an open birthday letter to Sade

Monday January 16th, 2012

Hi Sade,

Like most of the people I get along with, I have this fascination, or infatuation, with you. We talk about you like a pegasus, like somehow impossible, lighter than love + pared to bare simplicity. Oversized earrings and understated beauty. Few move with wave like you; there are fewer who would seriously investigate the colour of love; I think it’s twilight, the inbetween time, between dawn and sunrise or sunset and dusk, when sunlight below horizon illuminates the air: l’heure bleue.

For your birthday, we present this as a gesture of admiration and a tribute to the smoothness. Your contribution has been not just your music but the total influence, the input before and the output that’s followed. ‘Sade’ is a genre to me, and kind of a genre across genres, the sensuality epitomized by you but inclusive of numbers by so many others: Little Dragon, Anita Baker, Zaki Ibrahim, En Vogue, Drake, The Weeknd, OutKast, D’angelo, The Knife, Maxwell, Alicia Keys, James Blake, J Davy, Groove Theory, Phil Collins, Do or Die, Mike Jones, Currensy to name a few, and Aaliyah whose birthday is also today (RIP). I include all of those on that list. Sade is a tradition in music around a feeling. For us who had lovers rock to guide, you helped us know our selves and navigate our relationships. So in honour of you and to document your roots and branches, we recorded Sade Is In My Tape Deck, an ode to the elegance and influence. Humbly, we offer it on your birthday. Here’s to your excellence. Happy Birthday love.

Yours,

Robert