Am I Late: Who’s “The” James Blake?

Another Outdated Recommendation

Until this week, I only had one James Blake in my life.

A couple days ago, I was scrolling through my timeline and I saw a couple of tweets (like the one below) about music from James Blake.

And so the first thing that came to my mind was “Man James Blake the tennis pro is really a multi-talented person.” I didn’t have to hear one note of this album or song and I was ready to appoint him as the heir apparent to Jamie Foxx. But after doing a simple google search I found that my assumptions were wrong. (Note: I’m not even sure why I know who this James Blake is. I’m convinced I watched entirely too much SportsCenter as an adolescence).

What is he looking at? Why aren’t we taking a picture of that?

With one search I found what looked to be leftover pictures from One Tree Hill or some other canceled CW show. So now my world was just turned upside down — a world of two James Blakes. The James Blake I knew was an African-American tennis star (I use star loosely but hey he’s an American) that one 10 tournaments, reached 3 Grand Slam quarterfinals and was ranked as high as #4 in the world. That’s definitely enough achievements to honor the distinction of the James Blake. This would not be a Vanessa Williams vs Vanessa Williams scenario.

Then I went down a Wikipedia wormhole and saw that Yeezy called the new James Blake his favorite artist in 2014. So once again I’m late on pop culture. But I still kept thinking there is no reason to dethrone my countrymen from prestigious James Blake title for an overhyped brit who has a few twitter followers that use hyperbolic language. Then I clicked on this youtube video.

And everything changed after the Forrest Fire. This is the R&B track Drake wished he released on Views*. Sorry retired tennis player, James Blake, from this day on you will be known as old James Blake**. Yes, now you are the Vanessa A. Williams in this Vanessa Williams world.

* Still have not listened passed track 6 of Views
** R.I.P. James Blake as “The James Blake” (12–28–79 to 05–13–16)

Earnest Sweat is a Startup Adviser that specializes in mentoring startups within the fin tech, ed tech, and real estate tech sectors. If you have any questions, comments or requests please connect with Earnest through LinkedIn, Twitter, or AngelList.

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