Patiently Waiting
S
hanell Woodgette already has a long résumé. Although the girl tagged as the “softer, sweeter side of Young Money” isn’t the type to brag, as a dancer, choreographer and songwriter, she’s already worked with the likes of Ne-Yo, Kelis and Danity Kane, all before signing her deal with Young Money/Universal Motown. Now that she has joined Weezy’s Young Mula movement, Shanell a.k.a. SnL (an acronym for “Shut up n Listen”), is poised to present the world with a zest of music. “I’m an 80’s baby, and I listen to Method Man, the whole Wu-Tang, Nas and Biggie,” she begins. “But I also listen to Cyndi Lauper, Madonna and Prince. When I’m in the studio, a fusion of those sounds just happen. I think [my music] is gonna be new, fresh and dope.” Born in Springfield, MA, Shanell, along with her mother and younger sister (former Danity Kane member D. Woods), relocated to Atlanta shortly after the Summer Olympics in 1996. The two sisters were enrolled at Tri Cities Performing Arts, a high school that produced talented entertainers like rap duo Outkast, comedian Kenan Thompson and singer/songwriter Kandi Burruss. The school helped the Woodgette girls sculpt their
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passion for entertainment. D. Woods went on to make Diddy’s band, while Shanell’s entertainment career began as a dancer. “I’ve always done everything, but dancing is what I started doing professionally first,” says Shanell, who has danced and choreographed for Ne-Yo, The Game, Snoop Dogg and Bow Wow. “I learned a lot because I saw more than an artist that starts off being an artist.” In addition to dancing, she penned songs for Kelis, One Chance and Danity Kane, but still had an unyielding desire to be a recording artist. After meeting Mr. Carter while on the road with Ne-Yo, SnL finally got the break she was waiting for.
the YM emblem. She wrote and was featured on “Prom Queen,” the first single off Wayne’s forthcoming rock album Rebirth. She toured and performed on both the I Am Music and America’s Most Wanted tours. Her recently released Taste of Shanell mixtape has given listeners an appetizer for her free spirit and carefree musical persona, most notably on the remake of Eddie Murphy’s “Party All The Time” with former Danity Kane bad girl Aubrey O’Day. She’s in the process of helping to complete Rebirth and her crew’s Young Money compilation, and with her chance to finally have the spotlight; she vows to go where other females in her lane won’t.
“I met Wayne on tour. I was actually dancing for Ne-Yo at the time, but I was so serious about my music,” Shanell remembers. “[I] was trying to play music for everybody. I played my stuff for [Wayne] and he was like, ‘Well, what do you wanna do? You wanna dance or you wanna sing?,’” she says, imitating Lil Wayne’s voice. “I was like, ‘I really wanna sing.’”
“I haven’t seen a fun female [artist] in a long time,” she says. “It’s okay to have fun. It’s okay to wild out sometimes. You don’t have to be so uptight and perfect all the time, and as far as the lyrical content of my music, that’s what I talk about. It’s those things that other females are scared to talk about or admit.”
Shanell’s career came full circle since donning
Words by Randy Roper Photo by Allen Cooley