It's been awhile since Kofy Brown's spring 1999 album Skinny & Tight was released, but it still booms out the box like a State Of The Union address on black music. The multitalented Washington D.C. native delivers a stately, soulful, treatise on various aspects of rap, funk, and R&B, fusing the classic motifs of Motown, Stax and Tamla soul with the headnod beats of hip hop and the calculated, jiggy electronics of producers like Timbaland, Missy Elliot, and Swizz Beats. A veteran of the European jazz festival circuit, Kofy also plays damn near all the instruments on the album, thoroughly distinguishing herself from perfect, unattainable divas like Erykah Badu and That Other Black Female Rapper Whose Last Name Is Brown, whose talents exist only in the vacuum of commercial hits produced by men. Instead of singing the praises of platinum, ice, Cristal, and Beemers, wallowing in jealousy, or decrying duplicitous boyfriends who are always blowing up her beeper or turning off their cell phones, Ms. Brown prefers to keep her boys in check. She shares her observations on bohemian life in the inner city's dark side, calls for women's solidarity ("Can U Hear Me" even references Klymaxx), and evokes true love and companionship in the face of shallow users and players.
