I’ve been on an Erykah Badu kick lately, triggered by a months-old review in the New Yorker by Sasha Frere-Jones that made it pretty much impossible for me to avoid buying at least one album by her.
I feel pretty sure that she’s better in performance than she is on record — the video clip above from an MTV Unplugged performance attests to her charisma onstage. but on record she’s pretty damn awesome.
A big part of what I like about her music is the way she blends influences. Check out the video for “Honey.” If you can name all the references in the song — let alone the video — you are my musical hero.