I famously asserted the only reason people claim "Break my soul" is just a great hit ("Song of the summer" over "about damn time"?) is because folks are just tired of R&B being dead (the post I made that claim was deleted)

People are so tired of R&B radio playing trap-like sounds people happy for something not dead like trap-r&b, trap hip-hop.

Folks just ain't getting no life anymore from trap-R&B, trap hip-hop.

And...it seems that the Black community has no center so we can't tell what the people really like other than trap R&B or trap hip-hop.

It seems radio (like Mary J Blige said) has died so...the Black community has no "center" (Radio was "galvanizing" to the Black Community for as long as I was alive) to say what we really like...except the fumes of trap R&B and trap hip-hop.

https://www.okayplayer.com/music/diddy-responds-to-backlash-on-his-rb-is-dead-comments.html

Diddy Responds To Backlash On His “R&B Is Dead” Comments
MUSIC

JAELANI TURNER-WILLIAMS

Jaelani Turner-Williams is a contributing news writer for Okayplayer
with bylines at Billboard, MTV News, NYLON, Recording Academy and more. Read her mind on Twitter at @hernameisjae.

After proclaiming that ‘R&B is dead’, Diddy responded to backlash of his statement, saying that he wanted to “bring attention” to the genre.

Diddy is facing the music after claiming that “R&B is dead.” During an Instagram Live session with Timbaland last week, the Bad Boy Records and Love Records founder claimed that the genre was becoming endangered.

“The R&B I made my babies to? R&B gotta be judged to a certain thing — it’s the feeling though, doggy. No, no, no. It’s a feeling,” Diddy said during the livestream. “You gotta be able to sing for R&B and then you gotta tell the truth. R&B is not a hustle. This shit is about feeling your vulnerability.”

Diddy continued, “You gotta muthafuckas make a nigga dick hard or a woman’s vagina wet. You gotta cry. You gotta be able to get your girl back. I don’t wanna hear all this bitchass It’s our fault for accepting anything less for anybody getting on a mic. I feel like there was a death of R&B singing, and I’m a part of bringing that shit back! I ain’t feelin’ no emotions.”


On Saturday (August 20), he went to Twitter to clarify his statements.

This conversation was out of love and me purposely wanting to bring attention to R&B! It was something that I saw the effect of the Hip hop and R&B balance. That balance is honesty and realness when it comes together, melodies, vulnerability and most importantly LOVE!!!
1:04 PM · Aug 20, 2022·Twitter for iPhone

This message is that R&B game needs more love, vulnerability, support!!

Also joining an Instagram Live session with the Bad Boy Records founder was Mary J. Blige who shared that R&B gets dubbed as “popular music” when white vocalists like Adele and Justin Bieber “get a hold of it.”


Contemporary R&B singers like Arin Ray and Brent Faiyaz jumped into the ‘R&B’ is dead conversation on Twitter with their own takes.

Arin Ray

these old heads need to stop and just admit that THEY ain’t got it no more.

you’re washed. not r&b.
@Diddy


Diddy’s clarification comes days after announcing that he’d be joining Jermaine Dupri for a hit-for-hit music battle in Atlanta. In the style of Verzuz, the battle will not be a Verzuz exclusive amid Swizz Beatz’s and Timbaland’s $28 million lawsuit against Triller.


https://www.bet.com/article/jc3l5k/mary-j-blige-r-n-b-diddy-instagram-live-justin-timberlake-adele

MUSIC

Mary J. Blige On R&B Becoming "Popular" When Adele Puts Out A Song From The Genre

The R&B icon responded to the “Who killed R&B?” question that Diddy posed on social media.

By Alexis Reese


August 18, 2022/12:11 PM


Mary J. Blige let her opinion known about the state of R&B after sitting down with DIddy in a candid conversation on the history behind the genre and how when new tracks are released, it is labeled as "popular."

"Who killed R&B?" Diddy posted on his social media accounts before heading to his Instagram Live with Mary J. to have a chat.

“You can't kill something that's in our DNA,” said Blige. “It's gonna keep transitioning from generation to generation to generation to generation. They was trying to kill it.”

She continued, “Before I say what I'm gonna say, let me just say this: I wanna thank all the radio stations around the country that are playing R&B music and sincerely support it.”


"But, you know, a lot of the radio stations killed it for the same thing that Tank was saying. They ain't gon' jump on the bandwagon of whatever the hottest things is—but, let me just say this. We have to keep ourselves alive as R&B singers," she added, referring to words expressed by Tank when he appeared on the Drink Champs podcast.

Blige then gave out virtual flowers to some of the greats in the R&B genre Chaka Khan, Etta James, Sam Cooke, Aretha Franklin, Jazmine Sullivan, and SWV, before reiterating that these artists and their contributions to R&B can't be "killed."

"They wanna call it 'Popular Music' with Adele and Justin Timberlake get ahold to it, so now it's 'Popular Music.' But it's been popular music! We've been had it!"

-------------=

So....

Are those of us in the Diddy, MJB generation we just can't see that even though it seems that the Black community group/collective/"thrust" "faded" when radio just ran trap R&B/trap hip-hop INTO THE GROUND....the Black community DID SOMEHOW re-emerge (through Tik-tok, IG, Twitter, etc.) into something else Diddy, MJB and the rest of us Gen-X people JUST CAN'T SEE?

Discuss