SONG OF THE DAY
“Love Song #1” by Meshell Ndegeocello (Comfort Woman, Maverick Records, 2003). Written by Meshell Ndegeocello.
INTERESTING FACTS (a la wikipedia)
– Comfort Woman is the fifth solo album by Me’shell Ndegeocello.
– The album peaked at #150 on the Billboard Top 200 list that year. The album also peaked at #43 on Billboard’s R&B Album chart.
– The LP was the final record released by Maverick, ending her 10 year contract.
– Me’shell Ndegeocello’s contributions to the record include bass guitar, vocals, production, vocal arrangement, and “additional instrumentation” [whatever that is].
– Meshell Ndegeocello (born August 29, 1968) is an American singer-songwriter, rapper, bassist, and multi-instrumentalist. Her music incorporates funk, soul, hip hop, reggae, R&B, rock, and jazz.
– She has received significant critical acclaim throughout her career, and has had ten career Grammy Award nominations. She is often credited for having “sparked the neo-soul movement.”
– Ndegeocello was born in Berlin, Germany, to army lieutenant and saxophonist father Jacques Johnson and health care worker mother Helen.
– She was raised in Washington, D.C. where she attended Duke Ellington School of the Arts and Oxon Hill High School.
– Named Michelle Lynn Johnson at birth, Ndegeocello has had numerous name changes. She adopted the surname Ndegeocello, which means “free like a bird”. Meshell Ndegeocello is pronounced Mee-shell N-deh-gay-o-chel-o. Early pressings of Plantation Lullabies were stickered with the instructions. She has changed the spelling of this name a number of times during her career; for a long time in her career her stage name was Meshell Ndegeocello, without apostrophes or any unusual capitalizations. According to some sources and the current themes in her new material she has converted to Islam, and now goes by the name Meshell Suhaila Bashir-Shakur.
– Ndegeocello is bisexual and previously had a relationship with feminist author Rebecca Walker.
– She suffers from photosensitive epilepsy and is susceptible to seizures induced by flash photography when she is performing live.
– Her son Askia was born in 1989.