その多彩な音楽性と唯一無二の存在感で音楽界にセンセーションを巻き起こし、今や人気女優としても大活躍の"クイーン・オブ・フューチャー・ソウル"ジャネール・モネイ、超待望の新作!過去2枚のアルバムは音楽メディアから大絶賛、グラミー賞にも6度ノミネートされるなど、ソウル、R&B、ファンク、ポップ、オルタナティヴを超越する彼女のハイブリッドでフューチャリスティックな音楽性は今作も変わらず!

発売・販売元 提供資料 （2018/03/05）

Rolling Stone - 4.5 stars out of 5 -- "[S]he weaponizes Prince's fluidly radical pop-funk spirit for a new power generation, targeting oppression on various intersectional fronts....It's a sexy MF-ing masterpiece." Spin - "The album is best in its meatiest section, a run of songs in the middle of the tracklist that remind us that Monae and her team -- including the writers and producers Nate Wonder and Chuck Lightning -- have the songwriting chops to justify their reverence." Spin - Included in Spin's "The 51 Best Albums of 2018" -- "DIRTY COMPUTER is the closest she's come to making an album in which she's all things to all people. Most obviously, she's a successor to Prince..." Entertainment Weekly - "[A] collection of funky, smart, and ferocious tracks combining echoes of her heroes -- including Prince -- with her own special feel." Entertainment Weekly - Included in Entertainment Weekly's "The 20 Best Albums of 2018" -- "With assists from Zoe Kravitz and Grimes, Monae's DIRTY COMPUTER transforms 'The Future Is Female' from a marketable slogan into a foregone conclusion." Uncut - "Its kaleidoscopic, digital-funk sound was reflected in its castlist, though, including Prince, Stevie Wonder, Brian Wilson and Pharrell..." Billboard - "Monae shimmies and shines on sex-positive tracks like 'Make Me Feel' and 'I Like That,' weaving clever lyrics and beats baring her late mentor Prince's legendary fingerprints throughout." NME (Magazine) - 5 stars out of 5 -- "It's one of the greatest artists of our time carrying Prince's baton into the new world....She's got The Purple One's punk, mad-scientist approach but creates a world all of her own." Pitchfork (Website) - "DIRTY COMPUTER's opening act is harmonically lush, filled with bright synthesizers and rhythm guitars that refuse to linger in the melancholy found in the lower frets -- their realm is one of tentative exhilaration, of becoming." Clash (Magazine) - "DIRTY COMPUTER captures the plight of today's outsiders who are fighting back, forming the world to be. Monae is 10 steps ahead, past the Trump era, embracing the robot-utopia that gives hope to an unprejudiced and equal world."

Rovi

"Yoga" was an ostensibly minor part of the Janelle Monae discography by the arrival of Dirty Computer. Three years old and outshined by another Wondaland release, Jidennas "Classic Man," it nevertheless became Monaes first single to hit the Billboard Hot 100. That Monae hadnt previously hit the chart as a headliner was further evidence of a flawed industry, given that they and primary collaborators Nate Wonder and Chuck Lightning had been making songs with pop appeal for nearly a decade. "Yoga" did show that Monae was more open to messing with contemporary trends. Moreover, the songs humanized, sexually uninhibited, and anti-authoritarian qualities -- they were earthbound, celebrating their body, asserting "You cannot police me" -- also indicated the course they have taken with their third album. Oddly enough, "Make Me Feel," the one Dirty Computer track on which Monae employs a wholly pop songwriting team including Julia Michaels, Justin Tranter, and Mattman & Robin, is the funkiest and friskiest number here, clearly influenced by the late (and uncredited) Prince. Monae and their trusty Wondaland partners, the albums dominant creative force, colorfully twist and flip new wave-leaning pop with booming bass drums and rattling percussion. They transmit powerful and defiant jubilance in response to "wack ass fuckboys everywhere (from the traphouse to the White House) who make the lives of little brown girls so damn hard," among dozens of other inspirations Monae acknowledges in the essential liner notes. Almost every track is densely packed with quotables delivered in approaches that shift from easygoing elegance to hard-fought, triumphant conviction. The latter approach yields the albums apex, "Django Jane," in which Monae raps throughout with inhuman precision, threatening a pussy riot, declaring "We aint hidden no more," and uplifting the "highly melanated" while dropping some of the sets few sci-fi allusions, "Made a fandroid outta yo girlfriend" among them. Not to be lost in all the power moves are indirect and direct references to a romantic relationship -- another form of dissent -- referenced and explored throughout, from the glowing "Crazy, Classic, Life" through the fiery "So Afraid," the only moment of emotional fragility. While this is easily the most loaded Monae album in terms of guests, with Brian Wilson, Stevie Wonder, and Grimes among the contributors, theres no doubt that its a Wondaland product. It demonstrates that artful resistance and pop music are not mutually exclusive. ~ Andy Kellman

Rovi