Eric Roberson - Music Fan First (2009)

There is a generational sea change in indie soul music and on Music Fan First Eric "Erro" Roberson proves he's still firmly a leader in those transitions. Following the trajectory of jazz, soul is steadily moving from its version of be-bop cool to a more eclectic, electronic-funk hybrid age in music. Listening to Roberson's Music Fan First, is akin to your parents' experience of watching Miles Davis exit the hard bop world of blues and standards to create 1970's Bitches Brew or John Coltrane's adventurous travels on Transitions into avant-garde jazz sermons. It is not a surprise to hear Erro give disparate musical ideas, elements, and genres minutes-long expression within the same song, like a series of jazz movements. On any given song there are improvisational, sewn together spaces of hip hop meets soul meets rock meets doo wop meets...well, you get the idea. Musically, Eric is not alone in travelling into this ADD territory in underground R&B, and as an indisputable leader in independent soul it makes sense that he should join in on this growing party of experimental musical chemists pushing the boundaries of what qualifies as soul or at least soulful. But do all these science experiments sound good?

More often than not on Music Fan First the answer is "yes." It helps that Roberson is in extraordinary voice on some of these cuts, venturing more into the sweetness of his falsetto on ballads like "Pave A New Road." But, as I often find myself writing repeatedly over this summer, listeners may have to first abandon expectations of what their favorite artist is supposed to sound like to receive what's happening to their artist's sound right now. Of the latest daring releases, Eric does a better job than most progressive soulsters in making sure there is enough material for loyal fans of his old sound to dig into. There are three obvious radio singles that will delight fans of old Erro, including a smoldering duet with Lalah Hathaway ("Dealing") and a smash of a dance song with Wayna ("Wanna Believe It Again"). Fans who've seen Eric on tour this year have already heard him and the band perform an obvious single, "The Power That Kisses Hold," which holds up considerably better on the recording than I think it has on the song's first live forays. There are also three old school ballads that are classic Roberson, including: the intimate "Weekend Getaway;" the elegant, if thin "She;" and the simple "Borrow You." However, those songs-let's say seven or so strong-are the minority on the seventeen-track Music Fan First. The rest largely are the eclectic hybrid mixes that represent Roberson's love of various other genres he's clearly been itching to play with.

Eric Roberson's love of rock, electronica, and hip hop is no shocker to anyone who has seen his shows, where the most skeptical of listeners become life-long Erro converts. Roberson's rock and hip hop breaks from swooning ballads and housey foot-stompers are often show highlights, generating enormous applause from fans desperate for any release from these hard times. So, this isn't all new. Erro's played with movements and genre-bending on his debut, Esoteric, and more recently on Appetizer. He's also always written syllable-heavy songs that could be spit as rap verse rather than sung, but he's never committed so completely to letting go of traditional pop melody or structure like he has on Music Fan First. Where Eric demonstrates his serious skills as a musician is in consistently identifying a few compositional elements to tie together these adventures in sound in order to make these concepts real songs and not thrown together ideas straining for tracks of their own.

Hip hop dominates a quarter of Music. On "A Tale Of Two (featuring Ben O' Neil and Michelle Thompson)," Eric's sampling of Minnie Riperton's seductive "Inside My Love" is a ruse that quickly reveals a jingly West Indian flavored rap that doesn't introduce another new compositional element other than rap, Minnie, and band flourishes for nearly four-minutes, and even the transition-the guest spots-are really accent marks rather than notable contributors. The repetition of "I don't wanna stop," the infectious refrain of "The Hunger (featuring W. Ellington Felton)," holds together a fluid sung rap with that old Urban Ave. 31 flavor; one that free flows over jazzy R&B tracks for significant jaunts before retuning to anything resembling a chorus. "How Could She Do It" is a good example of an Erro transitional cut: the band is playing nu-bebop quartet material, Eric's many voices are harmonically singing layered soul in his signature style, while his lead alternates between rapping and rap-singing. 

For the next quarter, Erro wades into pools of synth pop and spacey electro-soul, but these strong skims are more melodic and accessible than his hip hop jams. "Bad For Me" is the most traditionally structured pop song of the bunch, whose clunky synthesized backdrops almost get in the way of what could be a solid single. A more successful melding of genres, "Pave A New Road," blends acoustic rock vocals with R&B bell trees, electric guitar, and video game sound effects (Ping, anyone?) for one of the most eclectic, gorgeously sung ballads of the year. The ebullient "Newness" and "Still," a deconstruction of older sister ballads like "Def Ears," "Obstacles" and "Love Changes," are the most classically romantic of this electro-soul squad and joins Foreign Exchange's "Daykeeper" and "Sweeter Than You" as pioneering examples of how progressive R&B can retain the beauty of its blues song roots while still maintaining forward momentum.   

With the standout exception of "Newness," the multi-movement works on this project are less successful in achieving their ambitions and join filler like "Break It Down" in skip potential. The Jackson-Dilla tribute "Celebrate (featuring Sy Smith)" and "Howard Girls (featuring Brandon Hines, Geno Young, and Aaron Abernathy)" each have compelling sections, but fail to work as whole songs. On "Celebrate," hipster fave Sy Smith is quizzically relegated to little more than a supporting vocalist on a bumping soft groove that too easily fades from memory. I admit to initially believing "Howard Girls" was creepily about guys nearing forty paying homage to young college girls, but upon closer inspection it's a nostalgic tribute to those now fully grown women during a homecoming. The HU alum here pushes "Howard Girls" through three different transitions (joined by a hip hop backbeat, fluttery piano strokes, and Curt Chambers' intelligent guitar) before yielding to auto-tuned doo wop and Bilal-ish gospel harmonies that are well-sung but simply don't fit anything that came before it.

It's all very creative and bold, but after awhile the post-modern experimentations of Music Fan First and its ilk self-indulge to the point of being a beautiful series of untouchable abstract art, appreciated from afar, but inviting only to those in the know. Luckily for Erro and his progressive indie peers, there is a hip generation in the know, one reared on rap, hip hop soul, 80s synth, J-pop, and a host of electronica beats; ones who completely appreciate Roberson and his peers' affirmation of their musically commitment-free, attention-deficit lives.  Music Fan First's mid-song genre jumps and patent refusal to be penned down by boxy labels and confining traditions are reflective of a generation chatting on Facebook while listening to their iPhone, and tweeting their last breath to virtual friends they'll never meet, floating from one experience to the next rooted in little of weight. Whether intentional or unconscious, the new music of Erro and other avant-gardists has tapped into the id of a generation, in both its fleeting nature and quick disposal of substance for feel and ambience. Though there are back-patting old school slivers and traces in chords, harmonies and experiences that have been five-fingered for this generation's soul, this is not their parents' music. Neither is there enough heft in these borrowed, fragmented sounds for it to be the remembered soundtrack of this generation's later lives. But maybe music born from-and for-a fast-moving people in a jazz state of constant transition isn't really meant to be. But shouldn't it? Recommended.

By L. Michael Gipson