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Speaker 1: What seven two Weekend Breakfast, then the music corner take

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Speaker 1: that for winded Back, or Sir got the voice to

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Speaker 1: take you take that for winded Back. Ludacris got the.

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Speaker 2: Floor, Natasha Raymond featuring Ludacris and Little John a song

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Speaker 2: called Yeah, taking us to fourteen minutes before ten o'clock.

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Speaker 2: That's how we pick off the music corner for this

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Speaker 2: week because we're talking about the album Confessions. It was

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Speaker 2: released this week in two thousand and four. I think

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Speaker 2: it's gone on to become Asher's biggest album. There was

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Speaker 2: a time shortly after he released Confessions, after eighty seven

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Speaker 2: oh one, and people can't tell which was his best work.

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Speaker 2: I think twenty years later, Confessions has surely endured and

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Speaker 2: I think it is his magnum opus. And so we're

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Speaker 2: talking about the enduring and impact of this album and

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Speaker 2: how it shifted R and B as well. But also

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Speaker 2: I'd like to hear your favorite songs from this album.

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Speaker 2: Give us a call on one one, eight, three or

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Speaker 2: seven two, send us samsas on three one seven oh

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Speaker 2: two and send us her WhatsApp voice notes on seven two,

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Speaker 2: seven two one seven oh two. Joining us on the

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Speaker 2: music corners, Dr Charlton Leel. He's a musicologist, academic registrid

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Speaker 2: the Academy of Sound Engineering. Good friend of the show,

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Speaker 2: Doctor Leel. A very good morning too.

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Speaker 1: Good morning Goods.

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Speaker 2: So we're talking about Usher's Confessions. It is twenty two

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Speaker 2: years old now, and I think it's proven because there

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Speaker 2: was at some point a bit of a debate because

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Speaker 2: he had an incredible run. He released eighty seven oh one,

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Speaker 2: then he released Confessions, and people couldn't figure out which

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Speaker 2: was his better album or his best album. I think

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Speaker 2: Confessions has clearly proven that Confessions is the better album.

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Speaker 2: What do you think?

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Speaker 1: I definitely think that is the case. You know, this

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Speaker 1: was his fourth studio album. Actually, he had released two

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Speaker 1: albums before, well three albums before. They were two before

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Speaker 1: eighty seven or one than there was Confessions. He was

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Speaker 1: very young when he were when he was discovered, he

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Speaker 1: was sixteen years old, so he was a very I

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Speaker 1: think he needed to go through number one, two and

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Speaker 1: three to really formulate his sound, and that he succeeded

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Speaker 1: with in Confessions. What really differentiated this from his previous

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Speaker 1: albums is that the first three were very much like

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Speaker 1: boy rn B, you know, like what we've heard before

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Speaker 1: we've heard it with Bobby Brown and all of those

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Speaker 1: new jack swing R and B artists, and with this

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Speaker 1: he really pushed the boundaries of what R and B

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Speaker 1: was with this new sound, specifically with this song Yeah,

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Speaker 1: which had it was more like a crunk R and

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Speaker 1: B sound, which was really something that was emerging at

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Speaker 1: the time, but it was mainly a thing within the

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Speaker 1: hip hop world and not really within the R and

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Speaker 1: B world, And by adopting this new crank sound, he

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Speaker 1: really set himself apart from all the other R and

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Speaker 1: B artists that were in the industry at the time.

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Speaker 2: And so, I mean, part of what was interesting about

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Speaker 2: this album was the storytelling, right, this kind of and

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Speaker 2: even in the title track, Confessions, the story of a

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Speaker 2: man who has an affair and then his mistress falls pregnant.

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Speaker 2: He then makes this confession to his main partner that well,

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Speaker 2: you know, I've been doing some terrible things and now

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Speaker 2: there's a baby and I'm really sorry, And it was

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Speaker 2: I think part of what made this album so cool

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Speaker 2: was the storytelling. People thought it was his life, but

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Speaker 2: Jermain Duprix has repeatedly said it wasn't about Usher's life

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Speaker 2: at the time, because I think he was dating Chile

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Speaker 2: from TLC at the time. And Jermaine Duprix has said, actually,

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Speaker 2: the events that inspired Confessions, that made it so juicy

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Speaker 2: were actually about his life. But there was something about

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Speaker 2: the storytelling in this album I think that made it

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Speaker 2: so good.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, and that's I mean interestingly enough. Yeah, sorry, I

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Speaker 1: meant to say this, but like Little John was so

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Speaker 1: that song yeah, wasn't even meant to be on Confessions.

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Speaker 1: So what actually had done is in two thousand and three,

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Speaker 1: he had finished Confessions, he delivered it to La Reid,

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Speaker 1: who was the head of Aristo Record, his record company

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Speaker 1: at the time, and Ala Reid was like, oh, there's

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Speaker 1: no hit here. You know, you need to go back

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Speaker 1: into studio, and like, for an artist to go back

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Speaker 1: into studio after such a prolonged period of time in

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Speaker 1: the studio is quite a daunting prospect. And he didn't

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Speaker 1: know what he was going to do, and he was

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Speaker 1: really anxious about the whole thing. And they approached a

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Speaker 1: Little John to write a few songs, and he did.

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Speaker 1: He even wrote a few songs. And what happened was

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Speaker 1: Little John had just been asked to write some music

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Speaker 1: for Mystical who was an iconic rap at the time,

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Speaker 1: and he had written fifteen songs, but Mystical had only

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Speaker 1: taken two. So he had some songs that he could

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Speaker 1: chop around, and he gave the song to Usha. But

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Speaker 1: at the same time, what he didn't know is that

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Speaker 1: his record label had given the same song to another

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Speaker 1: rapper called Pablo. Anyway, he was then forced to go

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Speaker 1: back into studio and rewrite something that sounded like the

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Speaker 1: song called Freaklique and that's where Yeah was born out

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Speaker 1: of now. So the interesting thing about this whole album

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Speaker 1: is that Usher was highly inspired by Eminem storytelling in

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Speaker 1: the creation of Confessions. He was like, he liked the

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Speaker 1: idea that someone could, you know, expose themselves in their

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Speaker 1: totality to their audience, and that Eminem was a big

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Speaker 1: inspiration behind that, almost like exposing your Pandora's box. That

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Speaker 1: was a good and a bad thing because you know,

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Speaker 1: like it really brought in the audience, and the audience

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Speaker 1: really into the album. I mean, to date, it's sold

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Speaker 1: over seventeen million units worldwide, and I'll tell you in

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Speaker 1: a few moments why that's such a big thing. But

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Speaker 1: it did go awry a little bit because of some

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Speaker 1: of the misogyny, and you can even hear it in

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Speaker 1: the rap. Although that ludicrous rap is iconic, there is

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Speaker 1: a lot of misogyny, which was Rice at the time

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Speaker 1: and so Usher, And you know, the album was heavily

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Speaker 1: criticized for this, like misogynist undertone? Is it acceptable? You know?

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Speaker 1: Are we willing to celebrate that kind of thing? Well,

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Speaker 1: you know, a year later at the Grammy Awards, that

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Speaker 1: ended up getting four Grammy So I guess the music

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Speaker 1: industry really did buy into what the album was. But

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Speaker 1: I think more so the sounds and the craft of

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Speaker 1: the music making on the album more than the messaging

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Speaker 1: of the actual songs. But it was a storytelling album

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Speaker 1: and Jermaine dupre had has said on multiple occasions that

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Speaker 1: it wasn't directed at Usher himself. And actually Usher made

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Speaker 1: a very interesting observation. So when he wrote Confessions, he

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Speaker 1: had ended the relationship with Chile and he was with

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Speaker 1: another woman at the same time, and he said, cheating

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Speaker 1: wasn't what caused the end of that relationship. And that's

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Speaker 1: something that sometimes people miss out on, is like the

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Speaker 1: relationship could have already been gone for quite some time,

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Speaker 1: and that it wasn't the actual cheating. That cheating was

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Speaker 1: just a symptom of like other problems that were already

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Speaker 1: permeating through the relationship.

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Speaker 2: Before we run out of time, you said you wanted

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Speaker 2: to touch on why it's significant that this album assault

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Speaker 2: seventeen million copies.

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Speaker 1: So in nineteen ninety nine, there was this big case

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Speaker 1: in the United States called the Napster Case, And what

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Speaker 1: that naps The case did was a pivotal moment in

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Speaker 1: popular music history. It was basically opened up the doors

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Speaker 1: to digit music downloads, et cetera. And for the next

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Speaker 1: tween nineteen ninety nine and about two thousand and fifteen,

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Speaker 1: the music industry renting to a downward spiral and actually

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Speaker 1: people weren't selling albums. Record companies shut down or merged.

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Speaker 1: There was like big chaos in the music industry. So

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Speaker 1: for an album to actually sell seventeen million units in

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Speaker 1: the midst of that downward trend in the music industry

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Speaker 1: just shows you how powerful that album was. And for

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Speaker 1: an album to sell that many unit at that specific

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Speaker 1: time would have meant that Usher would have been a

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Speaker 1: massive power broker in the music industry at that particular.

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Speaker 2: Moment, Doctor lil So, it's a great pleasure having you

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Speaker 2: on the show. Thank you so much for your time

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Speaker 2: this morning. Thanks