Word: scat
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...jail a poetry teacher named Lauren (Sonja Sohn, who can soar from a whisper to high-calorie emoting in the flick of a verb) encourages the inmates to examine the cycle of violence and put it into verse; they respond with pensive street scat like "I shot three m______f______s, and I don't know why." Well, it's a start. For Ray, it is the start of big things. He falls in love both with Lauren and with the furious folk art of slamming--a mix of hipster poetry contest and hip-hop riffing. Now Slam starts...
...beginning of "Apple Tree," she coos, "I can't control the soul flowin' in me," going on to prove it with scat refrains culminating in a call-and-response exchange with the audience. In "Apple Tree" as well as throughout Live, Badu lets her Southern accent creep beautifully into her phrasing, turning a there into "thur" and a can't into a lingering "caint...
...covers included on Live are not tepid re-workings that ultimately ruin their classic sources. Badu's rendition of Chaka Kahn's "Stay" is one of the best songs on the album. With her back-up band wrenching every bit of swagger and boom, Badu goes from a husky scat to a sonic howl that sounds like Mariah Carey after a massive infusion of soul. She does a medley of "Boogie Nights," "All Night" and "Jamaica Funk" that will bring a smile to lovers of '70s funk everywhere...
...musical attraction of "Semi-Charmed Life" is the scat section of the chorus-an easy sing-along that gives permission to even the most tone deaf amateur to join in (believe me, I know!). Along with this bebop blast, the chorus proclaims "I want something else, to get me through this...semi-charmed kind of life." Who better to identify with this mantra than the supposedly characteristic bored youth generation? Well, I have no answer for that, but I can say that a handful of suburban kids working jobs for spending money and wasting time in search of fun would...
Badu, whose original name was Erykah Wright (she gave herself the surname in homage to scat music), was born and raised in Dallas (she now lives in Brooklyn, New York). She studied theater at Louisiana's Grambling State University but, after deciding that "a degree is a piece of paper," left to pursue a music career. Kedar Massenburg, a 32-year-old record-company executive, heard Badu's demo tape and offered to sign her to his fledgling label, Kedar Entertainment. Says Badu: "I had several offers, but I went with him because he was young, black, very smart...