Twisted elegance: Janet Jacksons The Velvet Rope is a template for Black pop stars to embrace the darkness – TheGrio

Janet Jackson attends the Black Girls Rock! 2018 Red Carpet at NJPAC on August 26, 2018 in Newark, New Jersey. (Photo by Dave Kotinsky/Getty Images for BET)

Editors note: The following article is an op-ed and the views expressed are the authors own. Read more opinions on theGrio

By 1997, Janet Jackson was a global superstar. The younger sister of King of Pop Michael Jackson broke out of her brothers shadow as Pops Queen after a successful run of albums like Control, Rhythm Nation 1814, and janet. She was seen as a regal figure who lived the charmed, carefree life of a celebrity.

But that was far from the truth.

Jackson was quietly dealing with bouts of depression. Her inner turmoil manifested itself in her sixth solo album, The Velvet Rope, released on Oct. 7, 1997. Not only did her internal battle reflect in her lyrics, but also in the production and the front-facing style aesthetic of the album.

A lot of it is about pain, Jackson said in a 1997 Vibe Magazine interview. I dont know if its something that we developed as a family, but I developed this way: If I was ever in any kind of pain, Id find a way to brush it aside. Eventually it caught up to me.

The album was Jacksons way of exercising demons and longtime producers Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis provided her with an expanded canvas of sonics that matched the mature themes she brought to the table. Gone was the exuberance of When I Think of You and Miss You Much. Even the sexual openness of the preceding album, janet., seemed tame compared with where she was in The Velvet Rope.

The new sound and the introspective lyrics resonated with fans. The album debuted at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 chart, garnered two top five Billboard Hot 100 singles in Together Again and I Get Lonely. The album eventually sold three million copies.

To say that Jackson is an inspiration to female artists would be an understatement. Twenty-five years later, its evident how The Velvet Rope has influenced todays singers.

The albums impact is chiefly seen in the work of two of todays biggest stars: Beyonc and Rihanna.

The two have dominated the charts and the cultural conversation over the young 21st century. But it wasnt just the hit songs themselves, but their respective tonal transitions they took from being Black pop stars to artists. They went through rough times and used their music to showcase their hardships.

The Velvet Rope gave them the agency to do so. Without the album, its unlikely fans would have embraced Beyoncs self-titled album or Lemonade, and perhaps Rihannas Rated R, or Anti.

From the first glimpse of the album artwork, you can see how The Velvet Rope inspired both Bey and Ri. Jacksons drastic hair switch-up to curly red, her head down to hide her face, gives the viewer a visual clue about the dark vibes that are coming; it is an ironic photographic indication of a woman removing her mask.

Beyoncs Lemonade cover borrows from this very sentiment. Blond hair, cornrows, her head photographed from the side, her face down out of the cameras view. She is tired, enraged, yet empowered. Rihannas Rated R is black and white; her hand covers one eye, while the other stares angrily into the lens.

The production of The Velvet Rope was vastly different from 1993s janet. The atmosphere shifted to more foreboding, ominous, yet eclectic sounds. Got Til Its Gone and Free Xone embraced hip-hops evolving time signatures and trip-hops esoteric uses of samples.

This presented a blueprint for Beyoncs sound shift from 4 to her self-titled release. The latter was more atmospheric, ambient, and brooding evident in Drunk in Love, Mine and Superpower. Rihannas production transition from Good Girl Gone Bad to Rated R was dramatic as well. The pop smashes of Umbrella, Shut Up and Drive, Hate That I Love You and Dont Stop the Music gave way to more menacing beats like Hard, Russian Roulette and Fire Bomb.

The Velvet Rope tackled issues of Jackson fighting inner demons on You, Empty,and the title track. You expresses the bitterness of withholding your feelings of doubt and inadequacy in the face of outwardly expressing positivity for the sake of the fans and the glad-handers.

Beyonc dealt with this in her self-titled album opener, Pretty Hurts. She sings Pretty hurts/We shine the light on whatevers worst/Perfection is a disease of a nation. In Rihannas Anti opener, Consideration, she sings, I needed you to please give my reflection a break/From the face, its seeing now/Would you mind giving my reflection a break/From the pain, its feeling now?

Sexuality has played a big role in the music of Jackson, Beyonc and Rihanna at multiple phases of their careers. However, Jacksons The Velvet Rope took uninhibited sexual ownership with If, You Want This and Anytime, Anyplace and embraced kink with songs like Go Deep, Tonights the Night, My Need and Rope Burn.

Never before had Beyonc been as sexually present lyrically as she was on her self-titled album. The innuendos of explicit activities on Drunk in Love and unveiled sexual exploits on Partition were a far cry from songs like 1+1 and Suga Mama. Rihanna also experimented with kink on S&M from 2010s Loud. Rude Boy from Rated R speaks of the size of her lovers manhood.

One song on The Velvet Rope What About encapsulates so much of what Beyonc, Rihanna and many other Black female artists have sung about. Over the push and pull of a lilting acoustic guitar and finger snaps to explosive electric guitar and bass, it deals with infidelity, neglect, gaslighting as well as abuse of a verbal, physical and sexual nature.

What About alone could be an inspiration agent for nearly the entirety of Beyoncs Lemonade. Her expansive narrative of marital infidelity from suspicion to rage to indifference to reflection to forgiveness touched a nerve with fans just as Jacksons performance of What About did on her tour and the 1998 VH1 Fashion Awards.

Rihanna famously dealt with such abuse on wax with Man Down from 2010s Loud. Her tale of fatefully shooting a man who raped her is a type of murder ballad not atypical for dancehall and reggae listeners but sounds jarring and shocking to a pop audience. But she dared to not only record the song but to release it as a single that went double platinum.

Jacksons The Velvet Rope was not all doom and gloom. It was accompanied by self-acceptance and embracing ones heritage.

Her videos for Got Til Its Gone and Together Again illuminated the beauty of African culture from dandy culture to tribalism, respectively. Beyonc creating the Black is King visual album or Rihanna exploring the outward expressions of her Caribbean roots may not have been possible if not for Jacksons visuals.

One of the hardest things to do as an artist is to convey your humanity to your audience in the face of immense success. When the world sees you as a rich pop star with endless access to the material treasures, you are the envy of all who walk the earth.

Without a doubt, The Velvet Rope opened doors for Black female pop star to openly and viscerally discuss the taboos of depression, sexual hedonism and domestic violence without barriers.

Matthew Allen is an entertainment writer of music and culture for theGrio. He is an award-winning music journalist, TV producer and director based in Brooklyn, NY. Hes interviewed the likes of Quincy Jones, Jill Scott, Smokey Robinson and more for publications such as Ebony, Jet, The Root, Village Voice, Wax Poetics, Revive Music, Okayplayer, and Soulhead. His video work can be seen on PBS/All Arts, Brooklyn Free Speech TV and BRIC TV.

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Twisted elegance: Janet Jacksons The Velvet Rope is a template for Black pop stars to embrace the darkness - TheGrio