Janelle Monàe: The Outkast Offspring Pushes Atlanta’s Underground Soul Scene Forward
By: Amena Brown
Photos By: Skylar Reeves
You know how the story begins. It's 1985 and Marty McFly pays Doc a visit, only to discover Doc's been working on a time traveling sports car. Before you can say gigawatt, Marty's driving a DeLorean back to the year 1955, teaching kids how to skateboard and playing Chuck Berry songs alongside buttoned-up ’50s crooners.
Janelle Monàe could teach Marty a little something about traveling time. She is a walking anachronism, a welcome collision of era, sound, and fashion with her characteristic afro-pompadour, high-waist trousers, and saddle shoes. An alternative soul vocalist, Monàe’s music channels the intrigue of classic Judy Garland, the wonder of the Parliament mothership, and the frisky, rocking soul of Prince as she brings new music from the future to the present on her new album Metropolis.
There’s no place like home, and as a Kansas City, Kansas native, Monàe makes her home where the music is. Growing up in a small town with a father on drugs, Monàe learned to create her own world through her imagination. Music gave her a place to pour the hard knock stories she watched and experienced growing up. She ended up in Atlanta, figuring if the soulful city was big enough to house Outkast’s innovative sound that it might big enough for her too.
“When I moved to Atlanta, I lived near the AUC [Atlanta University Center], in a boarding house with five other girls and I started writing music. I would go on dorm lounge tours and really give people me, as a song,” Monàe said.
While honing her songwriting and performing, Monàe met Wondaland producers, Chuck Lightning and Wolfmaster Z. The first time Lightning and Z heard Monàe they knew they wanted to work with her.
“As soon as that young lady opened her mouth, I was like ‘Aww man she is crazy!’” Z says. “I remember watching the whole crowd lean forward in their seats and their mouths dropped. I could tell this was really an impactful thing. I made sure we got her information afterwards. She had asked me for a pen earlier and I was like, ‘A pen?! You need a record deal!”
Lightning and Z produced Monàe’s first EP, an acoustic album titled, The Audition, on which Monàe built her college fan base. But Janelle wasn’t interested in producing the same sound over and over again.
“She is not the type to want to do anything that anybody else is doing. If somebody else is doing something she’ll be like ‘Hmm, let’s go over here and see if they have any green oranges,’” Z said and laughed. “Anything that’s obtuse or abnormal, she’s going for that to see if she can make it her own.”
Monàe continued to perform around the city, increasing her already growing buzz. One of her open mic performances left a chokehold impression on Big Boi of Outkast. He signed her to his Purple Ribbon imprint, which led to appearances on Big Boi Presents Got Purp Vol. 2 singing the Wondaland produced, “Letting Go” and a dance cover of DeBarge’s “Time Will Reveal.” Monàe also appeared on Idlewild songs “Call the Law” and “In Your Dreams.” Working with a group she had grown up admiring continued to fuel Monàe’s inspiration and exposed her sound to more listeners.
“I looked at Outkast and saw that they were accepted socially, and they were getting Grammys. But musically, it’s like they don’t care if they are accepted, even though they are,” Monàe revealed, “I’m not trying to be better than what everybody else is doing. I look to people like Elvis, Buddy Holly, James Brown, and the people that have come before me. I’m just trying to be more funky than they were.”
Monàe and the Wondaland producers have since formed the Wondaland Arts Society record label, through which Monàe will release Metropolis in four “suites,” with four or five songs on each. The project will culminate with the release of one CD that will combine the music from each suite. Suite I: The Chase was released August 24.
A French-fair inspired track led Monàe and the Wondalanders to the Metropolis concept. The idea draws some inspiration from the 1927 groundbreaking Fritz Lang film of the same name — Metropolis (the album) keeps Lang’s struggle between the “Haves” and the “Have-Nots” but adds a compelling android character — Cindi Mayweather — as a heroine. In Monàe’s Metropolis, androids, cyboys, and cyber girls are the citizens, and musical innovation doesn’t have walls or a ceiling.
“I’m a huge Andy Warhol fan,” she says. “And he said always to do your art. Don’t label it. Let everyone else figure out what they think it is, and while they’re trying to figure out what you’re doing, keep doing more art. I care more about my supporters than I care about being accepted by the music industry, or about being über famous.”
Recording at Wondaland Studio with its grass-like flooring, bubbling fish tank, and cotton candy and popcorn machines, Monàe, Lightning, and Z built the Metropolis sound with live instruments, void of obvious samples and recycled lyrics. The guitars, bass, and cello suspended from the wall testify to the string-laden sound of Suite I: The Chase, which also features vintage synths.
“One of the greatest gifts that we’ve gotten from this Janelle Monàe project is watching people react to her music the way they have. Not just fans of her music, but other artists. She really is one of those artist’s artists, kind of like how Björk is to some people,” Lightning admitted.
On a steamy July day, Morehouse College’s Sale Hall is sprinkled with students and Janelle Monàe fans. Dressed in 1950s-inspired outfits — jocks, nerds, greasers and cool girls — all hoping to garner a spot in Monàe’s first video and lead single, “Violet Stars Happy Hunting,” which showcases her alto bravado over sci-fi inspired beds of music.
Monàe sits to the side of the stage, taking the time to meet each one. Her team of creative people is all here, but it’s evident in the way Monàe keeps her eyes on the whole scene that she has a way she likes things done. After a few minutes, she takes her stance on the corner of the stage and proceeds to project her hellos to everyone who gathered for the audition, immediately filling the room with her voice and captivating everyone’s attention.
She speaks in a crisp, clean tone with the class and sass of a young diva whose ego had not had the chance to grow outrageous. She thanks everyone for their patience and support and for sharing their talent with her. She smiles and takes her seat, the cue for everything to begin.
Each group of auditioners is asked to dance to “Violet Stars Happy Hunting,” which swings a rocked out funk with a slight ‘60s twist. You can easily do the jerk to this music and many of those auditioning do and get down to be setting their arms and legs free. If Monàe has her way, maybe minds will be set free, too.
“I want people to feel comfortable within themselves and not feel like it’s cool to not read or not accept yourself for who you really are. I’m not going to compromise myself as a young lady just to be in a video or to get a record deal or any of those things. I have a huge responsibility to other young girls. I’m always conscious of the things that I say, how I dress, and the type of music that I put out,” Monàe says.
Many of the young women Monàe refers to may find themselves in Cindi Mayweather’s story. As a Metropolis android, although Cindi is programmed not to feel, she falls in love with human Anthony Greendown, and wrestles with whether or not she should forsake love to be accepted.
“I traveled to Metropolis in 2719, and I had the chance to walk in Cindi’s shoes,” Monàe says with the demure chic of a classic starlet. “I learned a lot of life lessons there and it’s my job as an artist to tell everybody what’s going on. If we don’t try tofocus on change we’re going to have a hard time progressing and moving forward in life.”
Although Monàe does not describe Cindi as her alter ego, it’s not a stretch to draw some parallels between their adventures. While sci-fi Mayweather wonders whether or not to give in to interspecies human love, Monàe is still figuring out how to give in to career advice from business people.
“Stevie Wonder’s ‘Girl Blue’ is one of my theme songs, because I’m very independent. What I’ve been able to do is to learn how to accept help,” Monàe confesses. “Learn how to always remain humble and if there’s anything I need, ask. People are here to help and ‘Girl Blue’ is speaking about letting people help you, and accepting love.”
In ten years, if Janelle had to introduce you to her future self, she’s not even sure if she can tell you who that person is going to be.
“I may not even be alive in ten years, but I want people to know that I died trying to do as much as I could to help better the world. The world is going to change with or without me. But what I want to do is take it some type of direction musically to where people from all different walks of life have felt compelled to figure out their purpose in life,” Monàe replied.
And with that, her time machine arrives as she continues casting for a 1950s cyber hop set in the year 2719. Clearly Janelle Monàe’s time traveling has Marty McFly and Doc beat.
www.janellemonae.com |
