hard working normy and all that means is the tides of narrative don’t scoop her up as much as they should. Anyone who ever put pen to a blank page and made nothing into a world…adores her work and we got a heck of an album to show for it.

P.S. this youtube is a full album stream, PLEASE buy it if you like what you hear