The Dictatorship
I feared D’Angelo’s music would send me to hell — but it freed me
Even though I bought D’Angelo’s 2000 sophomore album “Voodoo,” I was afraid to listen to it because I was still very much a church boy committed to Pentecostal doctrines. I was a choir director and still planning to be a preacher and, perhaps, a pastor. Preaching was the family business, and I wanted to be a good son.
Voodoo was a spiritual practice I knew nothing about except that “saints don’t do that,” and I knew it would cause a spiritual crisis if I enjoyed D’Angelo’s music. Something so explicitly antagonistic to my spiritual beliefs, I feared, could be a portal to hell.
I knew it would cause a spiritual crisis if I enjoyed D’Angelo’s music. Something so explicitly antagonistic to my spiritual beliefs, I feared, could be a portal to hell.
But it wasn’t a portal to hell, it was a portal to freedom. What Michael Eugene “D’Angelo” Archer, a former Pentecostal church boy like me, modeled on “Voodoo” helped me figure out how to live a more generous and loving and honest life. Even when living a more generous, loving and honest life is very hard to do.
D’Angelo, whose album “Voodoo” won that year’s Grammy for best R&B album and whose single “Untitled (How Does It Feel)” won the Grammy for best R&B male vocal performance, died Tuesday at 51 after a diagnosis of pancreatic cancer.
He won four Grammys in total. In addition to the two mentioned above, his 2014 album “Black Messiah” won a Grammy for best R&B album, and the single “Really Love” won a Grammy for best R&B song. But as one of the innovators of what was called neo-soul, D’Angelo’s influence was far greater than the number of awards he won and far greater than you might expect from someone who only released three studio albums over his career. He released his debut album, “Brown Sugar,” in 1995.
When I finally broke down and listened to “Voodoo,” I loved everything about it. The connections from song to song felt like a good Friday night church service feels when folks sing songs that flow from one to the next without pause. The movement from song to song — and within each song, too — pulsates and drives and grooves. “Voodoo” felt spiritual to me in ways I didn’t yet know how to name. But I felt it, and I feel it still.
My connection to the album made more sense when I found out that, because of his Pentecostal background, D’Angelo felt the intensity and fervor of the spirit the same way I did. And he wanted that intensity and fervor to be felt in sounds and songs he’d create with others. Pentecostalism, and he absolutely meant Black Pentecostalism, “totally informs everything I do,” D’Angelo said in a 2015 interview with television host Tavis Smiley. “When I’m on the stage, I bring that with me.”
What he’d bring with him is immersion.
Pentecostals not only believe in baptism by immersion — where the water covers the entire body — but they also believe in what they call the baptism of the Holy Spirit. You have to be submerged in the spirit, all up in and through it.
That is what listening to “Voodoo” is like, being immersed in the spirit. And apparently, it was what recording and performing it was like, too.
Russell Elevatedwho was the recording engineer for “Voodoo” and was a close collaborator of D’Angelo, said as much: “A lot of times [D’Angelo] would sing something to get the right inflection and intonation, versus trying to articulate the word … And also, we were mixing his vocal level lower than normal. He liked it where the track kind of had him enveloped — not really on top of the mix, but more inside of the mix.”
D’Angelo not only understood immersion; he wanted to perform immersion. He wanted to live life immersed in the power of Black love and joy and sound.
Obviously, D’Angelo, a son and grandson of pastors who learned to play multiple instruments in church, would have been made to fear hell for playing secular music.
He wanted to be inside the mix, his voice finding refuge and home in the surround of sound. Not more prominent, not less, but with, together, abiding, constantly unfolding voice in relation to instruments and rhythm. To live one’s life as an immersive reality is to always be in the middle of things, always held, always carried. And what a beautiful thing it is to be held and carried.
With its tambourines and hand claps and foot stomps and Hammond organ and guitars and the sounds of praise and worship and moaning and wailing, this is what the music of Pentecostalism achieves: an immersive caress.
Obviously, a church boy like D’Angelo, a son and grandson of pastors who learned to play multiple instruments in church, would have been made to fear hell for playing secular music the same way I initially feared hell for listening to it. But we can thank God for his grandmother, who, he told Tavis Smiley, gave him permission to play secular music even when others in his church forbid it.
She never reprimanded his desire, he intimated. It seems she accepted him in his fullness, in his softness, in his beauty and wonder and curiosity. And he showed what softness as Black musical genius could sound like. Taking the best of the tradition — the gospel and the soul and the blues, he was a bluesman more than anything. Earthy. Warm and vibrational.
We can only imagine the reactions to his move toward secular music, to say nothing of him naming his second album “Voodoo.” Church folks can be unkind and unforgiving when you take up other sacred practices and make connections between theirs and the ones they say are demonic — like Voodoo, like Santeria rituals. Or, for me, like queerness. I have understood and felt that unkindness. And it is heartbreaking.
There’s a part in James Baldwin’s short story “Sonny’s Blues” in which the narrator connects the intensity of Black Pentecostal worship and music to the sought-after high of substance use. “When she was singing before,” the title character says, “her voice reminded me for a minute of what heroin feels like sometimes — when it’s in your veins. It makes you feel sort of warm and cool at the same time. And distant. And — and sure.” This sense of being near and far, distant and close, warm and cool is the in-between of immersion. Baldwin writes that “[T]he man who creates the music is hearing something else, is dealing with the roar rising from the void and imposing order on it as it hits the air. What is evoked in him, then, is of another order, more terrible because it has no words, and triumphant, too, for the same reason. And his triumph, when he triumphs, is ours.”
He was uncomfortable with being seen as a sex symbol and deliberately gained weight as he struggled with addictions to drugs and alcohol.
Though he was only shown from the waist up, D’Angelo appeared to be completely naked when he recorded the video for “Untitled (How Does It Feel).” But he was reportedly uncomfortable with being seen as a sex symbol and deliberately gained weight as he struggled with addictions to drugs and alcohol.
Some folks want drugs and sex and church to be very different kinds of things, but Baldwin in “Sonny’s Blues” tells us that no, they are of the same source. And D’Angelo sang to us to say that they are of the same source. I felt such a deep and abiding affinity for D’Angelo because, like him, I have attempted to find that immersive experience of intensity and fervor after leaving the church, the place where I learned and felt it most. You seek that intensity, you need that intensity, and sometimes you find it in love and joy, or sex and drugs. You want the immersive power but not the addictions that often come with it.
What he needed, what we all need, is space to be vulnerable, to allow it to flower and unfurl. And in his life, and with his music that will resound for generations to come, that will echo and hail us to its downbeat and groove, he showed how vulnerability and softness could be cultivated and tended to.
“Voodoo” and “Black Messiah,” and his debut album “Brown Sugar,” along with his features and live performances, offered a way to find balance in the immersive. Making music with others — musicians and audiences together — can allow for beauty to emerge because one is so very vulnerable and exposed to the world. In those performances, he allowed for vulnerability and softness to flourish.
Andon Crawley
Ashon Crawley is a writer, artist, and a professor of religious studies and African American studies at the University of Virginia. He is the author of “Blackpentecostal Breath: The Aesthetics of Possibility” (Fordham University Press) and “The Lonely Letters” (Duke University Press and is currently completing a book about the Black church, the AIDS crisis and the sound of the Hammond organ titled “From Infinite World: The Sound of the Hammond Organ and the Tragedy of AIDS in the Black Church.”(W.W. Norton)
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DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — Iran again launched drone and missile attacks targeting Bahrainand Kuwaiton Sunday following new U.S. airstrikes against the Islamic Republic, and threatened a “complete halt” in negotiations to end the warif Washington continues its attacks.
Efforts to reopen the Strait of Hormuzwithout Iran’s oversight has sparked days of crossfire. A multinational maritime body overseen by the U.S. Navy said Saturday it would expand a route near Omanfor inbound and outbound traffic.
Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi on Sunday reiterated the claim that Tehran must govern the strait to the Persian Gulfthat once carried a fifth of the world’s oil and natural gas.
“Any attempt to establish new or separate arrangements from those currently being carried out by the Islamic Republic of Iran will only lead to further complications, delay the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz and increase the level of tension,” Araghchi said.
The strait has long been considered an international waterway despite its location in Iran and Oman’s territorial waters. In recent days, Iran has twice attacked vessels going through a route near the Omani side.
A Pakistani official involved in the technical talks between the U.S. and Iran told MS NOW Sunday that talks between the sides are on hold given the ongoing fighting between the two sides. The source, who did not want to be named to discuss the sensitive matter, said the U.S., Iran, Pakistan and Qatar all have representatives currently in Switzerland to restart discussions when instructed to do so.
But the Trump administration said nothing has been canceled and technical talks are on track for the coming days.
Talks include arrangements around the strait, the removal of a U.S. blockade on Iranian ports and sanctions on Iran, and the future of Iran’s stockpile of highly enriched uranium. The two sides have 60 days from their signing of the memorandum of understanding earlier this month to work out details.
Continued conflict in Lebanon threatens the agreement, which says fighting must end on all fronts before certain issues can be discussed.
Strikes target Gulf states hosting US military
Iran’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard claimed responsibility for the attacks in Bahrain and Kuwait.
Kuwait, which hosts a major U.S. military base, said air defenses intercepted Iranian drones and two missiles just after the U.S. strikes in Iran. There were no reports of injuries or damage.
Bahrain said the Iranian strikes damaged a residential building near the international airport and no one was killed. Bahrain is home to the U.S. Navy’s 5th Fleet. The damaged building was not near its headquarters.
Bahrain’s Foreign Ministry denounced what it called “a dangerous escalation that reveals that what Tehran is doing is not a passing act, nor an isolated incident, but rather a deliberate approach and a systematic pattern of repeated aggression.”
Later on Sunday, Qatar said a civilian had been killed, and another person was hurt, by shrapnel related to “military operations in the area” after a vessel didn’t return at its scheduled time on Saturday. It did not give details.
Trump accuses Iran of violating ceasefire
The U.S. military said it struck Iranian military “surveillance infrastructure, communication systems, air defense sites, drone storage facilities and minelayer capabilities” following an attack on a ship on Saturday. The Panamanian-flagged tanker Kiku carried crude oil for the state-run energy company of Qatar, another key mediator.
U.S. President Donald Trump on social media accused Iran of violating the deal and warned of a point where the U.S. may “be forced to militarily complete the job.”
“If that happens, the Islamic Republic of Iran will no longer exist!” Trump wrote.
The exchanges of fire began when an Iranian drone struck a merchant vesseloff Oman on Thursday and the U.S. military retaliated.
Ship traffic on the strait had increased over the past 72 hours, “despite the elevated threat environment,” the multinational maritime body overseen by the U.S. Navy said Sunday, adding that “U.S.-assisted commercial transits continued uninterrupted.”
It said 89 such transits had been made, below the historical average of 138 vessels a day.
Iran calls for new ‘conflict control unit’ in Lebanon
Last week, Israel and Lebanon signed a framework agreementto end the latest fighting between Israel and the Iranian-backed Hezbollah militant group, which began two days after the Iran war started when Hezbollah fired at Israel. Israel has responded with an invasion of southern Lebanon and it has said it will not withdraw until Hezbollah is disarmed.
The agreement did not include Iran or Hezbollah, which has criticized itand rejected calls to disarm.
On Sunday, Iran’s foreign minister again said the U.S. must force Israel to halt attacks and withdraw. Israel occupies around 600 square kilometers (231 square miles) in southern Lebanon, which it says it needs as a security buffer.
Sporadic clashes have continued, and Hezbollah’s leader said Saturday that the group would continue fighting until Israel withdraws from Lebanon.
Key Iranian negotiator and parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Qalibaf said Sunday that a meeting of a new “conflict control unit” formed among Iran, the United States and Lebanon should meet as soon as possible, Iran’s state broadcaster reported.
Two strikes hit southern Lebanon on Sunday morning — one in Taybeh town and the other in the Nabatiyeh area, according to Lebanon’s National News Agency. There was no immediate word on casualties.
Overnight, Hezbollah militants killed an Israeli soldier in Deir Siryan village in southern Lebanon, according to Israel’s military. Hezbollah did not comment.
Israel targets a village in Syria
Israel’s military targeted Abdin village in southern Syria’s Daraa province with artillery shelling Sunday evening, Syrian state media reported. There was no immediate report of casualties.
State news agency SANA earlier reported that residents had blocked the road into the village with stones to prevent Israeli forces from entering it again after they had entered and withdrawn.
Earlier Sunday, Israel’s military said it had killed several armed men in southern Syria but gave no details. There was no statement from Syrian officials.
Israel seized control of a U.N.-patrolled buffer zone in southern Syria in December 2024 following the ouster of former Syrian President Bashar Assad in an insurgent offensive. Israeli officials initially called the move temporary, but more recently they have said they plan to occupy the zone indefinitely.
New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani has a message for political opponents using him as the new face of the Democratic Party: “Let them.”
Recent primary races in New York turned into a proxy war between progressives, including democratic socialists like Mamdani, and establishment Democratic politicians after candidates endorsed by Mamdani faced off against those endorsed by House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries and New York Gov. Kathy Hochul. After all three of Mamdani’s endorsements bore fruit, a national spotlight shone on the mayor as a growing influence in the Democratic Party.
Asked on ABC News’ “This Week” on Sunday how he felt about Republicans making him the “poster child” for the Democratic Party, Mamdani said, “Let them. We don’t have to ask ourselves what life looks like if a socialist wins. I won last November, and over the course of these last six months, what we’ve delivered for working people are the very things we were told were impossible.”
He touted recent campaign promises he delivered on, including freezing rents for nearly one million rent-stabilized apartments, expanding free child care and filling potholes across the city.
“I think we are seeing a hunger that is not just felt by New Yorkers, but frankly by Americans from coast to coast for a new politics, one that puts working people at the heart of it,” Mamdani told ABC.
Mamdani dismissed criticism from Republicans and Democrats alike. Jeffries, who represents parts of Brooklyn and Queens, said last week that he and the mayor “agree to strongly disagree about some of his endorsements, and he’s got work to do in terms of the conversations that he’s going to have with members of Congress moving forward.” Democratic Sen. Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut said, “The effort to nationalize New York is going to fail.”
Mamdani said he’s focused on the three congressional candidates he has already endorsed: Brad LanderDarializa Avila Chevalier and Claire Valdez. But he didn’t rule out future endorsements outside of New York.
“It’s not just New York City where working people are asking themselves ‘why can’t I afford my rent, why can’t I afford my groceries, why can’t I find enough money in my pocket for childcare no matter how hard I work?,’” Mamdani said.
When asked about a recent manifesto penned by a number of moderate House Democrats and Democratic candidates, promoting capitalism over socialism, Mamdani doubled down on his vision for the party.
“I’m not interested in writing a manifesto, or frankly, in reading one,” the mayor said. “I’m interested in delivering.”
Mamdani also criticized Democrats who continue to make antagonizing Trump the center of their politics rather than working people.
“You’ve got to have something that you are not just willing to stand up for, but that you’re also willing to explain how this is relevant to working people,” he said. “And I think this just comes back to the fact that I’m leading a city that’s the wealthiest city in the wealthiest country in the history of the world. I could end the sentence there and say that life is great for 8.5 million people. But it’s also a city where one in four are living in poverty. And for far too many Americans, those contradictions have become their day to day life.”
Erum Salam is a breaking news reporter for MS NOW, with a focus on how global events and foreign policy shape U.S. politics. She previously was a breaking news reporter for The Guardian.
Despite remaining undefeated in the initial round of the World Cupthe Iran national team is going home after failing to secure enough points to advance. But they do not leave quietly.
Iran’s tumultuous journey in the World Cup has been the subject of widespread attention amid the U.S. war with Iran, with the United States being one of three countries hosting matches. The Iranian team captain, Mehdi Taremi, blamed FIFA, saying, “It’s a disaster World Cup. A disaster.”
“I mean, FIFA, they have to solve every problem here but unfortunately they could not solve it since the beginning,” Taremi said at a press conference Friday after his team drew with Egypt, knocking Iran out of the tournament.
He pointed to the team’s biggest obstacle. “We don’t have our logistics people here. They don’t have a visa,” Taremi said, adding, “We always complain about these things but no one helps. No one.”
The Trump administration denied visas to key Iranian staff and severely restricted players’ travel. The team’s base camp was moved from Arizona to Tijuana, Mexico, where it was required to return immediately after each game.
“How is it possible we always have to travel from Tijuana? We love the people in Tijuana. We love Mexico,” the Iran team captain said, but added, “It’s not fair.”
Throughout the tournament, the Football Federation of Iran lamented the number of issues, threatening to lodge a formal complaint against FIFA. Head coach Amir Ghalenoei called his team the “most oppressed” in the tournament. A few days before Iran’s final match against Egypt in Seattle on Friday, the U.S. loosened travel restrictions to allow players to enter the United States two days before the game.
“The Iran team will still be required to leave the day the match ends,” the Department of Homeland Security said ahead of the match. “The overall security measures and protocol are the same. We remain committed to providing the safest tournament possible for players, staff, and fans alike.”
Still, Iran finished Group G in third place with three points earned after drawing in its matches against Belgium, New Zealandand Egypt. Under FIFA’s new 48-team format, the top eight of third-place teams move on to the next round, but Iran narrowly fell short.
The team initially seemed poised to advance when it was tied with the same amount of points as Algeria, which scored a goal in stoppage-time against Austria Saturday night. But moments later, Austria tied the game, guaranteeing Iran’s elimination.
Off the field, tensions with Iran heightened Friday when the U.S. struck Iran despite signing a memorandum of understanding meant to halt hostilities in order to finalize a peace deal.
Erum Salam is a breaking news reporter for MS NOW, with a focus on how global events and foreign policy shape U.S. politics. She previously was a breaking news reporter for The Guardian.
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