Blackground Records Clarifies Rumors of Aaliyah's Posthumous Album

Last week, a report claimed that a posthumous Aaliyah** album was in the works and that Drake** would executive produce the project. Additionally, the Young Money rapper was supposedly set to feature the late singer, who passed in August 2001, on his latest single.

Instead, this past Sunday (August 5th), Blackground Records released Aaliyah's "Enough Said" featuring Drake to Soundcloud. The ghostly cut touted previously unheard vocals, a smoldering beat from producer Noah "40" Shebib and a verse from Drake. Three hours after it was posted, the song racked up more than 100,000 clicks. As of press time, it has more than 620,000 listens.

The song ignited debates about the possible existence of a new Aaliyah LP. Many fans speculated that Aaliyah collaborators Timbaland** and Missy Elliott** would not be involved with the project. Some criticized the fact that Drake, who has continuously expressed his love for her music, would oversee an album when he had never actually met her. Aaliyah's brother Rashad Haughton posted an official statement on Facebook that her immediate family will not support this project, which Drake later countered by claiming that "everybody from her family to her old management and label" were behind the record. Billboard.biz reached out to Haughton but had not received a response as of press time.

Aaliyah's cousin Jomo Hankerson, who runs Blackground Records with his father Barry Hankerson, spoke with Billboard.biz about the posthumous release, confirming that an album is in fact in the works. Using 16 unreleased songs and "fragments" from Aaliyah's archive, Blackground hopes to release the LP by year's end, enlisting "contemporary artists" to color the project and help repackage her vocals. This marks the first release from the late singer since 2002's "I Care 4 U," a compilation album featuring previously heard and unheard recordings, and is intended to introduce her to younger listeners by updating her sound.

"We really felt like it was time. There's a real new generation that doesn't know her necessarily, and we wanted to continue her musical legacy with this new generation," explains Hankerson. "That's one of the reasons why we wanted to do very contemporary music. We didn't want to make it a nostalgic project; we already did that with the 'I Care 4 U' album. The idea was to release new music for her diehard fans, and also reintroduce her music to a new generation that doesn't really understand how much influence she has in the music that they're listening to today."

Hankerson denies that Drake is contracted to executive produce the project (he says that he and his father will executive produce the album, but that they are considering adding others to the fold), but says that he will appear on "more of the records" and that Shebib is "heavily involved" in reshaping the music. After moving its publishing to Reservoir Media in July, Blackground reached out to the Canadian producer on the strength of his work with Alicia Keys** ("Un-Thinkable (I'm Ready)") and his unique sound. It seemed only "natural" that Drake would contribute to what would become "Enough Said." Blackground was so pleased with the result that they released the stream before having a marketing plan or radio strategy in place.

While the album is in the early stages, Hankerson confirms that Timbaland and Missy Elliott will participate in assembling the LP. "Timbaland will be involved with this project. One of the records that we had that was never released was a Missy record that we obviously are going to be refreshing," says Hankerson, who did not clarify if Timbaland has already produced songs for the project. "This record ['Enough Said'] really kind of came sooner than we thought it was going to come, so it's really the beginning of the creative process for us. We've got a record out while we're still creating the project. A lot of that is still up in the air, but I can tell you that Timbaland will definitely be involved, Missy will definitely be involved." Timbaland declined to comment for this story, while Elliott did not respond to Billboard.biz's request as of press time.

Reservoir Media Management EVP Rell Lafargue estimates that there is enough leftover material for two posthumous Aaliyah albums, while Hankerson says that approximation might be "a little premature." Talks between Blackground and Reservoir began roughly 15 months ago for the latter to acquire the 500-song catalog that includes Aaliyah's archives, music from Static Major and albums from JoJo, Timbaland, Magoo and Tank. As part of the deal, Reservoir, a boutique publishing company with top 40 hits from 50 Cent, Madonna and Justin Timberlake, will market Aaliyah's music to television and film, as well as release songs to online services like iTunes and Spotify where much of her music cannot be currently found. Additionally, the company will assist with licensing of songs for covers and sampling (Lafargue notes that there are talks of Dr. Dre sampling "Rock the Boat" for a new song).

"Part of taking new music to market is to release old music as well in different forms. There are tons of old interviews, video, things that were shot before her passing will be part of any and all repackaging. There are alternate takes and different remixes that never got released," says Lafargue. "The one thing that was just confirmed, the demand, was Aaliyah's 10-year anniversary of her passing. The ratings on the BET special were huge for that network and there's a demand for it. I believe that we recognize the demand and want to give her fans what they want."

NEW Song! Aaliyah feat. Drake - Enough Said

A posthumous song by Aaliyah featuring Drake has come online. Billboard reports that the song was posted by producer Noah "40" Shebib to Soundcloud and is titled "Enough Said." The cover art for the song bears the logo of Drake's October Very Own as well as Blackground Records, the latter of whom represents Aaliyah's estate. As previously reported, Drake is said to be executive producing the late R&B star's first posthumous album while Timbaland, who worked with her on several songs, is in the dark.

"I know they trying to drop some Aaliyah records, but if [Drake] do it, it should be with me and him, and Missy [Elliott]," Timbaland said in an interview with Power 105.1. "I don't know what's going on. The proper way to do that would be for me, him and Missy to be all on the record. For it to be on his record, that would not be right."

Aaliyah sounds amazing so Drake Needs to give the full song to Her!

Listen to the song here:
http://soundcloud.com/futuresounds-bgr/aaliyah-enough-said-feat-drake 

Timbaland Opens Up On Drake Releasing New Aaliyah Music: Notable/Quotable

"I know they trying to drop some Aaliyah records, but if he do it, it should be with me and Missy. The proper way for him to do that would be for me, him and Missy to be all on the record. But to put it on his record, would just not be right."

--Grammy award-winning producer Timbaland opens up on recent news of Drake reportedly releasing new Aaliyah music.

Keshia Chante's Ode to the late great Aaliyah & 90's R&B

Keshia Chante'

"I recently had the pleasure of working with the incredible Matt Barnes whose work I have been admiring for quite some time. I’ve been wanting to do a photo shoot like this forever &; I am so thrilled to see Matt take things to the next level. His work always feels like your inside of a movie &; I truly felt like a character in his film. My heart will forever be in love with old school R&B, especially the 90′s &; of course the late great Aaliyah &; I feel this shoot was an ode to that! We mixed some Liy, TLC, Brandy, Slick Rick, etc in this shoot &; it makes my heart flutter. Peep the old school phone, gold rope chains, pager, timbs, etc,. BIG thank you to the team: Matt Barnes, Tara, Janet Jackson of Jou Jou (hair), Dee Daly (makeup), Caitlin Wright (wardrobe stylist), Jennifer Hyland &; all the interns at Westside who helped make it special!!! I hope my KCRyders will love this. I’ve never felt more comfortable then this…"

Matt Barnes
"Canadian cultural mainstay Keshia Chanté was in front of Matt’s camera recently, so the two could give a nod to Aaliyah & throwback R&B, for a personal creative. An accomplished artist, whose life has been spot-lit since her early teens, Keshia is a Juno Award winner and chart topper, who has made the occasional foray into acting. The shoot, paying tribute to the singers that helped to influence Keshia’s career, was helped aesthetically along by makeup artist Dee Daly, hairstylist Janet Jackson, and wardrobe stylist Caitlin Wright. Ride the jump for the entire series." 

She looks so stunning in these photos! Props to Matt, Dee and everyone who put this together! What an amazing job you all did! Full photo credit goes to Matt Barnes, these are not my photos! Article credits: Keshia Chante' & Matt Barnes.

A proud part of http://www.aaliyahweb.com

Drake To Reportedly Executive Produce Aaliyah's Next Album, Features Her On New Single

Drake is reportedly set to executive produce Aaliyah’s upcoming posthumous album. He is also slated to feature the late singer on his new single.

A reliable source with inside knowledge of the situation told HipHopDX that the Young Money rapper, who has a tattoo of the songstress on his back, will sit at the helm for her new LP. Details surrounding the album are scarce, but in March, producer Jeffrey “J. Dub” Walker said that an unreleased song titled “Steady Ground” will appear on the project. Aaliyah’s brother, Rashad Haughton, later said that no such album was in the works.

In late March, Drake hinted to Tim Westwood that he had some “special things” related to Aaliyah in motion. “I have some great Aaliyah news coming soon,” he said. “Just some special things. Just gave you that, just a little. Because I said, I’m with Westwood, so I can’t not. But great things, great things for music, period.”

Additionally, Drake, who sampled Aaliyah’s “At Your Best (You Are Love)” for his track “Unforgettable,” is reportedly set to feature her vocals on his upcoming single. He is set to debut the song at the OVO Festival, taking place this Sunday (August 5th) at Toronto, Canada’s Molson Amphitheatre.

Timbaland Remembering Making Are You That Somebody For Aaliyah

It has been 11 years since the beautiful Aaliyah left a mark on this earth musically.  That doesn't stop those who were close to her from reminiscing about special memories and time they spent with her musically.  One hit that he produced for Aaliyah was "Are You That Somebody".

It was produced in 1998 for the movie Dr. DoLittle.  The combination of his epic producing by Timbaland tacked with Aaliyah's voice was a combination for the ages leading to a Grammy Nomination for Best Female R&B Vocal Performance.  

It's great that these types are memories are being kept alive and its great that the people who worked so closely with her can reminisce about good times.

In Memory of Lisa Lopes

Ten years ago the music industry lost one of it’s brightest stars: Lisa Lopes.


Daring, candid, vibrant and unapologetic; Lisa ‘Left-Eye’ Lopes was the ‘Crazy’ to Chilli’s ‘Sexy’ and T-Boz’s ‘Cool’ in the Atlantic R&B girl-group that would go on to conquer the music charts and change the way women were seen in a male dominated industry.

As the world was still mourning the loss of R&B superstar Aaliyah in the summer of 2001, initial reactions to the news of the tragic death of ‘Left-Eye’ in Honduras, Central America, was that of disbelief.

Although Lisa’s passing was felt the world over by the millions of fans she had gathered over the ten years she had spent in the group TLC, for Tionne ‘T-Boz’ Watkins and Rozanda ‘Chilli’ Thomas the loss was inconceivable. When speaking to the remaining members of the group last year, they described how initially they believed the news of her death was just another of Lisa’s many ‘practical jokes’.

“Not that long before that she had played a joke like she was missing and I didn’t think it was funny because I was pregnant,” T-Boz remembered, “and this one time I was hoping it was a bad joke again. But it wasn’t, it was true.”

In 1991, Tionne Watkins was living in Atlanta as a hairdresser when she met eighteen-year-old Lisa. “I remember these little big eyes,” Watkins said. “She looked like a deer caught in the headlights, and this little squeaky voice, she looked liked she was about twelve...We got along really well, straight off the bat, we kicked it off immediately. Honestly we were laughing and kicking at it the first day, [it] just kinda happened naturally”. For Lisa, it was Tionne’s strong sense of style that she was really drawn to: “She had the big earrings that were in style, she had the latest hairdo, she had the fly clothes. She was beautiful, real cool.”

This instant bond between the two was the perfect fresh start for the young Lisa, who aged seventeen left her family home in Florida where she had lived with her mother and younger brother and sister. Life growing up in the Lopes family had not been easy: an alcoholic father who was abusive to Lisa’s mother and enforced a military style upbringing had a profound effect on Lisa in many ways.

It was from him that Lisa learnt to find solace from her problems in alcohol. “My father would come over and check on me every weekend and we’d have a case of beer and that was one of the ways I’d get a lot of attention.”

“She really loved her father and had a great deal of respect for him on one side,” Chilli later explained, “but she experienced a lot and I think she kept a lot inside.”

But it was also from him that she inherited her musical talents - her grandfather had been a saxophonist at the Cotton Club, her uncle a world famous hoofer dancer and Ronald Lopes Snr. himself was a talented musician. From a very young age music was a huge part of her life, from church performances to rapping at talent competitions and presenting her own radio shows she was always in the spotlight.

So, along with their friend Crystal, Lisa and Tionne started performing under the name Second Nature and it wasn’t long before they had caught the eye of Pebbles Reid, co-owner of LA Face Records.

From the very beginning of her career in music Lisa wasn’t afraid to do what it took to succeed, no matter whom she upset, as T-Boz recalled: “Even though it was her own group, we kicked Crystal out… It was the funniest thing because I’ll never forget I was like, ‘Lisa, how are we going to tell her?’ She was like, ‘I know how!’ So we’re sitting there and she was like, ‘Girl, we got some good news and some bad news. The good news is Pebbles wants the group. The bad news…girl we don’t want you in the group no more!’ she said, laughing at the memory.

So Crystal was out, and when Pebbles introduced former dancer Rozanda ‘Chilli’ Thomas to the duo, TLC was formed.

“We used to call it the ‘MTB’ thing, ‘Meant To Be’,” T-Boz recalls, “but chemistry’s really important. Even though we are all different we all brought something different to the group.”

One of the things that Lisa certainly brought to the group was her quirky sense of style. When TLC burst onto the music scene in 1992 it was their look that was as pioneering as their sound.

Bursting onto the scene in the United States around the time of the Government’s first AIDS awareness campaign with their day-glo trousers adorned with condoms and a no-nonsense attitude to safe-sex the girls really stood out from the crowd. And although they were clearly continuing the legacy that had been established in the 1960s by acts like The Supremes and The Ronettes there was something about their sound and their image that took them beyond the achievements of contemporaries Salt N Pepa, Queen Latifah and Monie Love.

But all their success and critical acclaim did not come without a fight.

“You know it’s hard to have your clothes on and not sell sex, and actually sell albums and have people like you,” T-Boz states. “We stood up for all women and basically said you can still be sexy, it doesn’t matter what you wear, that doesn’t make you… It was really hard at that time to do those things. What’s so easily given now we really, really had to break our backs for you know… And the thing I’m most proud of TLC achieving is standing for what we believe in and staying strong to that, and keeping our clothes on and still becoming the biggest selling girl group without having to soul our bodies or our souls you know, compromising our integrity or our character to do so. I love that.”

Promoting the image of strong women, TLC soon found that they needed to lead by example. In 1994, despite selling eleven million copies of their second album ‘Crazy Sexy Cool’, the conditions of their contract meant that they only earned an approximate $35,000 each after expenses.

What’s more, Lisa’s unhealthy relationship with alcohol and even more unhealthy relationship with American Footballer Andre Rison had led to Lopes being indicted on charges of first-degree arson. Sentenced to five years probation and a $10,000 Lisa seemed to have hit rock bottom, but it was during these times that she penned lyrics for one of the groups’ most famous songs.

“I was in the diversion centre at the time, serving out my sentence,” she told an interviewer. “I got on a two-hour break to go and record in the studio and listen to the song that TLC was working on we called ‘Waterfalls’. On the way I was admiring the trees, the buildings, the sky and I looked up and there was this rainbow and I was like WOW, this place that we live in never meant so much to me.”

Some cynics think that it was the additional publicity created by Lisa’s legal case that shot the group into the limelight, but by 1997 TLC were the biggest female R&B group on the planet, and that didn’t come without a fight or two…even amongst themselves.

“With anything, and anybody in life you’re going to have disagreements, whether you respectfully disagree or you argue it out,” T-Box admits. “You know we never got into a physical fight but yes, we disagreed about a lot of things all the time.”

With three multi-platinum selling albums, several Grammy Awards and chart-topping hits including ‘Waterfalls’, ‘Unpretty’ and ‘No Scrubs’ under their belt by 1999 the group seemed unstoppable. But as the Millennium drew near, other interests and a series of personal conflicts were tearing the group apart. Lisa had developed an interest in holistic medicine and started to spend time in a retreat based in Honduras, Central America, often missing recording sessions as a result.

As you would expect from three feisty women these rifts were not subtle, Lisa never being one afraid to speak her mind. “She would just say something and nobody knew she was going to say it,” Chilli recounts, “just some of the ideas that would come in her mind she would just execute, not always thinking, but you know that was Lisa. And that’s what you just have to love about her because she was as real as they get.”

Outside of the group, Lisa’s unique style and outspoken nature meant that she has developed a following independent of the other girls. So it was no surprise when her solo career proved so successful, topping the UK charts with duets with Donnell Jones and Melanie C.

In 2002 things finally seemed to be back on track for the once wayward Lopes, with her own solo album ‘Supanova’, plans underway to develop a foundation for deprived children in Honduras, and being a new mum to her adopted daughter Snow. But whilst in Honduras filming a documentary of her life she began to feel the presence of a “spirit”.

Her suspicions were strengthened when a car accident led to the death of a ten-year-old local called Bayron Lopez. Lisa was convinced that this ‘spirit’ mistook the young boy for her because they shared the same name.

Only a few weeks later, whilst driving to Sambo Creek with the band Egypt she managed, Lisa lost control of her Jeep and it rolled off the highway. In the early hours of her twenty-sixth birthday Tionne received the news: Lisa was dead.

News quickly spread and her funeral in Georgia was attended by thousands of fans and famous friends including Alicia Keyes, Usher and Missy Elliott.

Following the death of Left-Eye, T-Boz and Chilli announced that they would finish the fourth album which they had already begun recording, but that they would never replace Lisa with another third member.

Although it has been ten years since the death of one of R&B biggest characters, her legacy still lives on through the people she knew and the many more people who grew up with her music.

So, when you download the latest Lady Leshurr track or check out Nicki Minaj’s new crazy look online, just remember that it was the vision of one small woman with big ideas and an even bigger personality that made this all possible.

Words by Jade Hutchinson


Aaliyahweb.com

Watch Aaliyah's behind the music online

VH1 has been on point with their Behind the Music series, dropping recounts on the lives of Game and T-Pain for the previous pair of segments, and for the latest, they take on the tragic tale of R&B icon Aaliyah who tragically passed away in a plane crash 11 years ago (hard to believe it's been so long).

The episode addresses the great "what could have been" that's always surrounded Aaliyah's talent, with friends like Missy Elliot ("You can't even say anything negative about her because she was an angel when she was born) and hip-hop journalist Nelson George discussing her brilliance and what kind fo career that would have come had she not passed away.

You'll learn everything from the origin of her name to the dedication of everyone behind her career, and the deal makes out for not only a great documentation, but a tribute as well.

Here's the episode, give it a watch, throw up your thoughts.

Watch it here: http://alturl.com/gkgn4

Timbaland compares Aaliyah and Beyonce

Timabaland still has faith that Aaliyah was the best in the game prior to her untimely death. The producer behind most of her hits even claims that if she was still alive, she would have been on Beyonce’s level. Sister2Sister Magazine reports that Timb even goes as far to say that their only difference was vocals – Aaliyah wasn’t as great of a singer. According to Mr. Magoo, Aaliyah might not have been a bigger star than Beyonce, but she would have been the first icon to use her star power out of the studio.

Drake to Release Aaliyah Collaboration

The rapper hints at a possible posthumous collaboration with the late R&B singer

Drake has never been shy about his love for late singer, Aaliyah. He once confessed that he truly loved her, and even has image tattooed on his back. Could he have finally convinced her label and producers to let his create a track featuring her vocals?“You know it’s hard for me to ride around to a female singer because at the end of the day, you’re a man, but she always kept it so G with the writing and the melodies. It was something to ride to, especially when it was chopped and crewed. That’s when I used to love,”

Drake explains of his love for AaliyahSpeaking with Tim Westwood while promoting his current Club Paradise tour, Drake shared, “I have some great Aaliyah news coming soon.” When questioned for more information, Drake simply said, “Some special things. Great things man. Great things for music, period.”

A posthumous Aaliyah album has been in discussion for quite some time. Earlier this month, producer J.Dub tweeted “Just got great news today; the smash unreleased song called ‘Steady Ground’ I produced on #Aaliyah is gonna be on her upcoming album:)”Although Background Records has not confirmed the upcoming album, it would not come as a surprise considering two posthumous albums have already been released; I Care 4 U in 2002 and Ultimate Aaliyah in 2005.