- #ALICIA KEYS ALBUM COVER 2009 FULL#
- #ALICIA KEYS ALBUM COVER 2009 PLUS#
- #ALICIA KEYS ALBUM COVER 2009 TV#
Oprah calls herself Alicia’s ‘mother-sister-friend’. ‘I could feel the power of her presence’: Alicia Keys with Oprah Winfrey in 2019. Keys is still awestruck that she, and the album that brought her global fame, still have a presence today. She won five of them and has since gone on to win 10 more. The album sold millions (10.5m physical sales and 645.8m streams to date) and Keys was nominated in six Grammy award categories. (Winfrey, who calls herself Alicia’s “mother-sister-friend” has since said, “Even before she belted out the first soulful notes of the lyrics that made her famous, I could feel the power of her presence.”) Following the God-like endorsement of the influential Winfrey (and the backing of Clive Davis, the legendary music producer who gave Keys her big break), the song topped the charts.
#ALICIA KEYS ALBUM COVER 2009 TV#
Looking at a barefaced Alicia Keys, hair pulled back into a bun, one can’t help marvel at how much she still resembles the 20-year-old who made her 2001 TV debut singing Falling on The Oprah Winfrey Show. Her voice – smooth, deep and slightly gravelly – calls out, “Good morning!” and as she inches in to take her position close to the screen, she smiles so fully that every crevice of her face lights up. She is sitting on a light-coloured sofa in front of a floor-to-ceiling wall of immaculately lined-up books. When she appears on screen there is no “onion”, no entourage, no shock absorber. I am waiting to interview Keys via Zoom on the day she launches a special edition of Songs in A Minor, to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the groundbreaking award-winning debut album that started it all. A formidable, multi-layer of managers, confidants, coaches, assistants, a personal film crew and various people with ambiguous job functions formed around Keys, like a “shock absorber”. An article written in the Guardian by a journalist who was on the promotional junket described the machinery of her management system at the time, as functioning “like an onion”. An MTV Unplugged performance, a book of poetry and an acting career was just around the corner.I n 2016, when Alicia Keys released her sixth studio album, Here, she celebrated the launch with a gig in New York’s Times Square.
However, it is easy to hear why The Diary of Alicia Keys was so popular – well-written, well-played and, although it boasts a cast list commensurate with all urban albums of the 21st century, it is unmistakably the vision of one person. There can be a level of suspicion about Grammy-gathering albums often subsequently reduced to their statistics – US No.1 618,000 US sales in its first week alone – as this often says little, and commemorates only the commercial accomplishment. Diary, which features Tony! Toni! Toné!, is faultlessly languid late-night soul with a superb “your secrets are safe with me” hook. Titles such as Harlem's Nocturne and her cover of Gladys Knight’s If I Was Your Woman (which merges into Isaac Hayes’ version of Walk On By) make her nods to history explicit it's like some RnB relief teacher coming in and taking the class.īut it is so much more than just that – the album is all about mood and groove. With contributions from artists such as Kanye West, Timbaland and John Legend, at times this album is like an academic exercise in spotting her reference points. The meshing of modern street funk with its gorgeous, string-laden predecessors is hardly the freshest concept, but the subtlety – and Keys’ stunning voice – carries it through. Lead single You Don’t Know My Name is built around a sample from the 1970s New York group Main Ingredient’s Let Me Prove My Love to You.
#ALICIA KEYS ALBUM COVER 2009 FULL#
They could so easily have been full of gauche heart-on-sleeve angst, but fortunately everything is kept in good measure with the listener being drawn into her world of contemporary takes on classic soul. Keys states in her accompanying notes that the 15 pieces of music here are like diary entries.
#ALICIA KEYS ALBUM COVER 2009 PLUS#
Released two years after the 20-million plus sales of her debut, Songs in A Minor, The Diary of… underlined 22-year-old singer and pianist Alicia Keys’ increasing maturity and her significance to 21st century American music.
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