The Love Below by Andre 3000

by Kristopher Adams

When Outkast released Speakerboxx/The Love Below, I was only 1 year old. As I grew up, the only song I heard from this project was ‘Hey Ya!’; that was my first introduction to Andre 3000 as an artist.

I thought he was eccentric, out-of-the-box, and an all-around artist who every artist aspires to be by making the music they want. That's exactly what ‘The Love Below’ is.

‘The Love Below’ is an album that doesn't stay in the box of hip-hop, and it starts with a ballad-like intro track with only three lines, which doesn’t prepare you for what’s to come.

This album goes through many shifts production-wise with the next two tracks, ‘Love Hater’ and ‘Happy Valentine's Day’, which bring two different vibes.

‘Love Hater’ brings a smooth jazz club vibe that I enjoyed. This song is interesting because I have never heard a rapper talk about the importance of love. Andre gives us two verses that talk about what you miss out on if you don’t take love seriously.

He says that your lover scratching your dandruff or rubbing your shoulders are things that he explains are important. He also explains what you would do for love, like knowing that company is coming over, so you start ‘scrubbing hard’.

Then you shift to ‘Happy Valentine’s Day’ that has a Prince-pop vibe. This is a song that I don’t have a problem with, but I’m not going to listen to it unless I do another full album listen through, but that doesn't go for the next track, ‘Spread’.

‘Spread’ is one of my favorite songs from this project, essentially for its funky hook. It’s a fun sex song, and it's another example of this album being out of the box. I also like what he does with the high voice, which isn’t annoying, but it adds almost an inner thought type of element to it.

The next song is ‘Prototype’, which continues the funk trend, and it’s a sweet song. In the first verse, Andre says, “I hope that you're the one, but if not, you're the prototype,” and with him saying that, it shows that the woman he met meant so much to him that he hopes to find another one just like her.

Then the album does another shift with ‘She Lives in My Lap’ which has a neo-soul type of vibe to it, and when I got to this song, it made me realize how vulnerable Andre was on this album.

It shows how complacent Andre was in the relationship and says that he knows he has her for as long as he wants. He doesn't necessarily have to commit because she's his ‘forever fiancée.

Then comes “Hey Ya,” a song where Andre said in the song, “you don’t hear me, you just want to dance,” and to be honest, he wasn't wrong. For as long as I have known ‘Hey Ya,” I have never paid attention to what he was saying, but how catchy the song was.

This is what makes Andre a great artist; he can put together a certified hit, and people do not pay attention to the message.

I will say that after this song, it was hard for me to get to the end of the album because ‘Roses’ is an extremely catchy song. Recently, it's been the only song I’ve listened to all day.

The directions that Andre takes on topics of love are so interesting, and that's what makes this album so good. He’s very intentional with everything when it comes to the naming of the song or even the interludes, and ‘Roses’ continues the intentionality trend.

To follow ‘Hey Ya!’ with ‘Roses’ is masterful. To add, Andre did a great job on production. The echoes of the last words of the first verse hook me into the song, and the hook just prompts me to put the song on repeat. Then you add Big Boi, who slides on this track effortlessly, and you get a masterpiece. ‘Roses’ does everything that I love from Andre.

‘Good Day, Good Sir’ is an interlude, but it reminds me of De La Soul. It’s just a wacky skit that I find funny, which leads into ‘Behold A Lady’. This song is still growing on me, but I can see why people would like it.

The same can’t be said about Pink & Blue, which is not a song I particularly enjoy. When I first heard the song, I thought it was going to be an Aaliyah sample. I was sorely mistaken, it's one of the slower songs on the album, and I enjoy a more lively Andre, and thats what I got in ‘Love In War’.

‘Love In War’ and ‘She’s Alive’ are both songs where Andre is singing. Some people don’t like Andre's singing, but it doesn’t bother me because I don’t expect him to do anything crazy, and it sounds good.

Andre goes back to the funky vibe on ‘Dracula’s Wedding’, and it’s an interesting perspective that I have never heard before. Again, this is what makes Andre the visionary that he is, not that he made a song as Dracula and Kelis as the lover, but because he’s outside of the box. He doesn't go into the standard that hip-hop puts him in, instead, he makes his own, which brings listeners to “My Favorite Things,” which is a cover of John Coltrane's “ My Favorite Things” with the three stacks touch.

I won’t say that this track adds or takes away from this album. It’s one of those tracks that either you enjoy or you don’t.

As the album concludes, Andre gives us “Take Off Your Cool’ which is a soft folk song with minimal words, and it's a song that I feel isn't needed on this album.

The mood stays the same, but the message changes with ‘Vibrate’. ‘Vibrate’ is on the slower side, but the message is what keeps me in. What I like about this song is that even though it's on the slower side, it's how repetitive it is. I am a sucker for a catchy repetitve hook and ‘Vibrate’ does just that.

‘The Life of Andre Benjamin(Incomplete)’ is the last song of the album, and for a storytelling song to be the last song is the icing on the cake. As I previously stated, Andre is intentional, especially when he does things, for instance, adding incomplete at the end of the title of the song.

This is the first storytelling song that I have heard from Andre or even Outast, for that matter, but I hope that there are more because this is a good ending to a great album.

‘The Love Below’ is one of those albums that come once in a lifetime. This is an album that I have heard so much about, but I never got around to it, and now that I listen to I can hear why Andre is the most heralded Atlanta MC. ‘The Love Below’ is the album that everyone wants to make but no one will ever come close to this type of artistry.

I give “The Love Below” 5 spins.