Image via Complex Original
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For nearly two decades, Erykah Badu has been one of the most unique and essential voices in popular soul and hip-hop music. From breaking through with the multi-platinum Baduizm in 1997 and changing the sound of R&B radio to the increasingly political and avant-garde leanings of her New Amerykah albums, she has remained a restlessly daring creative force and a fiercely unique vocalist.
No longer pigeonholed with the “neo-soul” tag or early comparisons to Billie Holiday, Erykah Badu is an artist whose body of work has gotten richer and more complex with time. Even though she hasn’t released a new album or single in nearly five years, she remains as relevant as ever. And just as she has reemerged from previous lengthy hiatuses, we’ll be ready to listen whenever she comes back with a new track. In the meantime, these are the best Erykah Badu songs from her solo releases, with a tip of the hat to some of the great collaborations that she’s done with contemporaries like the Roots and OutKast.
20.“Otherside of the Game” (1997)
The third single from Baduizm is sung from the perspective of a woman whose beau is involved in some risky business. And it’s the ambivalence of the song, wrestling with the instinct to support his hustle and concerns about safety, that makes it compelling and universal, even as it’s easy to imagine the modern-day circumstances being described. “Brotha’s got this complex occupation/And it ain’t that he don’t have education/’Cause I was right there at his graduation.”
19.“Didn’t Cha Know?” (2001)
When Common introduced Erykah Badu to J Dilla, she went to the producer’s Detroit basement to get to work on his contributions to her 2000 album, Mama’s Gun. “He had records wall to wall like a public library, and he goes, ‘OK, I want you to look for a record,’” Badu recalled to The Fader in 2006. The first record she pulled out was by Tarika Blue, and the first track she heard instantly inspired Badu to write “Didn’t Cha Know?” which sampled the Tarika Blue track “Dreamflower.” Where the “Otherside of the Game” video ended with Badu revealing her hair to the public for the first time, the “Didn’t Cha Know?” video concluded with the singer showing off a freshly shaved scalp.
18.“I Want You” (2003)
Although the less than three years between Mama’s Gun and Worldwide Underground actually represent one of the shorter waits between Badu projects, she was apparently dealing with some writer’s block at the time. In early 2003, she took the few new songs she had on the road, along with her greatest hits for the Frustrated Artist Tour, to help drum up inspiration to finish the record. One of the songs from that tour, “I Want You,” wound up at the 10-minute centerpiece of Worldwide Underground, a nominal EP that featured nearly an hour of new music.
17.“Me” (2008)
Over a sumptuous groove by Sa-Ra Creative Partners producer Shafiq Husayn, Erykah Badu shouts out both of her children’s fathers (Andre 3000 and the D.O.C.), Louis Farrakhan, and her mother, Kolleen. But clearly Erykah’s main topic on “Me” is herself: “This year I turned 36/Damn, it seems it came so quick/My ass and legs have gotten thick/It’s all me.”
16.“Jump Up in the Air and Stay There” (2010)
Both of the New Amerykah albums were cohesive and offbeat affairs with few concessions to radio. And two of the most immediate and accessible songs on each album wound up relegated to bonus tracks. “Honey” was an unlisted hidden track at the end of 4th World War, and “Jump Up in the Air and Stay There,”—a collaboration with one of the biggest rappers in the world—only appeared on the iTunes deluxe edition of Return of the Ankh. Lil Wayne famously asked, “Where is Erykah Badu at?” on his 2008 hit “A Milli,” shortly before she returned from a few years out of the spotlight. And in appreciation of the name check, she invited Weezy to contribute a verse to the studio version of the warped, funky live favorite “Jump Up in the Air and Stay There.”
15.“Telephone” (2008)
Erykah Badu was one of many musicians deeply affected by the loss of J Dilla in 2006. And she composed one of the most moving of the many elegies written for the producer, inspired by a story told to Badu by Dilla’s mother at his funeral. Apparently, Dilla had a dream, shortly before his death, about Ol’ Dirty Bastard giving him directions home. That poignant image informs the chorus of “Telephone,” a gorgeous seven-minute ballad that features liberal use of a siren sample Dilla often used in his tracks.
14.“4 Leaf Clover” (1997)
On one of the funkier, more upbeat tracks from Baduizm, Erykah Badu scats freely and opens the track by giving herself a memorable nickname: “Buzilla, baby!” Cupid’s arrow, catching a leprechaun, and a rabbit’s foot all join the titular four-leaf clover as good luck charms in the search for romantic fortune.
13.“Bag Lady (Cheeba Sac Remix)” (2000)
The lead single to 2000’s Mama’s Gun, Erykah Badu’s biggest Hot 100 hit, is best known not for the mellow live band version that appears on the album, but for the Cheeba Sac Remix. That mix borrows the beat from Dr. Dre’s 1999 track “Xxplosive,” in a nod to the fact that both “Bag Lady” and “Xxplosive” are built on the guitar line from the Shaft soundtrack deep cut “Bumpy’s Lament.”
12.“Green Eyes” (2000)
Erykah Badu’s relationship with Andre 3000 had dissolved by the fall of 2000, when both artists released songs inspired by the experience. By far the most famous one was OutKast’s chart-topper “Ms. Jackson,” which dealt with the familial fallout of a couple with a child together breaking up. But Badu’s Mama’s Gun had its own tales of heartbreak, most memorably on this playful, jazzy tale of jealousy: “My eyes are green because I eat a lot of vegetables/It don’t have nothin’ to do with your new friend.” As the song unfurls several sections over the course of 10 minutes, however, the emotional territory becomes far more complex and mournful (“I know our love will never be the same/But I can’t stand this growing pain”).
11.“Soldier” (2008)
Produced by Karriem Riggins in a homage to J Dilla’s sound, “Soldier” is the hardest-hitting track on New Amerykah Part One: 4th World War, with funky drums snapping underneath an ethereal flute loop. Riffing effortlessly over the beat, Erykah Badu’s wide-ranging verses touch on everything from 9/11 and Katrina to crooked cops and the Civil Rights Movement, ultimately declaring solidarity with present-day activists: “Everybody know what this song’s about/They be trying to hide the history/But they know who we are.”
10.“Love of My Life (An Ode to Hip-Hop)” (2002)
For the soundtrack to 2002’s Brown Sugar, a film that intertwined the subjects of love and hip-hop, Erykah Badu teamed up with then-boyfriend Common for something of a spiritual sequel to his 1994 breakthrough hit “I Used to Love H.E.R.” Picking up from Common’s concept, equating hip-hop with a romantic partner, Badu digs into the possibilities for wordplay with sly lines like, “He moved around and we kept in touch through his friend Mike (mic).” The hit featured rap icons like Chuck D. and MC Lyte in the video and won Badu her fourth Grammy, for Best R&B Song. A year after the original, Worldwide Underground featured a new version, “Love of My Life Worldwide,” featuring Queen Latifah, Bahamadia, and Angie Stone.
9.“Danger” (2003)
The intro to Worldwide Underground’s “Danger” features a callback to one of Badu’s earlier singles, “Otherside of the Game,” sampling the line “The brotha’s got this complex occupation.” The song that follows is something of a spiritual sequel to that song, though a much more aggressive and up-tempo take on the same subject matter.
8.“Window Seat” (2010)
The lead single to 2010’s Return of the Ankh was Badu’s biggest radio hit in nearly a decade. It caught the ear of one of radio rap’s biggest stars of the moment, Rick Ross, who hopped on an official remix of “Window Seat” that further helped drive the song’s popularity. And Badu returned the favor by appearing on Ross’s next album, Teflon Don. “Window Seat” also gained some infamy for its controversial music video, in which Badu walks through the streets of Dallas, taking off her clothes in front of on-lookers, and is then taken down by a simulated assassination by sniper.
7.“A.D. 2000” (2000)
The 1999 death of Guinean immigrant Amadou Diallo, who was shot by NYPD officers, brought about a wave of public debate about police brutality. And while Bruce Springsteen’s “American Skin (41 Shots)” became the most famous and controversial song written about the Diallo murder, Erykah Badu had her own quietly intense protest song dedicated to the tragic victim a few months later on Mama’s Gun. The lyric, co-written by Betty Wright, laments from Diallo’s perspective: “You won’t be naming no buildings after me/My name will be misstated, surely.”
6.“Gone Baby, Don’t Be Long” (2010)
“Gone Baby, Don’t Be Long” is the third installment in a loose trilogy of songs Badu has written from the perspective of a woman in love with a lawless hustler, beginning with “Otherside of the Game.” And “Gone Baby” is the romantic denouement after the frantic “Danger,” flirtatiously admitting, “I can’t wait to see how you move/I like to watch you do what you do.”
5.“On & On” (1996)
The song that started it all, “On & On,” was Erykah Badu’s debut single, first chart hit, and it also won her her first Grammy. The song single-handedly conjures so much of what became Badu’s signatures: a wizened, mystical presence with a street-wise, straight-talking edge, rolling her eyes “oh what a day” at one moment and unspooling a playful metaphor about “three quarters and six dimes” the next. Her MTV Unplugged performance of the song features a classic moment of Badu showmanship—she delivers the lyric “I think I need a cup of tea,” and then sips from an actual teacup in favor of singing the next line.
4.“Master Teacher” (2008)
We know #StayWoke as a Twitter hashtag often employed to playfully invoke political or spiritual consciousness. But that meme hasn’t done anything to diminish the power of the song that popularized the phrase, from 2008’s New Amerykah Part One: 4th World War. Over a six-minute medley, Badu intones the “I stay woke” refrain over two very different backing tracks: first, a swirling, dramatic beat featuring a Curtis Mayfield sample, and then a light organ-driven groove.
3.“Next Lifetime” (1997)
Erykah Badu’s greatest love song has a metaphysical slant to it: She’s just a woman in a relationship, daydreaming about someone she wishes she could be with under different circumstances, which, of course, turns to thoughts of reincarnation. The bittersweet longing of the song resolves in the gorgeous melody and a resignation: “No hard feelings, I guess I’ll see you next lifetime.”
2.“Tyrone” (1997)
As a victory lap for the runaway success of her debut, Erykah Badu released a live album in 1997 that ran through all the favorites from Baduizm. But toward the end of Live, Badu primes the audience for a preview of new material with a playful disclaimer: “Keep in mind that I’m an artist, and I’m sensitive about my sh*t.” But from the moment she sings the bawdy new song’s first line, she has the crowd in the palm of her hand, hollering at every hilarious lyric that follows. By the second chorus, they already know the song so well that Badu doesn’t even need to sing every word herself. It’s breathtaking to hear a singer so completely sell an audience on an unheard, new track.
1.“The Healer” (2008)
New Amerykah Part One: 4th World War begins with “Amerykahn Promise,” a funk sample fanfare with minimal, distorted vocals welcoming you into the album’s atmosphere. But the next track, the Madlib-produced “The Healer,” is the hypnotic, otherworldly masterpiece that truly keys you into this new era of Erykah Badu’s music. Name-checking God in several different languages, Badu then announces “It’s bigger than religion: hip-hop.”