Alicia Keys rode into the 21st century in a motorcade of hype, fueled by comparisons to just about every golden-voiced god of the past. Since putting out her debut album at age 20, the smooth New Yorker has been pitched as the heir apparent. Calling the record Songs in A Minor reinforced her classical music tutelage, doubling down on the line that she was an artist of substance right at the start of the Pop Idol era. Do you remember how big a hit “Fallin’” was? Keys somehow managed to tread between neo soul legitimacy and commercial prosperity.Her sound was something completely different than cyborg songstress Aaliyah’s progressive digital grooves. Instead, Keys took a vintage R&B style and deftly adding modern touches, even when working with super-producers like Kanye West and Timbaland, or providing the uptown chutzpah on Jay Z’s mega smash “Empire State of Mind.” Her recently released sixth studio album HERE isn’t quite her finest work (The Diary of Alicia Keys is my favorite of the canon), but it is in the traditional Keys vein. “I feel like history on the turntables,” she declares on opener “The Beginning (Interlude).” “Old school to new school, like nothing ever been realer.”This album finds Keys embracing her appointed role as a medium of bygone eras. It’s the distillation of decades of musical history, as well as her own body of work. She quickly namedrops two key influences: Nina Simone on HERE’s intro and Sam Cooke on first song “The Gospel,” a track that sees her bring rap to the jamboree.Elsewhere, the bluesy groove of Keys’ organ on “Illusion of Bliss” is reminiscent of ‘50s R&B belter Big Maybelle’s “Candy,” as well as The Animals’ “House of The Rising Sun” and Led Zeppelin’s more muscular blues rock. One of the most prominent instruments throughout the record is the acoustic guitar, as Keys evokes the spirit of the Delta Blues, Bob Dylan (who once name dropped her in the song “Thunder on the Mountain”) and Bob Marley. The militant march of “Pawn It All” itself sounds like a redemption song, trudging forward with the relentless stomp of Son House’s “John the Revelator.”Album standout “She Don’t Really Care_1 Luv” moves to the same summertime cookout flavor that DJ Jazzy Jeff and The Fresh Prince once mined from Kool and the Gang. The sleek track sees Keys’ graceful vocal moving with the satin-smoothness of ‘90s R&B, with the whole thing ending with a homage to Nas’s “One Love.” Though the influences are wide-ranging, Keys funnels them through her own distinctive lens. A decade and a half in and she’s still a key voice in commercial soul. Don’t take what she does for granted.
