FEATURE:
Second Spin
Missy Elliott - The Cookbook
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THERE are a couple of reasons…
why I am featuring Missy Elliott’s The Cookbook in this feature. For one, we found out earlier in the month that she has been inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame. She is the first female Hip-Hop artists to receive that honour. It is a bit shameful that it has taken this long for the organisation to recognise Elliott and female Hip-Hop artists, but it is good that she has been acknowledged. Also, The Cookbook is her most recent album. Released on 4th July, 2005, let us hope that it is not her final album! I think that it is underrated. It did get some positive reviews, but there were some that were more mixed. The Cookbook has a different vibe and feel to albums that we associate with Missy Elliott like her 1997 debut, Supa Dupa Fly, or 1999’s Da Real World. The Cookbook got its title due to the fact Elliott feels that no two records of hers is the same. Each one is made in a different kitchen with different ingredients. The eclectic nature of the album can also be applied to ingredients. The black-and-white cover of Elliott in a 1920s jukejoint is her bringing music to its roots. This elemental approach results in one of her very best albums. I feel that it is one that people need to give a second spin. I am going to bring in a couple of reviews for The Cookbook.
AllMusic were among those who gave The Cookbook a positive review. The sixth and most recent album from the Queen of Rap, we all hope that she puts out some new material soon. She appeared on the FLO single, Fly Girl, back in March. I am sure that we will hear more from her soon:
“Critics and fans were praising Missy Elliott and Timbaland so much during 2002-2003 that the hottest production combo in hip-hop may have started believing that a great production is synonomous with a great song. This Is Not a Test!, her first major mistake, featured cutting-edge tracks in abundance, but virtually nothing in the way of heavyweight material. Its follow-up, The Cookbook, brings the focus back to Missy the rapper and songwriter, wisely (in most cases) leaving the productions to a more varied cast than any of her previous records. Ironically though, Elliott herself produced the lead single, "Lose Control," giving it a tight electro feel (courtesy of some vintage '80s samples from Cybotron and Hot Streak). It's only the first nod to the type of old-school party jam that Elliott does better than ever here; "We Run This" resurrects the "Apache" break and a classic Sugarhill Gang track for one of the best club tunes of the year, Rich Harrison gives a bright, brassy production to another party song, "Can't Stop," and "Irresistible Delicious" featuring Slick Rick sounds at least 15 years removed from contemporary rap (yes, that's a good thing).
In a few spots The Cookbook isn't too far removed from This Is Not a Test! -- Elliott forces a few rhymes, plays to type with her themes, and uses those outside producers to follow trends in hip-hop (she could have easily accompanied a 12-track record of her usual solid material with a watered-down "New Sounds in Hip-Hop & R&B EP" that would kick off with the syrupy Houston retread "Click Clack," the Neptunes' tired "On & On," and the bland pop-idol duet "My Man" featuring Fantasia). What's different here is how relaxed Elliott is, how willing she seems to simply go with what comes naturally and sounds best. "My Struggles" isn't the myopic confessional suggested by the title, but an East Coast all-stars jam that features one of her best raps ever and deftly switches in midstream to allow Mary J. Blige to reprise her "What's the 411?" classic (to say nothing of Grand Puba's verse). And the final track, "Bad Man," sees one of the most welcome collaborations seen in rap for some time, as Elliott joins dancehall heroes M.I.A. and Vybz Kartel (plus a drumline from Atlanta A&T)”.
I am going to round off with a review from The Guardian. Even if there are some weaker or questionable moments on The Cookbook, it is very much business as usual from a legendary artist who is always evolving. I hope that people who have not heard this album check it out, as it is full of incredible moments and astonishing songs:
“Elsewhere, however, The Cookbook is a convincing return to form. The ballads Elliott takes charge of are too bizarre to be boring: for reasons known only to herself she punctuates Remember When's lachrymose lyrics and electric piano with wildly inappropriate shrieks, whoops and triumphant cries of "yes!" The Neptunes-produced On and On is a sexy racket featuring military drums, electronic buzzing and a bizarre effect somewhere between a record scratching and a submarine's sonar ping. We Run This and Can't Stop - the latter the work of Crazy in Love producer Rich Harrison - are both unreasonably exciting, wrapping ferocious old funk horns around futuristic beats. Sampling Cybotron's 1982 proto-techno classic Clear, Lose Control shows Elliott's ongoing willingness to search further than any other hip-hop artist for inspiration. House and techno are still inexorably entwined with gay culture in the US: most rappers would eschew them out of sheer prejudice.
Most thrilling of all is Irresistible Delicious, a collaboration with veteran rapper "Slick Rick" Rogers, last heard enlivening an album by coffee table trip-hoppers Morcheeba with a guest rap that cheerily suggested fat women should be murdered. He has met his match here. Elliott twists his two most famously offensive tracks to her own ends - stealing the riff from Lick the Balls and subverting the lyrics of Treat Her Like a Prostitute - then mimics his distinctive sly, sing-song delivery to perform a rap so sexually predatory that even Rogers sounds a bit disconcerted at its close. "Uh-huh," he interjects, but he sounds like he's anxiously crossing his legs as he does it. And well he might: back on top, sounding as unique and startling and formidable as ever, Missy Elliott is clearly not a woman to be messed with”.
After her long-overdue induction into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, new eyes and fans will be led to her incredible music. A Hip-Hop pioneer and one of the most important artists who has ever lived, long may her music inspire! It would be a shame to think that 2005’s The Cookbook is the last album we will get from Missy Elliott. Let’s hope not. It is one of her more underrated releases, so I do hope that people approach it. I think that Elliott’s sixth studio album is…
WELL worth a deeper listen.