Entertainment | Music
A call to charms
R&B star Ne-Yo wants a revival of gentlemanly conduct
- By Ludovic Hunter Tilney, Financial Times
- Published: 23:35 September 25, 2008
An art form grown stale and decadent tends to attract hungry young talent with manifestos for change.
The R&B/hip-hop scene is no different. Brash values and formulaic music are the evils diagnosed in Ne-Yo's forthcoming album Year of the Gentleman, which argues for a return to a more debonair code of living.
“It's about charm and charisma, as opposed to money and jewellery,'' he says.
“It's about the fact that chivalry is dead, the guy that'll do something as simple as a pull a chair out for a lady, or open a car door for a lady.
"The guy who really takes his time to make sure he looks his best before walking out of the house. You know, that guy. He's few and far between nowadays.''
A clarion call for better manners and improved personal grooming may not sound like a very revolutionary artistic manifesto.
Yet Ne-Yo, one of the rising stars of R&B, is not to be taken lightly. His first two albums were number one hits in the US, and the single Closer from Year of the Gentleman topped European charts this summer.
As well as releasing three albums in successive years, he also has a prolific side career as a songwriter composing hits for the likes of Rihanna and Beyoncé.
Jay-Z once likened the sweetly voiced 25-year-old to a young Michael Jackson. Leaving aside Jacko's prodigious personal eccentricities, it's about as high as praise can get.
“Very, very flattering,'' concedes Ne-Yo, who is currently writing material for Jackson's comeback album.
“But I know what Michael Jackson is and who Michael Jackson is, and I know that in order for me to get there I got a long, long way to go.''
We meet in a recording studio in London where the singer has been performing live for a radio show.
There's no vast entourage of hangers-on, nor the dazzling displays of wealth of the archetypal R&B/hip-hop star.
Evidently Ne-Yo isn't the sort of singer who demands a dressing-room painted in gold leaf or meals flown in from his favourite restaurant.
“Yeah,'' he agrees in the tone of one who has seen his share of monster egos in the music industry.
“My family is a little too tough with me to become that. If I ever became that and my mom got wind of it, oh man, there'd be serious trouble.''
Ne-Yo, real name Shaffer Smith, grew up with his mother in Las Vegas. His musical education came from her eclectic listening habits, which encompassed country, soul, pop, R&B ... “Everything! My mom was my hero when I was growing up.''
Year of the Gentleman is influenced by the Rat Pack, who ruled his hometown in the 1960s.
“Nowadays, in place of charisma and swagger, we have money. A man will try to impress a woman with his car and the diamonds in his chain, not his conversation and his personality,'' he complains.
“Money, diamonds, cars, all that stuff gets attention but it's personality, charisma, class that keep attention and that's where I'm trying to go.''
His conversation is studded with admiring references to old-school greats: Nat King Cole's smiling charm, Frank Sinatra's effortless cool, Sammy Davis Jr who “had that charisma that just made you pay attention''.
In Ne-Yo's eyes, they were true gentlemen — though his understanding of the term isn't meant to imply a nostalgic return to the music of yesteryear.
“Look at Jay-Z, he's one of the coolest cats walking the face of the planet, he's an absolute gentleman,'' he says.
“A gentleman is diverse. A gentleman knows that there are lots of different kinds of people in the world and he takes it upon himself to communicate with them.''
The new album takes this gentlemanly credo to heart. Characterising himself as “a bit bored with the urban scene'', Ne-Yo has ventured out to investigate different genres of music, spicing up his usual R&B with dancehall, pop and techno.
In an industry obsessed with following the latest hit, it carries a certain risk.
“There's a saying that was born in Las Vegas,'' the singer says: “‘Scared money don't make nothing'.''
His outlook is simultaneously adventurous and old-fashioned. He loves melody and speaks dismissively of the prevalence of modern R&B songs that hammer away robotically at a single note.
“That's not the R&B I grew up listening to, where people sing with emotion and feeling.''
As a songwriter he's willing to work with unfashionable old stagers such as Celine Dion and Michael Bolton.
As well as the Olympian task of rehabilitating Jacko, he has also submitted work for the comeback album of another troubled 1980s icon, Whitney Houston.
“Those are going to be two very, very important records in their careers. It's got to be done the right way.
"It's not like either one of them is missing any meals at any time, it's not like either of them is hurting for any money.
“They have time to make sure it's done right, so why not take that time?''
The tone betrays the bruises of his unhappy experiences when he first signed to a record label in his teens, which ended with him going to court to free himself from the contract.
“That taught me that never in a million years walk into one of these record labels and tell them you don't know who you are yet, because they will create for you who you are, and if you don't like what they create, tough, because it's their money.''
The gentlemanly persona isn't flippant. Underlying it is a desire for integrity in an untrustworthy world where you can't place faith in surface appearance, whether it be the crocodile smile of a record executive or the gleam of a diamond bracelet.
“There's a lot to be said about a person who makes you like them when they speak,'' Ne-Yo says. We're talking about Barack Obama, whom he enthusiastically supports.
“It can go one of two ways. They're going to make you trust them and then they're going to do you wrong, or they're going to do what they say they're going to do.
"Being in this business makes you very good at knowing the difference between the two. Anyone who's too nice, watch your back.''
So there are similarities between the snakepits of Washington politics and the music industry? Ne-Yo laughs.
“Yeeaah,'' he says. “A lot of similarities there. A lot of ‘smile in your face and stab you in your back' situations going on.''
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