Recordings
Solange's table is ready
Solange Knowles happens to be the younger sister of one of the most famous women in the world, Beyonce. She's also quietly built her own estimable career, and her third studio album, “A Seat at the Table” (Columbia), delivers a major statement about what it means to be a woman of color in America.
The triple-threat singer-songwriter-producer's slim discography has raised expectations with each step: a 2003 album released when she was still a teenager that only hinted at the artistic ambitions to come; a more expansive 2008 album, “Sol-Angel and the Hadley Street Dreams”; and an excellent, more atmospheric 2012 EP, “True,” in collaboration with producer Dev Hynes, highlighted by the should-have-been hit “Losing You.”
“A Seat at the Table” is in no hurry to deliver a knockout punch. Instead, its subtle grooves and delicate vocals underplay the steely resolve, the long-simmering ache in the words. Solange transforms her strong declarative sentences about the state of her community — “Don't touch my hair,” “I'm weary of the ways of the world” — into after-hours soul music. Her collaborators — Raphael Saadiq, Magical Cloudz, Q-Tip, Tweet, Lil Wayne, Dirty Projectors' David Longstreth — come from across the musical spectrum. By Solange's design, “A Seat at the Table” is meant to be inclusive both in terms of message and music, untethered from formula or bromides.
It is a protest album from its title on down to the nitty-gritty of its verses, but its rebellion is not about lashing out so much as drawing in. Solange writes songs that seek to understand the world, but she does not cloak her observations in metaphor or oblique generalities. This is deeply personal music that never becomes solipsistic; her lyrics reflect the culture that shaped her through her personal travails.
“Cranes in the Sky” may be the album's loveliest song (among many contenders), as Solange's voice ripples like a duskier cousin to the late Minnie Ripperton over tumbling harp and piano. In a world of pain, Solange sings, “I tried to dance it away.”
Even when singing about her struggle in “Weary,” the music finds a glimmer of serenity: Her voice becomes a choir, the wordless melody a balm.
Interludes include the voices of her parents and rapper Master P, and their comments provide a profoundly adult perspective in what is very much an adult album. In speaking to her audience as peers, she has the courage of her convictions, even as some listeners may construe her words as divisive.
Following comments from her father, Matthew Knowles, about coping with and managing his own anger in a racist country, “Mad” presents a deeply nuanced examination of what it means to be typecast as the “angry black woman:” “I ran into this girl, I said I'm tired of explaining, man this s--- is draining, but I'm not really allowed to be mad,” she sings over a slinky soul rhythm. The music suggests a hazy summer afternoon, even as the narrator wrestles with her frustration.
The music points a way out, but its breezy charm shouldn't be misconstrued as a lack of resolve. “Do you belong?” Solange is asked at the outset. “I do,” she responds, “I do.”
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