Continuing our look at some of 2013′s most notable R&B/soul releases, next up is the new LP from Dungeon Family songstress, Janelle Monae, which sits among the best of the year. Like recent releases from The Foreign Exchange and John Legend beside it, Monae’s sophomore effort, Electric Lady, carves its own path, rather than subscribing to industry-created formulas for “success”.

Continuing a narrative started on her debut EP, Metropolis: Suite One: The Chase, and followed by her stellar full-length debut, The ArchAndroid, Electric Lady continues the tale of her robotic alter-ego, in some sort of alternate universe 1970′s, where androids are a downtrodden, persecuted minority. Narrated by fictional DJ Crash Crash (played by real life personality Chuck Lightning), the story of Electric Lady follows Cindy Mayweather, as played by Janelle, who is on the run for being an illegal android.

Metaphorically, Janelle’s narrative mirrors the Civil Rights movement of the 1960′s or the gay rights movements of today, as her archandroid alias is representative of any group that faces adversity from mainstream America. The narrative doesn’t quite extend into the music itself, but does a great job of sewing it all together.

While not as airtight as her full length debut, Electric Lady is still a very impressive follow-up to ArchAndroid. She gets right to it by kicking the album off with an eyebrow raising pair of collaborations with the rock-tinged “Give Em What They Love” with Prince, and funky Erkyah Badu collab, “Q.U.E.E.N.” You think your guest list is hot because it has the entire G.O.O.D. Music / Young Money / MMG roster? Janelle’s sharing studio space with legends.

What follows is another set of high-profile collaborations, on “Electric Lady” with Solange, and “Primetime” with Miguel. While these tracks boast big names in the current R&B world, truthfully Janelle takes center stage on both tracks, as the guests kind of melt into the background of the LP. That’s not necessarily a bad thing.

So after these attention-grabbing appearances set the album up, Janelle does a fine job carrying the rest of the album herself. Rather than going full Cee-Lo Green retro for the entire LP, she bobs and weaves with many different styles and sounds. The catchy “Dance Apocalyptic” is a fun sock-hop of a jam, while tracks like the sultry “Look Into My Eyes” and “Dorothy Dandridge Eyes” employ cinematic, samba-bossa nova vibes. This is hardly fashionable in this day and age, but highly likeable.

And thats what set Janelle Monae apart from all of her contemporaries. She’s producing smart, well written, musically rich soundscapes here, and piecing it together with a multi-level narrative that extends to her past and future works. True, she set the bar unbelievably high on her full-length debut, The ArchAndroid, but Electric Lady serves as a worthy follow-up. It will be interesting to see how she closes out the seven part narrative on her next project.

Janelle performs two new cuts, “Dance Apocalyptic” and the title track from her new album, Electric Lady, on SNL, as broadcast last night.

In stores now.

It’s almost a Dungeon Family reunion, in a way. Goodie Mob Age Against The Machine review coming tonight, by the way.

Janelle Monae sits in with 97.9 The Beat’s Jesse Salazar about her new album, and the concept behind the “Electric Lady”.

From Age Against The Machine, due August 27th.

From Age Against The Machine, out August 27, 2013.

From the forthcoming album, The Electric Lady, due September 10th. Directed by Wendy Morgan.

This Emotion Picture is an excerpt from a larger short film named The Dance Apocalyptic, which is set in an alternate version of present-day America.

To read the entire the apocalyptic adventure click here:

Second single from The Electric Lady, coming soon.

From Age Against The Machine, coming August 27, 2013.

Janelle Monae is back…. and with Erykah in tow? The single will be released on iTunes tonight at midnight (4/23).

The festival will happen September 1 and 2 at the Benjamin Franklin Pkwy in Philly, and will feature Jay-Z, Pearl Jam, Skrillex, Miike Snow, Afrojack, Calvin Harris, Odd Future, D’Angelo, Rick Ross, Wale, Meek Mill, Passion Pit, Santigold, Dirty Projectors, X, Janelle Monae, Prince Royce, Rita Ora
Savoy, The Knocks, and more.

Jokes: What, no Beanie Sigel? Also, we didn’t know Calvin Harris and Afrojack were made in America.

Late edition from the Sir Luscious Leftfoot: The Son Of Chico Dusty LP.

Eminem accepts the award for Best Rap Album for Recovery, competing against The Roots How I Got Over, B.o.B. The Adventures Of Bobby Ray, Jay-Z The Blueprint 3, and Drake Thank Me Later.

Eminem celebrates Recovery, while Dr. Dre prepares for Detox with this medley performance featuring Rihanna and Skylar Grey of both “Love The Way You Lie” and “I Need A Doctor”. After seeing this, we’re expecting “I Need A Doctor” to be a crossover smash on the level of “Airplanes” or “Love The Way You Lie”.

Eminem also took awards for Best Rap Solo Performance for “Not Afraid”

B.o.B. performs “Nuthin’ On You” (nominated for each “Record Of The Year”, “Best Rap / Sung Collaboration”, and “Best Rap Song”) with Bruno Mars (winner of Best Male Pop Vocal Performance for “Just The Way You Are”) and Janelle Monae (nominated for Best Urban/Alternative Performance for “Tightrope” and snubbed for Best Contemporary R&B Album for The Arch-Android). This led into a doo-wop rendition of Bruno’s “Grenade”, and closed out with Monae’s “Cold War”.

B.o.B. speaks on the red carpet to the Grammy’s interviewers and makes plans for Valentine’s Day.   Drake and Rihanna peform “What’s My Name”, breaking down into a dancehall rhythm remix. Heh, Drizzy said “good weed” on CBS. Rihanna took the award for Best Dance Recording for “Only Girl In The World” and was nominated several times for “Love The Way You Lie” in each Song Of The Year, Best Rap/Sung Collaboration, Best Rap Song, and Best Short Form Video categories. Cee-Lo performs his ridiculous smash hit “Fuck Forget You”, which took the award for Best Urban/Alternative Performance, dressed in an Elton-esque getup, with help from The Muppets and a surprise performance from Gweneth Paltrow, who sung the tune on Glee a few weeks back. John Legend speaks with MTV legend, John Norris, about his multiple wins this year with The Roots for Wake Up! LP. Wins include Best Traditional R&B Vocal Performance for “Hang On In There”, Best R&B Song for “Shine”, and Best R&B Album for Wake Up!. Nominations also for Best Rap Sung Collaboration for “Wake Up Everybody” and Best R&B Performance By A Duo Or Group With Vocals for “Shine”. He also speaks on working with Kanye and Sade (!) on his next solo album.

Swizz Beatz on the red carpet about his recent endorsement deals, along with new albums in the works from himself and Alicia Keys.

Swizz and Jay won the award for Best Rap Performance By A Duo Or Group for “On To The Next One”.

Chamillionaire (“who’s awesome!”) speaks on the red carpet about Twitter and the status of his next LP, which will not be called Venom.

For a complete list of winners, check out Grammys.Com.

Atlantic assembled it’s dream team of artists to start a round table discussion on how to “change the game”, so to speak. This video dropped early last month, but we slept.