My Favorite Things 2008

It's December and that means it's time for everybody and their mother to create their year-end best of lists, and Can You Dig It? is no exception.
Over the next few weeks, we'll (please ignore the self-aggrandizing use of the first person plural) do a little tastemaking of our own by profiling some of our favorite things, covering everything from music to frozen dinners.

A great album cover as well

I've been a fan of Raphael Saadiq since I was a soul-searching eighth-grader and he was Raphael Wiggins, the lead singer of the forward-thinking R&B group Tony Toni Toné!. They actually played instruments, which was, and still is, a rare thing in the world of popular R&B music.
It was their second album, "The Revival" (1990) that first got my attention. It included the hit "Feels Good," which unfortunately is still the only thing many people know about the group. They went on to record two more albums, "Sons of Soul" (1993) and "House of Music" (1996), both of which bucked the trends of what was popular at the time, and therefore, are still listenable today.
Saadiq changed his last name for a solo career and began producing songs for other artists, including a Grammy-winning collaboration with D'Angelo, the Prince homage "Untitled (How Does it Feel?)," but saved some of his best work for his own solo albums, "Instant Vintage" (2002) and "Ray Ray" (2004). The tuba solo he melded with West Coast funk on "Still Ray," was proof of his musical genius.

This September, Saadiq released his latest solo CD, "The Way I See It," on which he perfectly recreates the golden era of early 1960s R&B, specifically the classic sound of the Stylistics, the Delfonics and Motown's house band, The Funk Brothers, without abandoning his own unique voice.The ballads "Oh Girl" and "Calling," a Spanish doo-wop duet with Saadiq discovery Rocio Mendoza, are among the album's many highlights, which also include the Hurricane Katrina-inspired "Big Easy" and "Love That Girl," which could be mistaken for a Temptations outake. And did I mention that Stevie Wonder has a guest harmonica solo on "Never Give You Up"?





Christmas comes early for Can You Dig It? when the wife and I get to see Saadiq open for John Legend Wednesday night at the Peace Center in Greenville. You should come with us, but if you can't, I recommend staying home with your baby and this album.