Not Too Young to Enjoy New Jack Swing

So by now everybody may know I'm only 20. I think I mentioned in the School Daze blog that I was born in the latter part of '88. But I like to think I'm not too young to appreciate the New Jack Swing movement. Randy Bandit took me back a little bit when he mentioned The Winans. My first experience with the New Jack Swing sound was probably with Teddy Riley's work with gospel group Commissioned. Teddy Riley definitely made the fact my mom only wanted me listening to gospel music real cool lol. But now that I make my own musical decisions I have to say my iPod is heavily influenced by New Jack Swing. I mean yeah I've got some recent stuff and some late 90's music that doesn't fall into New Jack Swing but if Guy or Keith Sweat comes on it can definitely change my day lol. To me, some of the best music post-Motown was during the New Jack Swing era. Like Phill Boogie said, it gets you moving and its fun. I can't betray my generation and say we make bad music but I have to say that......hmm I can't think of recent male R&B groups, that says a lot. Well I'll throw Dru Hill out there (they fall in the middle of now and then). Dru Hill was hot when they came out but none of their songs gets people going like a Guy song or Bell Biv DeVoe. And on that note, New Jack Swing groups were full of talent. All of those guys could hold their own outside of the group (Aaron Hall is a good example). To keep it simple, without New Jack Swing, R&B would have had a hard time finding a new direction. If any era of music represented the culture of its audience at that time it was definitely New Jack Swing.