i wanna thank ya

FROM September 21, 2004

Oh sure, you will hear breathless tell of the Dave Chappelle rigamorole, recounted by incredulous, red-cheeked attendees; you will hear of the guest appearances, the reunions, the unexpected collaborations, the man in the audience who caught Jill Scott's drummer's stick. And you might even witness it with your own two eyes, on DVD, in the warmth of your apartment, after Michael Gondry has sufficiently edited and distributed what it was he captured on his dioramic fairytale camera. You will hear of these things. It was meant to be grandiose, and it surely was, and even though I was not in attendance I suspect it was spectacularly anticlimactic, like opening your parent's birthday gifts on the appointed day after you have already secretly peeked.

Fugees reunion, that's all fine. But I ask you, was Al Sharpton there?

Sunday night, the day after Ft.Greenestax, Angie Stone hosted something of an epilogue to it, with a many-splendored procession of surprise guests and unexpected collaborators. These included Mr. THC, Styles P, Marsha from Floetry, Anthony "the women love him, so the men try to cut him down" Hamilton, backup singers (Angie's high school best friend and the woman who wrote all SWV's hits and two numbers on the upcoming Destiny's Child record), and, of course, the Rev. Sharpton.

But I'm getting ahead of myself.

Angie Stone, whose title "the Queen of Neo-Soul" is somewhat generic but also accurate, is Soul, partially evidenced by a fist-sized medallion in her right earlobe which declared, in gold wire, "SOUL." She, of The Sequence and Vertical Hold and D'angelo's toe-sucking, is one of the only people who can rock an earring like that and not incite dispute (though if Anthony "So, do you wanna come over for dinner tonight?" Hamilton wore one, I wouldn't complain). She opened with "I Wanna Thank Ya," the best song on Stone Love, which features Snoop Dogg rapping his gratitude for Angie's understanding of his gangsta within. Snoop wasn't there, so the rapper Mr. THC played his understudy. (A second "Mr. THC" was a clearly herb-knackered Styles P on "Black Magic," whose coherence and flow were equal to that of my senile grandmother.)

Angie complained about being ill, but it didn't effect her performance, and in a way it was fitting; her appeal comes from her incredible humanness. She embodies how being grounded and surviving day-to-day, normal (and specifically female) trouble is extraordinary in itself. Early in the concert, while describing how she had to fight to get the Anthony/Angie tour going, she even started weeping from the sheer rawness of it. I wept in solidarity.

(These were not the night's first tears, however; Anthony "i am so smooth and loving" Hamilton, verbally calling upon Christ but physically calling upon Crazy Legs, wailed and popped for "Lucille," his gut-wrenching song about abuse and self-destruction.)

But Angie's not all blue, and when she played songs like "Lover's Ghetto" and "No Rain," she glistened like church. Appropriately, right before her great hit "Brother," which, as J.Hova can attest, fueled an entire summer on the elliptical trainer for me (my gym empowerment album, '01's "New Workout Plan")--

Right before her great hit "Brother," she announced the Reverend Sharpton was in the house, and would he please come onstage and join her for a special song. After an unecessary introduction, she started singing--"Black brother/strong brother/there is/no one above ya/I want you to know that/I'm here for you forever true"-- it was certainly the most appropriate Sharpton serenade probably in existence. He tried to dance, a little, but I don't know if it's in his nature, because he gave up after managing a timid little bounce. It was amazing and I LOVE ANGIE STONE SO MUCH OH MY GOD. I cried like 95 times and traveled the spectrum of emotion via Soul Earring. It was a night of reprieve for romantics stuck in the wrong time.

Apparently the Sharpton onstage appearance was not unique, because when I got home, Steve told me he was at last year's James Brown show at the Apollo, but whatever.

IN OTHER NEWS: I am glad to hear Teedra Moses on the new Raphael Saadiq concept album; together, they sound like really sexy Atlantic Starr. And the beat for "I Want You Back" is chilly.