Azealia Banks - "New Bottega" + General Discussion

New Bottega is so good that it has spurred me, FINALLY, to take a deep dive and actually listen to her material beyond 212.

It's a crying shame that she's such an abominable asshole, because she honestly has more raw talent in her little finger than many other artists are able to muster across their entire careers. I don't actually like most of the songs (not really a rap or house fan), but the creativity and skill are undeniable.

Also, has someone made the obvious point already that Beyonce's entire new era (which I like, before you jump me) is essentially Fierce with a budget?
 
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Also, has someone made the obvious point already that Beyonce's entire new era (which I like, before you jump me) is essentially Fierce with a budget?

Well, Beyoncé and Azealia are obviously drawing from the same pool of influences. Both have their own personal relationships with it; Azealia being a bisexual black woman who grew up around the ballroom scene in New York, and Beyoncé having a close relationship to her uncle who was part of the scene in the 80s and 90s – both excel at it.
 
Also, has someone made the obvious point already that Beyonce's entire new era (which I like, before you jump me) is essentially Fierce with a budget?
Azealia herself did it excessively on Instagram. Not exactly nice things have been said and tons of tasteless accusations have been made. Also within the ballroom scene there is huge discussion if it's fine that Bey went into that direction and Azealia is brought up as the credible example from critics.

As a white men I have no right to judge anyone here really. But I can say that most music has always been about taking existing things a a) take them further or b) distill them into something for the masses. Azealia did and does something very exciting. So does Bey. Pitting them or anyone against each other is never a good idea.

All I can say is Azealia has a couple songs that deserve to be at least as big as most Beyoncé songs but sadly aren't. And that New Bottega is top tier music and one of the best songs that dropped this year.
 
All I can say is Azealia has a couple songs that deserve to be at least as big as most Beyoncé songs but sadly aren't.

Oh no, that's not at all what I was trying to do - as I said, I ended up really liking Renaissance despite expecting to hate it, and there's absolutely no reason why multiple artists can't mine the same influences when done well. I was just peripherally aware of the whole Kelis debacle over an alleged drumbeat sample, but hadn't heard anything about Azealia, which surprised me. Guess I just wasn't looking in the right places.
 
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Oh, that's not at all what I was trying to do - as I said, I ended up really liking Renaissance despite expecting to hate it, and there's absolutely no reason why multiple artists can't mine the same influences when done well. I was just peripherally aware of the whole Kelis debacle over an alleged drumbeat sample, but haven't heard anything about Azealia, which surprised me. Guess I just wasn't looking in the right places.
Oh I didn't take your post in any bad way. I just wanted to say Azealia was very vocal on this and that it actually is a topic. It wasn't directed at you personally. It was just a chain of thoughts started by your post.
 
It's gonna grate on me that she mispronounces maraschino but then gets Moschino right.
For whatever reason "mare-uh-sheeno" is by far the more common pronunciation in the US, even if it's not Italian accurate. Honestly comes across a little pretentious if you pronounce it correctly nn. Same way if someone said "karaoke" the way it's pronounced in Japanese, they'd get a look.
 
For whatever reason "mare-uh-sheeno" is by far the more common pronunciation in the US, even if it's not Italian accurate. Honestly comes across a little pretentious if you pronounce it correctly nn. Same way if someone said "karaoke" the way it's pronounced in Japanese, they'd get a look.
It would be the more common pronunciation in every English speaking country but my point was that if you're gonna go with Mo-skeen-oh then probably say maraschino correctly too given it's the exact same sound in both names. Esp in a song namechecking Italian labels and imitating the accent! But truly 'my point' wasn't really a point at all because I was only joshing.
 
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She said she signed a deal with Warner Records yesterday. If this were any other artist, I’d be scared she’d get stuck in label limbo and say this was an awful move, but she wasn’t really giving us much in the way of music independently either so like dd congrats to her!
 
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