Darkness and Light John Legend

• 1 I Know Better 03:03
• 2 Penthouse Floor 04:43
• 3 Darkness and Light 03:50
• 4 Overload 03:20
• 5 Love Me Now 03:30
• 6 What You Do to Me 03:21
• 7 Surefire 04:03
• 8 Right By You (for Luna) 04:16
• 9 Temporarily Painless 03:55
• 10 How Can I Blame You 03:56
• 11 Same Old Story 03:32
• 12 Marching Into the Dark 04:21
• Total Runtime 45:50

Info for Darkness and Light

„Darkness and Light“ is the new album from acclaimed, multi-platinum selling, Oscar, Golden Globe and 10x Grammy Award winning singer/songwriter John Legend. This new 12 song collection is produced by Blake Mills (Alabama Shakes), and features multiple guest collaborations including Chance the Rapper, Alabama Shakes' Brittany Howard, and Miguel. The lead single and video from „Darkness and Light“, is the anthemic track, "Love Me Now," written and produced by John Legend with Blake Mills and John Ryan (One Direction).

John Legend's work to date 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. His 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 arrived in 2013, and featured the worldwide hit "All of Me," his highest selling and charting song to date. Following the success of the platinum album Love In The Future, Legend won his first Academy Award, first Golden Globe Award, his 10th Grammy award, and a Critic's Choice Award for his song "Glory," that he wrote and performed with Common, for the film SELMA.

The next chapter of John Legend's continually building career is „Darkness and Light“. The music on this new album not only reflects Legend's continued evolution as an artist, but also his role as a husband and a new father. John married his longtime girlfriend, model Chrissy Teigen, in September of 2013. In 2016, the couple had a daughter named Luna.

„Unlike John Legend's first four proper studio albums, this one, his fifth, was produced almost entirely by one person. Floored by Alabama Shakes' Sound & Color, Legend -- coming off his first number one pop hit and an Academy Award -- recruited Blake Mills, that album's chief collaborator. Mills, who also plays several instruments and co-writes almost every song, responds in kind here with a similarly vivid touch. Even at its most processed, the album sounds handwrought, a fully evolved synthesis of gospel, folk, rhythm & blues, and adult pop. Legend's supporting cast of songwriters, an unconventional mix of commercial pop and underground figures that widely ranges from John Ryan to Will Oldham, is completely different to that of 2013's Love in the Future. The bulk of the songs are thematically similar nonetheless, with the embrace of an intense and long-term partnership -- up against "all that shit from the outside" -- at the center. A little more personal and societal context is drawn here. It starts with "I Know Better," a ballad led by Larry Goldings' Hammond organ and piano, where Legend enters in almost startling fashion with "They say sing what you know, but I've sung what they want." He renounces vanity, then beams "My history has brought me to this place/There's power in the color of my face." After the elegant funk-soul number "Penthouse Floor," a triumphantly escapist number enhanced by Chance the Rapper, the content switches to more personal matters. A one-night stand ("Temporary Painless"), the rejection of anxieties to seize commitment ("Surefire"), love after war ("What You Do to Me"), and life under a microscope ("Overload") are among the subjects. There's also a moving ballad, featuring tenor sax from Kamasi Washington, addressed to Legend's daughter. In addition to Legend's laser focus and Mills' presence, the album is tied together by the supreme rhythm section of Pino Palladino and Chris "Daddy" Dave. Each track has its own kind of burning intensity. The album's front, back, and inner photos are in black-and-white, but the music evokes rich shades of yellow, orange, and red.“ (Andy Kellman, AMG)

John Legend
is a nine-time Grammy Award winning recording artist, critically-acclaimed concert performer, philanthropist/social activist, and was named one of Time magazine’s 100 most influential people. Legend’s debut album, Get Lifted (2004) sold more than three million copies worldwide and earned an astounding eight Grammy nominations with three wins for Best New Artist, Best Male R&B Vocal Performance and Best R&B album. Legend’s follow-up album, Once Again (2006) earned RIAA platinum certification and a Grammy Award for Best Male R&B Vocal Performance. High off the success of his third consecutive Top 10 album, Evolver (2008), Legend embarked on an extensive world tour with an 11 piece band - his largest traveling show to date. Inspired by the monumental 2008 Presidential election, Legend teamed up with The Roots to release the socially conscious album, Wake Up! (2010.) The album was nominated for five Grammy Awards and won Best R&B Album, Best Traditional R&B Vocal Performance and Best R&B song (for “Shine”- an original composition also featured in Academy Award-winning director Davis Guggenheim’s documentary film Waiting for Superman) along with two NAACP Image Awards for Outstanding Album and Outstanding Duo, Group or Collaboration. In 2007, Legend launched the Show Me Campaign, a nonprofit organization fighting poverty around the world. John also sits on the Boards of The Education Equality Project, Teach for America, and the Harlem Village Academies. Legend has been honored several times for his activism, including the 2010 BET Humanitarian of the Year award, the 2009 CARE Humanitarian Award for Global Change, and the 2009 Africare’s Bishop John T. Walker Distinguished Humanitarian Service Award. In early 2012, Legend released one of the hottest songs of his career, the RIAA gold-certified hit “Tonight (Best You’ve Ever Had),” which sat atop the Urban AC radio chart for six consecutive weeks. Legend recently released his fifth studio album Love in the Future, with executive producers Kanye West and Dave Tozer, and will embark on a North American tour this autumn.

This album contains no booklet.