''Authenticity'' is the third studio album by American musical duo

the Foreign Exchange The Foreign Exchange is music duo consisting of the American rapper Phonte and the Dutch record producer Nicolay, their music is a blend of hip hop, soul, R&B and electronica. Musical career The pair initially made contact via message boar ...

. It was released on October 12, 2010 via The Foreign Exchange Music. The album peaked at number 145 on the ''Billboard'' 200 chart in the US.

Critical reception

''Authenticity'' was met with universal acclaim from

music critics Music journalism (or music criticism) is media criticism and reporting about music topics, including popular music, classical music, and traditional music. Journalists began writing about music in the eighteenth century, providing commentary on ...

. At

Metacritic Metacritic is an American website that aggregates reviews of films, television shows, music albums, video games, and formerly books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted average). Metacritic was created ...

, which assigns a

normalized Normalization or normalisation refers to a process that makes something more normal or regular. Science * Normalization process theory, a sociological theory of the implementation of new technologies or innovations * Normalization model, used in ...

rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream publications, the album received an

average In colloquial, ordinary language, an average is a single number or value that best represents a set of data. The type of average taken as most typically representative of a list of numbers is the arithmetic mean the sum of the numbers divided by ...

score of 86 based on five reviews. '' Urb'' reviewer praised the album, stating: "what I realized listening to this studio masterpiece is that

Phonte Phonte Lyshod Coleman, known mononymously as Phonte (born December 28, 1978), is an American rapper, singer, and producer. He is also a member of Team Supreme, that co-hosts the Questlove Supreme podcast. Phonte is a member of the North Caroli ...

Dwele Andwele Gardner (born February 14, 1978), known professionally as Dwele, is an American R&B singer, rapper, songwriter and record producer from Detroit, Michigan. He is best known for his guest appearance on Kanye West's 2007 single " Flashing ...

, and

Aloe Blacc Egbert Nathaniel Dawkins III (born January 7, 1979), known professionally as Aloe Blacc (), is an American singer and rapper. He is known for his guest performance on Avicii's 2013 single "Wake Me Up (Avicii song), Wake Me Up", which peaked on ...

are all former MC's with new grown and sexy albums out this year worth purchasing".

Nathan Rabin Nathan Rabin () is an American film and music critic. Rabin was the first head writer for ''The A.V. Club'', a position he held until he left the ''Onion'' organization in 2013.

of ''

The A.V. Club ''The A.V. Club'' is an online newspaper and entertainment website featuring reviews, interviews, and other articles that examine films, music, television, books, games, and other elements of pop-culture media. ''The A.V. Club'' was created in ...

'' called the album "a work of hushed intimacy and unabashed romanticism that uses synthesizers to create incongruously organic, natural-sounding grown-folks R&B".

AllMusic AllMusic (previously known as All-Music Guide and AMG) is an American online database, online music database. It catalogs more than three million album entries and 30 million tracks, as well as information on Musical artist, musicians and Mus ...

's Andy Kellman wrote: "more moody, modern R&B that sounds like nothing else and reveals remarkable depth (there's even a little well-placed twang and some violin), ''Authenticity'' is neither an everyday nor an every-day album, unless playing it is necessary for the sake of convalescence". Andrew Martin of ''Prefix'' magazine described the album as "a concise, cohesive effort that finds The Foreign Exchange again successfully pushing the boundaries of R&B, soul,

electronic music Electronic music broadly is a group of music genres that employ electronic musical instruments, circuitry-based music technology and software, or general-purpose electronics (such as personal computers) in its creation. It includes both music ...

, and

hip-hop Hip-hop or hip hop (originally disco rap) is a popular music genre that emerged in the early 1970s from the African-American community of New York City. The style is characterized by its synthesis of a wide range of musical techniques. Hi ...

". Tal Rosenberg of ''

Pitchfork A pitchfork or hay fork is an agricultural tool used to pitch loose material, such as hay, straw, manure, or leaves. It has a long handle and usually two to five thin tines designed to efficiently move such materials. The term is also applie ...

'' concluded: "the music on ''Authenticity'' may initially sound remedial and elemental, even saccharine, but further listens reveal new intricacies".

Track listing

Charts

References

External links

* {{Authority control 2010 albums The Foreign Exchange albums Albums produced by Nicolay (musician)