Allow him to reintroduce himself

Buried somewhere in the middle of this story about former Tony Toni Tone' frontman Raphael Saadiq is this tantalizing nugget of news: D'Angelo is somewhere in a studio, working on some new music.

It's about time. In fact, it's well past time.

When D'Angelo released his Grammy-winning sophomore album "Voodoo" in 2000, I was a senior in college, Bill Clinton was in his final months as president, Elian Gonzalez was on his way back to Cuba and my Internet browser of choice was Netscape Navigator.

Since then, D'Angelo has virtually faded from the spotlight except for a somewhat public battle with alcoholism and drug addiction and a stint in rehab (more on all that here). He's made more headlines than music, and to be honest, he hasn't made that many headlines.

Either way, I just hope he can stay clean and focused long enough to get out this long-awaited third album, which is reportedly named "James River." D'Angelo needs music and music, R&B in particular, really needs him; I don't think I can take another "hit" song from someone like Chris Brown. No offense.

Just to get a sense of what we've been missing, try this out. When I first heard this song, I knew I would be hooked. Has it really been 13 years?