So Friday night I headed to a popular nightclub here in Chicago to see my favorite singer perform live. It was my second time seeing Amel Larrieux perform live, the first being a couple years ago, February 2007 I believe. Despite the fact that I wish I'd shared my spare ticket with someone more deserving I was extremely happy when Amel began her performance right after midnight hit.
I don't know about her other fans, but I assume like me, their first time hearing her was on the radio back in 1995 when she was part of a duo called Groove Theory, and the hit song playing in regular rotation was Tell Me. I got my copy of that CD by ordering it, along with a couple more from one of those rip out and mail in club forms that were in every magazine blaring the get so many for a penny irresistible deal of the decade. I never paid attention to the fine print but at such a young age when the club membership bill came in the mail I was happy for a piece of mail with my name on it, but had no intention of sending them the penny or anything else.
I have no idea what album I played first on my cassette/single CD boom box but I know that Groove Theory's only release is the only CD I still play to this day.
Some years after that Amel went solo and that album was Infinite Possibilities. I admittedly did not buy this album when it came out, but only because I was poor and barely out of 8th grade. But from this CD do remember some television interviews of hers and the video for the single "Get Up", both grabbed my attention, but the interview stuck with me, and I wish I could say what about it did, but I have no idea, can't remember. I do remember thinking the video was strange and don't remember seeing it on the Box to often.
Aside from my constant need to hear the song "Keep Tryin" from the Groove Theory album, to get me through many difficult moments of youth, Amel was pretty much out of sight out of mind. Then out of nowhere she was on the radio again with the most beautiful song that no one knew the correct words to, except for me by the third time I heard it. The song was "For Real" and I was on edge waiting for the album to come out. Bravebird came out in 2004, while I was in college. By then I had money enough to go get it the day it came out. The only person I could share the excitement with was my friend Senyo who drove me to Best Buy and got the album as well, if I remember correctly I had to resist the urge to purchase two copies. The album was a smash hit in my eyes and ears but much to my surprise Amel released another album while I was in college. Two years later "Morning" came out and off to Best Buy I was again to support my favorite singer and her and her husbands record label Blisslife. This time I drove myself, I still had money and was doing well enough to have a car... the same car I have today...but anyway this CD is probably my least favorite. I can't listen to it all the way through like I do the others, however there are two standout songs from the album that I listen to on repeat and a that solidified Amel's spot as my favorite all over again, "Weary" and "Gills & Tails."
Then the unthinkable happened, Amel released another album, the very next year but I didn't hear about it immediately, I don't recall seeing it in Best Buy and I missed the new music Tuesday to get it even if it was there. I was hurt, until the next day when I realized it was a Jazz album. Don't get me wrong Jazz is fine with me but being back in my usual poor form and with the Internet, YouTube etc. the all consuming furor that usually overcomes me at album drop time just wasn't there. But that same feeling was back and in full effect as I waited patiently for over an hour for her cheating short performance to begin this past Friday. Despite the constant and growing annoyance from the person I shouldn't have brought with me I must admit again that I was in complete and total bliss during the short performance. However the time I saw her years ago is what I'd call a show.
Amel's daughter Sky Larrieux on the keyboards.
Amel has done a couple collaborations, been featured on a couple soundtracks and if I remember correctly was in a Coke-Cola ad campaign years ago with other and more popular artists. Her music is categorized as neo-soul which fits but her voice is unlike any other artists in the genre and though the content of her songs from the lyrics to the beats fit the category there is still something different about Amel Larrieux. Where most the other neo-soul singers can sing each others songs of course with their own twist, none of them can attempt an Amel Larrieux song. Maybe it's that there is so little of her personal life out there or maybe it because her song's don't seem to speak to anything we may have heard or would like to assume about her, whatever it is, the music is magic, at least for me.11:49p.m.
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