This is the title track of the second studio album by the American recording artist Janelle Monáe. The record continues the utopian cyborg concepts of its predecessors and serves as the fourth and fifth installment of her seven-part Metropolis concept series.
The song (and album title) is a reference to an imaginary woman Monáe started painting when listening to her track "Mushrooms and Roses" whilst on tour. Each night she'd paint the same female silhouette until she'd produced over 100. Monáe brought up was the woman, during a visit to a shrink and the professional advised her to name her, and the Electric Lady was born.
Asked who the Electric Lady is, Monáe replied: "Someone who cares for the community, who has her own perspective on making love and what love is."
This song features Solange Knowles, who is the sister of Beyoncé. She is best known for her 2008 single, "I Decided," which was a Top 40 hit in several European countries.
The Electric Lady album cover is a drawing by New York artist Sam Spratt of Monáe plus her alter ego Cindi Merriweather alongside her four sisters. Spratt said in NME: "I took her and my own influences and made these disparate elements cohesive without being some sort of Frankenstein's monster."
The song's music video pays tribute to some of the Electric Ladies that came before. The clip starts off at at Monáe's home, where she says goodbye to her mom (yep, that's Janelle's real mother saying the opening monologue). She then heads off to a house party for the Electro Phi Betas alumnae, where we see TLC's T-Boz, Monica, Estelle, Esperanza Spalding and Kimbra singing along as framed photos on a wall of the college honorees.
Janelle's dance partner is rapper T.I. They supply some impressive moves choreographed by Fatima Robinson.
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