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28 Days of Album Cover Blackness With VSB, Day 13: Preston Love's Preston Love's Omaha Bar-B-Q (1969)
Have you ever seen an album cover that had you at hello? For me, that album cover would be Preston Love’s Preston Love’s Omaha Bar-B-Q (featuring Shuggie Otis on Guitar). I’d never heard of Preston Love. Or at least I didn’t know I had. You see, you know Preston Love even if you don’t know…
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28 Days of Album Cover Blackness With VSB, Day 12: Diana Ross' Diana (1980)
You know this album. I know this album. Your neighbor knows this album. Everybody knows this album by the Queen of Motown, Diana Ross, simply titled diana. Even if you can’t tell me what songs are on this album title, if you love Black music, I’m about 100 percent sure you know this cover. Everybody’s…
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28 Days of Album Cover Blackness With VSB, Day 11: Kay-Gees' Keep On Bumpin' & Masterplan (1974)
I cannot stress to you how much I love this album cover for the Kay Gee’s 1974 album, Keep On Bumpin’ & Masterplan (alternately released with the title Hustle With Every Muscle). Shot by Howard Winters and designed by Frank Daniel, this album cover for the Kay-Gees debut album is a masterclass in Black cool…
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The 2021 Skippies: An Interview With the Bay Area About Whether or Not They Were Snubbed In the 'Best Verzuz' Category
Last week, The Root dropped our nominations for the second annual The Blackest Awards, or more simply, the 2021 Skippies. The categories, both fun and serious, are fairly non-controversial. The nominations though, can sometimes tread into “Yo, how are you going to include X but not Y?” One such situation this year centered on a…
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28 Days of Album Cover Blackness With VSB, Day 10: The Brothers Johnson's Winners 1981
To be Black (especially in America) is to know the Brothers Johnson. They had several No. 1 singles on the R&B charts in the ’70s and ’80s. Even though they didn’t write “Strawberry Letter 23“—that distinction goes to Shuggie Otis—their rendition is probably the one most of us are familiar with. They also gave us…
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28 Days of Album Cover Blackness With VSB, Day 9: Amii Stewart's Knock On Wood (1979)
You may know Amii Stewart because she had a monster disco song in 1979, “Knock On Wood.” The song made it all the way to the top of the pop charts and is a disco staple. And it still bay-yangs. You know what else bay-yangs? This album cover. For one, Amii is giving all a…
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28 Days of Album Cover Blackness With VSB, Day 8: Guy Warren of Ghana's Afro-Jazz (1969)
I’ll bet if that if I didn’t tell you that this album cover was for an album by a Ghanaian artist in 1969, I’d bet good money that you might assume this was a reference cover for a Kool Moe Dee album in 1989. Or for some gangsta rap artist out of Compton in the…
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28 Days of Album Cover Blackness with VSB, Day 7: Miles Davis' On the Corner (1972)
I mean, I don’t even have to say it, but do you see this cover?? Look at all that animated Blackness permeating that bright yellow background. I like to think that yellow represents the sun, and everybody on the cover is the Black gold of the sun? This cover is for Miles Davis’ 1972 album…
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28 Days of Album Cover Blackness With VSB, Day 6: Queen Latifah's Nature of A Sista' (1991)
The album cover for Queen Latifah’s sophomore album, Nature Of A Sista’, is a much better take on the album cover for her debut, All Hail the Queen. Where All Hail the Queen had her standing in a stately, militaristic-ish fashion with the album’s title surrounding a silhouette of the African continent—it was a little…
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28 Days of Album Cover Blackness With VSB, Day 5: Betty Davis' Nasty Gal (1975)
I love Betty Davis. Her string of albums in the early to mid ’70s—any of which could have easily been included in this series—are a clinic in funk, and in my estimation, were decades ahead of their time. In fact, that’s why I included this particular album, Davis’ 1975 album, Nasty Gal, in this series.…
