Gyptian, Sex, Love & Reggae

Gyptian’s latest studio album, Sex, Love & Reggae, is in stores today and his timing couldn’t be better. In the aftermath of all the Halloween blackface scandals, it’s clear that people need a hug and some loving, and that’s what you’ll get with this album. Gyptian, who many credit to being a modern day torchbearer of the lover’s rock movement (pioneered by the likes of Gregory Isaacs and Beres Hammond), has done a good job combining roots and reggae with a more contemporary R&B-pop sound. Over the past few months, he’s been busy showing and proving that his next project is worthy of your ears by releasing tunes like “One More Time,” a true school reggae collaboration with Melanie Fiona, and dropping the video for “Vixen,” which features Angela Hunte, the woman who co-wrote Jay Z and Alicia Keys’s “Empire State of Mind.”

Check out the video for “Vixen”:  

And don’t forget to head to iTunes to cop the album if you like what you hear.

Prince, The Breakfast Experience EP

Prince’s “Breakfast Can Wait” is an ode to morning sex; The Breakfast Experience EP is an ode to its remix. The entire five-track EP is a compilation of remixes of “Breakfast Can Wait.” The original song is a funky mid-tempo tribute to a.m. seduction while the “Grits N Gravy” remix sounds like a nod to 1990s uptempo R&B. There’s the “Espresso Remix,” “The Honey Remix” and “The Buttermilk Remix,” which is a contemporary jazz instrumental. Basically, there’s enough here to titillate the Purple One’s fans… at least until he’s on to releasing the next big thing.

Available here.

Res, RefriedMAC

Here, Res has lent her perfectly raspy, soulful voice to paying homage to Stevie Nicks circa Fleetwood Mac. She’s teamed up with producer Tim Spiker to Mac attack classics like “Rhiannon,” “Dreams” and “Little Lies,” and does the songs much justice. Stevie Nicks should be proud. RefriedMAC is a five-song EP that’ll be available in 2014, but you can hear a few snippets and pre-order the album now on iTunes.

Amel Larrieux, Ice Cream Everyday

Amel Larrieux has finally blessed audiophiles with her fifth solo album, Ice Cream Everyday, and if anyone who listens is smart, they’ll keep the tracks repeating over and over again. Then again, people who are familiar with Larrieux’s music should be used to that sentiment by now, because you’ve run her past albums into the ground (which is a good thing). Ice Cream Everyday is a lovely delivery of acid jazz-infused acoustic soul where Larrieux muses on life, love and self-empowerment in ways that only she can.

Available now.

Aaradhna ft. Common, “Wake Up”

New Zealand R&B singer Aaradhna teamed up with Common for the remix to her latest single, “Wake Up.” The song is an upbeat motivational tune urging the world to get up, get out and do something. The only real difference with the remix is Common’s verse, but other than that, the music channels a Motown-style sound like a lot of her recent album, Treble and Reverb. The Samoan and Indian diva, who’s been around since at least 2006, is starting to make waves stateside and just in time—because we could use more soulfully sanging singers in our collections.

Check her out here.

Starrene Rhett Rocque is a pop culture junky who often fantasizes about becoming a shotgun toting B-movie heroine, and aspires to save the world from the impending #ZombieApocolypse… In reality she’s a freelance entertainment journalist/blogger who muses about music, TV, movies and love. Follow her on Twitter @GangStarrGirl.