Album Review: Janelle Monáe - Metropolis: The Chase Suite
Vinny breaks into your day for a few minutes to talk to you about his love of Janelle Monáe's debut EP: Metropolis: The Chase Suite.
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(upbeat music) - Anyway, anyway. - Speaking of cyberpunk stuff, you wanna talk about Genemone? - Hell yeah. - Let's talk about Genemone's metropolis, the Chase Suite EP. This is an album I stumbled upon many moons ago. This was a little bit after release of Tightrope. I think the EP that I had had Tightrope on it. It starts off with a song called "March of the Wolfmasters" where it's like this like imperial march type effect, like people walking in. And then all of a sudden her announcing that an AI robot has fallen in love with a human and that's not allowed. And she's recruiting assassins to murder, said AI. So very Blade Runner-esque, very, very fun. But it hits all those fun sci-fi vibes that 2008 pop music didn't have. (laughs) - The droid control marshals are full of fun rules today. No phasers, only chainsaws and electro daggers. Remember, only card-carrying hunters can join our chase today. - No lasers, just shadesaws and electro daggers. - It's a bunch of daggers. (laughs) - I know a handful of these ended up on the Ark Android album. Dear Mr. President did for sure. I wasn't exactly in pop music land at the time. I was dipping my foot into it and I was looking to a lot of experimental stuff when I found this, but it really hit me. I'm like, pop music can be cool. Pop music can be interesting. And it can do things that isn't just be on the radio. And that's what really attracted me to Janelle Monet. And she has since gone on to become very famous. She's coming actress now. Just so versatile in what she can do. And I've been a huge fan ever since I heard this one. - I'm literally going through all of those phases of emotion that you just said, listening to this. I was thinking that right before you said it, I was like, pop music can do something like this? - Yes. - She was very much ahead of her time. - And this is one of the reasons we kind of started this. It just like Janelle Monet is infinitely popular, but like not a lot of people know, and she still has that sci-fi-ness, like in Dirty Computer. I mean, it still has that kind of vibe, but to be so in your face about it, the way that Metropolis EP was was just so, was such a nice breath of fresh air that just kind of like really attracted to me to her and her music. It just essentially made me a fan automatically. - You said you did catch it when it first came out or you caught on to it later. - From what I'm seeing here, it was 2008 and I wasn't that early. I've definitely heard it like 2010, 2011 for sure. The thing is, so I graduated high school in 2009. I had found Janelle Monet after I graduated high school. - When you said it and I was good, I went on to Spotify and I was looking at it. And like the first five songs is like, it's like 200 million listens. And I was like, what am I getting into? I was like, what is this about to be? And then I scrolled down and found this. I was like, oh, this is a very deep cut if you were gonna have any. - Yeah, Janelle Monet has a lot of followers. Like if you look at her like on her popular on Spotify, it's like 151, make me feel it's 151 million listens. And this album specifically is in the only like the two millions. It's a good album. It's a fun one. It's just like, I'm sure she's picked up a lot more traffic from it just because of who she is and people that are fans of her are pretty big fans of her. Myself included, but that was the one that sold me on it. And I think I'll just like make me a Janelle Monet fan forever, you know. - I love anything that's sci-fi. - This podcast is just turning into getting Mike into pop. Slowly but surely. - And it's just one of those albums that I don't hear a lot of people talk about. I mean, people have been talking about 30 computer since it came out. It's such a good album. If you're into pop music, if you're into sci-fi, if you like seeing people push the buttons and just kind of do something different, I will always recommend Janelle Monet. Even better, check out the metropolis, The Chase Suite. It is a special edition EP. Top album for me from the last 10, 15 years. ♪ Badly ♪ ♪ Broad nose ♪ ♪ Cold state ♪ ♪ Tap shoes ♪ ♪ Broad boy ♪ ♪ Toto Tuxedo ♪ ♪ Holiday ♪ ♪ Creative block ♪ ♪ Love song ♪ ♪ Stupid words ♪ ♪ Erase song ♪ ♪ The gun shots ♪ ♪ Orange house ♪ ♪ Dead ♪ ♪ Dead ♪ ♪ Up with a dirty mouth ♪ ♪ Spill wood ♪ ♪ Stone brick ♪ ♪ Up on a cliff ♪ ♪ Like blood ♪ (upbeat music) (upbeat music)
