VIDEO PREMIERE: ALL OF ME - JOHN LEGEND

Hello Beautiful People,

I am very excited to share with you the world premiere of my new music video for "All Of Me"! 

Watch it now HERE. 

This video is very special to me and you'll see why...

Of course, "All Of Me" is the latest single from my new album, Love In The Future, out now. 

GET IT HERE.

Love,

John Legend

Album Review

This is John Legend's first solo studio album since 2008's Evolver. Between the two releases, he recorded the Grammy-winning Wake Up! with the Roots, scored a gold single with "Tonight (Best You Ever Had)" (from the Think Like a Man soundtrack), was featured on a couple albums' worth of songs by other artists, and somehow managed to be deeply involved in philanthropy. He also got engaged. 

Although he proposed to model Chrissy Teigen five years after meeting her, much of Love in the Future seems drawn from a romance that was quicker to bloom. "The Beginning…" sets a tone of urgency with a scene from the day after their first night spent together. Legend sings with certitude, "Pick some names, boy or girl/Then we'll change, change the world." That sense of blissful urgency — of seizing the moment, getting lost, and knowing that the future is set — is belied in the pacing. Even the album's standard 16-track edition meanders at a crawling pace. It's broken up by the occasional soaring arrangement or some hypnotically clanking/pinging percussion, as heard on highlight "Made to Love," which resembles a latter-day Moby collaboration with distant hand-clapping  spooky background vocals, and a sample from Lil Louis' noisy house classic "Video Clash." 

This is a heavy, laboriously made set of songs. The list of producers alone includes Hit-Boy, Bink, 88 Keys, the Runners, Doc McKinney, Q-Tip, and Ali Shaheed Muhammad. Kanye West, and Dave Tozer pile on as co-producers and co-executive producers. Perhaps they ensured that the whole album would have its dramatic, slightly eerie tone; even the covers of Bobby Caldwell's "Open Your Eyes" and Anita Baker's "Angel" are a little uneasy. 

That level of sonic indulgence seems like it should be incompatible with an artist who is, essentially, a piano man, but Love in the Future is among Legend's best work, made for couples who are into one another for the long term while feeling a little daring and crazy. (A Deluxe Edition added four bonus tracks.)

Biography

Neo-soul singer and pianist John Legend combined the raw fervor of Cody ChesnuTT and the burning precision of D'Angelo. Born John Stephens, Legend was a child prodigy who grew up in Ohio, where he began singing gospel and playing piano at the tender age of five. Legend left Ohio at 16 to attend college in Philadelphia, and it was there that he first found a larger audience. Not yet out of his teens, Legend was tapped to play piano on Lauryn Hill's "Everything Is Everything" in 1998. After completing college, he moved to New York, where he began to build a loyal following playing in nightclubs and releasing CDs that he would sell at shows. He also became an in-demand session musician, playing and occasionally writing for a wide array of artists, including Alicia Keys, Twista, Janet Jackson, and Kanye West.

It wasn't until West signed the young talent to his new label that the Legend name was adopted with 2004's Solo Sessions Vol. 1: Live at the Knitting Factory. Get Lifted, Legend's first studio album, was released that December. On the strength of enduring single "Ordinary People," the album reached the Top Five of the Billboard 200. This led to three Grammy Awards: Best R&B Album, Best R&B Male Vocal Performance, and Best New Artist. Once Again, which peaked at number three on the Billboard 200 and number one on the R&B/Hip-Hop Albums chart, followed in October 2006 and eventually went platinum. Live from Philadelphia, sold exclusively at Target stores, was a successful stopgap release — a Top Ten album, despite its limited retail presence. October 2008's Evolver spun off the sprightly crossover hit "Green Light" but managed only gold-selling status. Legend followed it with September 2010's Wake Up!, in which he was backed by the Roots. The album featured covers of still-relevant, socially aware songs like Harold Melvin & the Blue Notes' "Wake Up Everybody" and Donny Hathaway's "Little Ghetto Boy." After he toured with Sade, Legend collaborated with producers and writers including West and Dave Tozer for Love in the Future, released in September 2013.