Jill Scott has that unmistakable big brass voice, and it’s even eerier to listen to now, just months after watching a biopic about blues legend Bessie Smith. Scott’s voice is similarly cocky and demands you to be entranced. It woos, wails and does sick intonations. It makes you forget that the vocally untouchable Scott has her idiot moments. On her new album Woman, there’s a stretch at the end of “Closure”—a song about having one last post-breakup sexual relapse—where she pronounces every word with a prickling attitude and derision. “You want some of my time? You want some of my affection?” she sneers. “You want me to listen to you, baby? Aw, is that what you want from me?” That’s why Jill Scott is Jill Scott.
After hearing the first two singles leading up this album’s release, I predicted: “’Fool’s Gold,’” as a complement to “You Don’t Know,” makes it seem like Jill Scott is writing a great fuck-love thesis about falling for the deceit of a romantic con artist.” More than just painful, Woman sounds tough and secure, too, and seems to mostly take place well after the breakdown phase of heartache, when you remember everything about you that’s good. In the spirit of Bessie, Scott sounds every bit like a mutha when she sings, “I’m the boss lady, busy handling and managing,” and “Mama’s working your nerves/ Mama’s able, I’ll be right back when I’m done.” The music, like much of her music, is as intense and melodramatic as a spoken word scene in Love Jones.
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