Rhythm and Blues (R&B) royalty is coming to Birmingham to put on a show. Billboard reintroduced R&B in the 1990s to categorize all music made by Black people that is not hip-hop.
Lalah Hathaway, five-time GRAMMY award-winning singer, released her seventh studio album, VANTABLACK, two months ago ahead of her tour, which kicks off on Aug. 24 at the BJCC Concert Hall in Birmingham.
The VANTABLACK collection is named after the darkest shade of black and is meant to be a political commentary of the racism and hatred within the current political climate in the United States, according to a press release about the album, as well as a celebration of Hathaway’s African American heritage.
The musician’s father is the late R&B singer Donny Hathaway, who is most known for his songs “This Christmas,” "The Ghetto," "Someday We'll All Be Free" as well as his duets with singer Roberta Flack. Hathaway said her father being the singer helped made her job in the music industry easier.
“I come from the greatest singer who ever lived. That's my opinion, and in my mind, it's a fact, but it makes it so that I don't have to even really work hard to do what I'm doing,” she explained. “It's such a natural thing… It influences everything that I do. My dad is always with me, and I feel like it's such a blessing to be associated with someone so great. It makes it easy for me to do my job.”
The album VANTABLACK has already received praise from Billboard and GRAMMY.com was well as leading to a performance on the Kelly Clarkson Show. Hathaway said she began creating the collection during the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020.
“It’s kind of a record that I started during the quarantine, which was an odd time for everybody, but it was really a time for me to sit and be quiet and breathe and recharge. I started working with people over Zoom and having different ways of communicating and building music together,” she explained. “The word ‘Vantablack’ is the blackest black, and I feel like it represents who I am at this point in history as a human, being here in America,” Hathaway explained.
According to Hathaway, her newest record was a way to speak on the recent waves of anti-Black racism in the United States. While the singer said she does not have all the solutions to the issues regarding the county’s current political climate, she felt it was her job to bring attention to it through music.
“An artist, I have to speak to what I see in my community and what I see in my world. If I'm seeing it, others are seeing it,” she explained. “So really, it's just to tell the story, to be the griot, to try to illuminate what is going on from my perspective and from my lens as a Black America, and then really to offer hope in that area.”
Prior to VANTABLACK’s release, Hathaway spent time in South Africa where she said she was able to observe her identity from a new perspective.
“I think that being able to just kind of objectively observe my Blackness in a place where almost everyone is Black, without the burden of being an American for those two weeks, without Jim Crow, without lynchings, without gerrymandering, without redlining, without so many things that are endemic in this country, was a really fascinating exercise to just really be a Black woman for a minute,” she explained.
“I wish that more people of color could travel and have that kind of access, because it was really something I can't even explain to you. It was such a sublime experience for that moment to turn the world off and just be Black,” Hathaway continued.
The singer said everything from her identity, personal experiences and other music lent itself to the creation of VANTABLACK.
“I think that art is one of those things that you're always called upon to talk about, so that people get it. For me, [it’s] a holistic experience. The best way to talk about it is to do it and have people observe what the art is,” Hathaway explained.
The VANTABLACK Tour, which kicks off in Birmingham, was chosen because Hathaway said cities in the South that are not major hubs like Atlanta, GA, are usually forgotten.
The GRAMMY winner said the history that Alabama and the wider southern region has, coupled with the message of VANTABLACK, is important because it can be a teaching moment for those who may not have learned particular parts of Black history.
“Music is such a teaching tool. Music is a teacher of Black history in this country. Black music is a teacher of history in this country. It ranks as important to me, in terms of study, as English and math. It is really the story of our history,” she said.
“What I really try to impart is music that people can give to their children, people who can pass down and be proud of that has a legacy of joy, however the music makes you feel,” Hathaway continued. “Some of the songs are battle cries, some of the songs will make you cry, will make you sad. Ultimately, there's the hope in that record that I really
Hathaway’s VANTABLACK Tour kicks off on Aug. 24 at the BJCC Concert Hall in Birmingham. For more information on the singer’s tour and latest record, visit her website here.
