Who can resist the rock and soul filled tunes pouring out of this new mixtape courtesy of one of our favorite artists, Lenny Kravitz.
Artist: Lenny Kravitz
Title: Black and White America Mixtape
Label: Atlantic Records / Roadrunner Records in collaboration with Peace Bisquit
Release Date: January 12, 2012
Genre: Rock/Soul
Related Links: Twitter, Facebook
Produced, Written, Arranged, Composed and Performed by Lenny Kravitz.
Mixtape compiled by Bill Coleman for Peace Bisquit.
Mixtape coordinated and engineered by Jamie Brundage, Angelo “Pepe” Skordos and Bill Coleman for Peace Bisquit.
Artist Bio from Wikipedia:
Leonard Albert “Lenny” Kravitz (born May 26, 1964) is an American singer-songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, record producer, actorand arranger, whose “retro” style incorporates elements of rock, soul, R&B, funk, reggae, hard rock, psychedelic, folk and ballads. In addition to singing lead and backing vocals, Kravitz often plays all the guitar, bass, drums, keyboards and percussion himself when recording. He is known for his elaborate stage performances and music videos. Full bio here.
Review from PastMagazine.com:
Pop music chameleon Lenny Kravitz, being a half-white/half-black American, has plenty of justification for titling his ninth album Black and White America. There aren’t too many biracial rock stars in the U.S., after all. But as a musician, producer and songwriter, Kravitz has always been a tough nut to crack—he’s been a spaced-out guitar hero-hippie (“Are You Gonna Go My Way”), a falsetto-sporting soul man (“It Aint Over ‘Til It’s Over”), a fist-pumping, riff-driven modern rocker (“Fly Away”) and a piano balladeer (“I’ll Be Waiting”), among other titles. Being deeply immersed in both black and white cultures—and the musics of both—he brings a fairly singular perspective to his songs.
But Kravitz’s genre-hopping skills are pretty impressive, regardless of ethnicity. Few pop stars have been able to cover so much stylistic ground, and even fewer have been able to do so without falling out of the record-buying community’s good graces (even if there have been a few critical speed bumps along the way). If you turn on your car radio, you can flip through three or four stations and hear a Kravitz song at any given moment. Which is certainly saying something. There’s a reason he’s been able to stick around for over 20 years in an unforgiving industry. Even in his clumsiest, most awkward moments (Is anyone else still traumatized by the dancing-girl music video to the god-awful “Lady”?), Kravitz has remained a reliable craftsman: writing (or co-writing), producing, and playing nearly every instrument on every one of his albums. Full review here.
Tracklist:
- Come On Get It
- Everything (RedTop Re-edit)
- Stand (Count De Money Re-edit)
- In The Black
- Rock Star City Life (RedTop Re-edit)
- Sunflower featuring Drake (RedTop and Tony Sap Re-edit)
- Superlove (RedTop Re-edit)
- Life Ain’t Ever Been Better Than It Is Now (Angelo Pepe Skordos Re-Edit)
- Boongie Drop featuring Jay Z and DJ Military (RedTop Re-edit)
- Liquid Jesus
- I Can’t Be Without You (Craig C. Re-edit)
- Black & White America
- Looking Back On Love
