On: How I grew to not hate Phrenology as much as I did

Monday, May 3rd*

7:29 PM me: last thing: is it bad that the only song I remember off of Phrenology is "Water"?
7:31 PM fredara: nope!
7:33 PM me: cool haha
7:40 PM uh oh
so I'm listening to "Sacrifice" and thinking of giving the album another listen
:-(
7:41 PM fredara: oh?
me: yeah
you
know
age and shit
fredara: lol
7:42 PM me: I'm staring real hard at the CD
fredara: lol
me: fuck it
7:49 PM me: three songs in and I see what went wrong
7:50 PM 1) they left all that band feel out the door
2) that punk rock song was way too early
7:52 PM 3) too many effects
6 minutes
7:59 PM me: uh oh
I think...
fredara: ?
me: I might actually not hate it as much as before
8:00 PM fredara: lolol
5 minutes
8:05 PM me: oh no
i don't dislike "Seed 2.0" as much either
8:06 PM fredara: yeah, i'm cool with that
8:07 PM me: I'm beginning to think I had too much access to not really like the album
like the original Water, the original Seed
knowing that most of these songs were on Masterpiece Theater
8:08 PM and the d'angelo version of Break U Off

Tonight (Phrenology the background music)

1. "This isn't like Illadelph Halflife or Things Fall Apart!" Very true, it's not like either of those albums. It's something...different. Where were the "Vs."? Why wasn't Ursula Rucker doing the poem at the end as usual? For a fan during the Organix to Things Fall Apart, this was a major departure. To me, this is more akin to Buhloone Mindstate ie "I don't know if I could really get into this because it doesn't sound like a typical *insert artist* album"
2. "What the f*ck is that crazy sh!t after 'Water'?!?!" Actually I wasn't turned off by the "Fiend" part of "Water", but I could see how others could be. It's long, jarring, head scratching; yes all of that. However it's beautiful piece of work...that might have worked better as a last track (speaking of which, the hell was going on with the hidden track "Thirsty"?)
3. "Man, half of this is Black Thought's album! We waited this long for a half ass album?!?" This, I believe, was the major gripe about the album. To some of us, it just seemed that the Roots kinda put together a compilation album. You have some songs from Black Thought's shelved MCA album, Masterpiece Theater ("Water", "Rock You", "Thought At Work", and "Pussy Galore") and "Seed", which was originally on Cody Chesnutt's debut album The Headphone Masterpiece (minus Thought's verses). Three years and we get less than half a Roots album.
4. "Musiq Soulchild?!?! WHERE'S D'ANGELO?" Haha for the full (?) story of that, read the liner notes for Homegrown. Long story short, music business business (seriously ?uestlove tells a better story of the incident, though you could see the madness involved in the Phrenology's notes)
5. "'Seed 2.0' is vulgar!" Again, I didn't have a problem with this or the imagery, however I know some female fans were turned off with "I push my seed in her bush". Understandable.

So how is it that I came to not dislike the album as much as back in 2002? Simple, it's 2010, meaning growth and age happened. Musically, I can understand the album better as well as kinda see where the group was heading. Age led me to be more objective, especially since I'm not that rabid "Yall ain't heard of the Roots?!?" fan anymore. It's more subtle "Check out this track if you liked them on Jimmy Fallon's show."

It's interesting to revisit an album which divided a fan base like Phrenology did. Maybe it was a barometer of said fan (stan?) base like, imo, Around the World in a Day, where Prince distanced himself from Purple Rain. Kinda like "Will you still be with us after we do this" to which my answer was yes.

I do know one thing:
I'm still not listening to Tipping Point besides "Star", "Stay Cool", "Boom" and "Web" (sorry)
So yeah, Ahmir, my bad...

*chat used with permission