D’Angelo surprise releases new album ‘Black Messiah’

D’Angelo has surprise-released his third album and first in fourteen years, ‘Black Messiah’.

Arriving twenty years since his ‘Brown Sugar’ debut, it follows years of rumours that a new release was in the works. Earlier this year, the R&B artist’s manager Kevin Liles promised that “there’ll be an album this year,” and in the years before, Questlove stated that it was the “Apocalypse Now on black music.”

After the lead single ‘Sugah Daddy’ came online earlier this week, ‘Black Messiah’ is streaming in full on Spotify, available to purchase on iTunes. ‘Really Love’ is the official lead single.

In a statement about the album, D’Angelo writes: “It’s about people rising up in Ferguson and in Egypt and in Occupy Wall Street and in every place where a community has had enough and decides to make change happen.”

Stating that not every song is politically charged, he adds: “It’s not about praising one charismatic leader but celebrating thousands of them.”

Listen below on Spotify. Purchase on iTunes here.