Honorable Mention #8: Beyonce - 4

Maybe it was inevitable that Beyonce would be welcomed into indie cultures waiting arms. After all, Jay-Z was brought into the fold years ago, even after releasing consecutively disappointing albums. But in his case, to some degree, I think it was more the man, the ideals, than the music. And that’s why it seems a bit late, but about time, for Beyonce to be afforded the same respect. She has, after all, been releasing consistently more interesting music than her husband in the past few years. With 4, she further cements her reputation for releasing hook-filled, operatic ballads and broken-hip shaking club tracks and with far greater creative muscle than her mainstream pop “peers” like Lady Gaga or Ke$ha. Over the course of her career, she has managed to gradually move away from the limiting, generic dance/pop that made her a radio star and focus on the emotionally intense, though no less hook-filled and melody rich, connective songs which she has released on her last few records. With songs like the MIA-aping—in a good way—bombastic “Run The World (Girls)” and the curiously, critically maligned ballad “I Was Here”--and yeah I know that the first line is god awful, Beyonce proves that execution of any given musical trait has never been a problem for her. Over the course of 4, she never strays radically from the topics she has covered on her previous albums, including (female)empowerment for the down-trodden, her overarching love for her husband and the adoration she holds for her fans. But it’s the simple and subtle beats, musically and lyrically, beneath the surface which hold the album up and never let it fall into caricature or laziness. “1+1” and “I Miss You” both touch on her love for her husband but they feel more universal than that; it seems as if she knows that these songs can and should mean more than just a love for a particular man. She also knows the ramifications of love gone wrong, which are well documented in “I Care” and “Best Thing I Never Had”. And thankfully, these emotionally volatile songs never fall into the easy steps common to mainstream pop music platitudes. Beyonce has finally broken free of only being known as that woman who sang those songs with Destiny’s Child and as the wife of Jay-Z. With 4, she allows us to see that even in a genre as void of general creativity as mainstream pop, there exists the capability, given an artists’ determination and talent, to extend the borders between musical tastes and allow everyone to see and hear what she’s been talking about for the last decade.

Tracklisting:

01. 1+1
02. I Care
03. I Miss You
04. Best Thing I Never Had
05. Party
06. Rather Die Young
07. Start Over
08. Love On Top
09. Countdown
10. End Of Time
11. I Was Here
12. Run The World (Girls) (listen to the mp3 below)