It’s been a while since the last Speak Easy podcast. But rest assured, this episode is better for it.

One of my greatest desires is to improve my relationships and to help people who encounter me do the same. So, this week I discuss the importance of friendship and dare you to ask yourself a question about how you view friendship. Don’t worry, I asked myself the question and I talk about my personal answer.

And then I provide a hypothetical answer to the age-old question, “Why me?,” but introducing a new one: “Why you?”…all for your listening pleasure.

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Welcome to Metropolis, circa 3005, where you’ll hear about an uber-powerful robot that’s leading her fellow androids to follow love and discover freedom. That’s the premise behind the whimsical drama that is Janelle Monáe’s masterpiece debut album.

But if you’re apprehensive about her outlandish thematic backdrop, she’ll disarm your skepticism with her transfixing voice and chameleon-like ability to channel so many different vocal personas.

Lead single, “Tightrope” featuring Big Boi of OutKast, shows the Kansas City-native at her funkiest, as she works into a frenzy only James Brown could appreciate or duplicate. Ironically it’s the only moment of its kind. The majority of the material is far more daring and memorable.

The first three songs of Suite II, the album’s first half, come at you in tandem, fused into a dizzying DJ mix that’s so infectious the songs’ deeper meaning is easily missed on the first listen.

“Dance or Die” starts Monáe off as an emcee spitting urgent rhymes: I’m praying for the man sitting without much time/May he understand the clock will never rewind. Then there’s a sprinkle of Motown on the breezy “Faster,” where she seems to catch her breath before launching into an all-out vocal assault on “Locked Inside.” Sampling elements of some of the biggest 70s R&B hits, “Locked Inside” instantly feels familiar but is refreshed so well by her unique church-bred vocal delivery.

Elsewhere, upbeat moments on “Cold War,” which genuinely infuses the British Rock of the late-60s, and “Come Alive” with its beautiful raw vocal and stripped instrumentation, harbor a completely different vein of intensity.

Those tracks could easily stand alone. It’s the other moments on ArchAndroid – the sweeping and intricately-placed overtures, and particularly the sprawling final two songs on Suite III (part two) that elevate Monae’s work to near-epic.

“Say You’ll Go” and “BaBopByeYa” both clock in at more than six minutes long, weaving through crescendos and stark moments of silence, while Monáe unveils the brilliant jazz guise of her voice.

But wait. She’s singing about artificial life, right? Or is she?

“Oh, Maker” is a pure R&B slowjam wrapped in folk music where she sings: Oh maker, have you ever loved, or known just what is was? The maker she’s referring to in the context of the album is surely the androids’ “maker,” but it could easily be God in a slightly different context. Either way it’s a love song she sings with such conviction it almost sounds like love lost. Few singers have been able to achieve this dynamism in their voca delivery.

Monáe purports to be an android as an allegory to the realities of society. All of the android folly is juxtaposed to the world we live in. Metropolis in 3005 is a snapshot of the world today; the globe is brimming with war, children are being stripped of their innocence, people have lost their identities and world leaders their integrity.

So, if God is the “maker” then the place she sings about on “Wondaland” must be an an heaven. That’s one way to explain why she sings to angels, and why the last line of the song is an echoing refrain: “Hallelujah, hallelujah…hallelujah.” There are other ways to explain it, although you don’t need to dig that deep to thoroughly enjoy it. This is true of virtually every song.

The seamless fusion of genres on the album – to include psychedelic –  is a testament to Monáe’s ability to . Even when the creativity is not easily placed, as with the overwrought “Make the Bus” and underdeveloped “Neon Gumbo,” the overall effort is grand enough to mitigate their presence.

Much more than a collection of well-produced and precisely sung songs, The ArchAndroid is a musical soundtrack in search of an accompanying feature film. Interwoven meticulously and replete with showmanship, the album’s main advantage -its cosmic ambition – may be to some its biggest fault.

There’s a chance many people won’t peel ArchAndroid to its purest layers and embrace Monáe’s immense artistry. But at the very least they’ll recognize that it’s the most ambitious album since Lauryn Hill’s ‘Miseducation’ and eagerly anticipate the sequel.

Please comment below or email troy@theurbanintellectualdc.com with your feedback!

A photographer attempts to tell stories with their camera. Sometimes we work hard to capture the essence of what happens around us. Then there are other times when everything falls into place. The moment in this picture happened on its own.

Over Memorial Day weekend, my family gathered in Connecticut to celebrate my uncle’s 40th birthday. After everyone had feasted on barbecue and soul food, friends and family began to pay tribute by sharing a few words about the birthday boy.

When my uncle’s father-in-law got the microphone, I prepared to snap a shot of him for the party pictures I was providing. As I was framing the shot I noticed that his wife was standing about 50 feet behind him, so I moved to his left side a bit more and included her in the shot.

The picture you see her doesn’t just show a man speaking into a microphone, it shows a man’s wife admiring her husband’s wise and insightful remarks during a family gathering. That is the story, and this photo tells it.

Please comment below or email troy@theurbanintellectualdc.com with your feedback!

If Alicia Keys isn’t drawing on personal experiences for some of her new songs, she’s got one heck of a muse.

The lyrics from her latest single, “Unthinkable (I’m Ready),” tell the tale of a women who pleads with her lover to make their love official, even though it will make them look “crazy.”

Well, you ask, how’s that similar to Grammy-award-winning singer’s real life? With her official announcement that she’s pregnant and engaged to hip-hop producer Swizz Beats (Kasseem Dean), a lot of people are wondering if she’s not a little crazy.

Marriage is a beautiful thing, and the birth of a child is certainly to be celebrated – but this won’t be Swizz’s first go round with either. He used to have a wife and already has a son.

Firm details are scant, but the general consensus is that Keys and Swizz’s relationship, which began in 2008, led to his separation and divorce from his then-wife Mashonda. That in turn led to Keys being labeled a heartless home wrecker, a rumor many people hoped wasn’t true.

Numerous reports from the blogosphere and gossip columns said Swizz and Mashonda were living separately prior to the start of his relationship with Keys. But Mashonda repeatedly blasted her ex-husband for abandoning her and his girlfriend for destroying her home.

The question is, “why?” It happens all the time in Hollywood. Actors fall in love with their co-stars while filming movies and TV shows. Anyone remember Brad and Angelina? Will and Jada Pinkett Smith met on the set of “Fresh Prince of Bel-Air” while Will was going through a divorce. Apparently, sparks fly in the recording studio as well.

But for others, the question is – of all people – “why Swizz Beatz?” Not exactly the way people questioned Whitney Houston and Bobby Brown, but sort of.

It seems that Keys gives insight into her relationship with Swizz with the current single “Unthinkable” from her latest album. Telling lyrics may sum up how much she doesn’t care that people don’t understand their connection.

“You give me a feeling that I never felt before…and I deserve it, I think I deserve it,” she sings during the bridge. Then, the chorus ends with the stanzas “If we do the unthinkable would it make us look crazy…If you ask me I’m ready.” Even if this song isn’t about Swizz (even though I’m sure it), the irony is uncanny.

I have to admit, I don’t exactly take Alicia for a fool. I know she’s packing equally well in the brains and beauty departments. Let’s hope she’s a love guru, too, because if she’s not the end of this marriage could play out like a song Swizz Beatz produced for Jay-Z on The Blueprint: “On to the Next One”

D.C. sports fans are die hard. They have to be. With the exception of the Capitals (hockey), a win is a rare feat for the major teams here.

This was the case when I went to a Washington Nationals baseball game on Friday. Not surprisingly, the lost. I can’t really talk too much trash – I’m a Redskins fan.

But I can take one for the team. Even though I still can’t see exactly why it’s America’s favorite pastime, I’m up always willing to root for a Washington sports team. That’s one thing no one but another D.C. fan can understand.

And with that…get those Ws up!

Feel free to comment below or email troy@theurbanintellectualdc.com with your feedback!

After weeks of hard work, I finally launched the Web site for my newest project and first real business venture, UrbanSophistic Photography. I’m proud to say I built the site myself and I think it turned out pretty well – especially for an amateur!

Also, Wednesday would have marked Malcolm X’s 85th birthday. But a surprised was unveiled on the same day that brought us a little closer to the heart of the leader who was slain some  four decades ago.

All this and more on the Urban Intellectual Podcast: Speak Easy.

Visit my photography portfolio Web site www.urbansophistic.com.

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Prompted by the book I’m currently reading, The Breakthrough by Gwen Ifill, I discuss an icon of change and my opinions on why we’ve got to stop being afraid of it.

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My niece Jaila is 2 years and 9 months old. She could barely say umbrella when she got this one featuring Dora for the spring.

But, as is the case with any two year old, she’s always walking around talking about what’s hers, even if it really isn’t.

“That’s mine! My sandwich. My cookies. My chips. My shoes. My keys.” Yeah, right.

Now she can’t get enough of her “uh-brella.” Still kind of working on the “um” sound, but it doesn’t matter. ‘Cause it’s hers.

Please comment below or email troy@theurbanintellectualdc.com with your feedback!