John Legend 05/25/2017
Legend’s fifth studio album Darkness and Light, which has received a plethora of critical praise, released on December 2nd on Columbia Records. USA Today hailed the album as John’s “most personal record” with tracks like “Right By You” which they described as “a heart –tugging rumination on his 7-month old daughter, Luna.” Time Magazine called the body of work “unflappably classy” while the New York Times said Legend “treats love as something far more complex than a panacea and a fount of perpetual reassurance, with music to match.” Continuing, the New York Times pointed to the album’s most recent anthemic hit single, “Love Me Now,” which they praised as “a seize the moment song,” that “revolves around an insistent, lo-fi piano figure, and its chorus first arrives with Mr. Legend nearly alone, singing over simple, fading chords.”
Ohio-born John Legend is a critically acclaimed, multi-award winning, platinum-selling singer-songwriter. His work has garnered him ten Grammy Awards, an Academy Award, a Golden Globe Award, the BET Award for Best New Artist and the special Starlight Award from the Songwriters Hall of Fame, among others. Legend’s debut album, Get Lifted, was released in December of 2004 through Columbia Records. The critically acclaimed album spawned the artist's first hit single, “Ordinary People,” and scored Legend multiple Grammy Awards in 2006, including Best R&B Album, Best New Artist and Best Male R&B Vocal Performance. The follow up was 2006’s platinum-selling Once Again, which brought Legend another Grammy, Best Male R&B Performance, for his single “Heaven,” and included collaborations with Kanye West, will.i.am and Raphael Saadiq. Legend’s next release was 2008’s Evolver, led by the hit single "Green Light" featuring Andre 3000. His 2010 collaboration with the Roots, Wake Up, won the Grammy for Best R&B Album a year later. Legend’s highly acclaimed fourth studio album Love In the Future, features “All of Me,” Legend’s highest selling and charting song to date, reaching #1 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart and #1 on both Mainstream Top 40 and Rhythmic charts. Legend won his first Academy Award, first Golden Globe Award, a Grammy award, and a Critic’s Choice Award for his song “Glory,” that he wrote and performed with Common, for the film SELMA.