Maybe it has something to do with the fact she's better than even Miss Alicia Keys. India.Arie caught everyone's attention when the 44th Grammy award nominations were announced Jan. 4, 2002. India.Arie led all female contenders with seven nods (to Keys' six) and collected more nominations than any other as a solo artist (rock veterans U2 lead all acts with eight nominations).
Most expected Keys to lead the pack of all contenders, so most were surprised, India.Arie especially, when the 25-year-old singer-songwriter dropped the soul bomb on the Grammys.
Arie captured nominations in all four of the top Grammy categories: Best New Artist, Best Album, Album of the Year, Record of the Year and Song of the Year, both for "Video," her first single.
How is it that a nearly undiscovered soultress such as Arie can go nearly unnoticed by the masses and open a can of Whoop Ass in the Grammy category?
Simple: She's not prepackaged, manufactured pop and her videos likely won't make it into the TRL countdown. These days, that's the sign of a true musician.
Acoustic Soul is not an album you throw in at a house party (of the collegiate brand, at least), nor is it one you throw in to your car's CD player with you and four other friends crammed into your two-seater Geo Metro en route to the mall.
Yes, it has beats—it has mad beats, but you'd sooner see Arie with a mad bassist in a quiet, smoke-filled lounge than you would see "featuring Ludacris" on any of the tracks.
That's the beauty of Acoustic Soul versus pop albums now on the market. Arie's artistry is intimate. It's as if she's holding a guitar in one hand and a heartlight in the other. Each track has a message, as if South Park's Kyle Broflovski could say, "You know, I learned something today" (coincidentally, both are native Coloradoans).
The upbeat "Strength, Courage and Wisdom" edges out even "Video," the song that garnered three Grammy nominations of its own. Her Grammy domination will not end in 2002. Just as U2 will capture awards two years in a row from one album, Arie will do the same in 2003.
The smooth track "Brown Skin" is a sexy, slow jam that takes us in a spell of Arie's low alto-near-tenor lullings. Her lyrics result from years of being trapped behind winds and brass instruments (Arie played the trumpet and several types of clarinets). Now that she can lyricize and play the guitar concurrently, she holds nothing back, singing "I'll be your Almond Joy, you'll be my Sugar Daddy," and "I love your brown skin. I can't tell where yours begins, I can't tell where mine ends."
Her obvious devotion for R&B great Stevie Wonder comes out in "Wonderful," the album's closing track.
But perhaps the album's best track takes us "Back to the Middle." Appropriately placed in the middle of the album, the jazz organ in the background adds just the right touch to this soulful anthem about success and failure, and falling somewhere in the middle.
Acoustic Soul entered the Billboard charts at No. 10 (released March 27, 2001), and in December the album went certified platinum. Watch for the album to go double platinum within two months, as it comes out from under the radar and receives the respect and recognition it deserves.
