The Love & War MasterPeace received positive reviews from music critics. Billboard

Billboard (magazine)

Billboard is a weekly American magazine devoted to the music industry, and is one of the oldest trade magazines in the world. It maintains several internationally recognized music charts that track the most popular songs and albums in various categories on a weekly basis...

writer Gail Mitchell praised the album's themes and music, writing "Drawing from a palette rich in R&B, hip-hop and jazz, DeVaughn has crafted a powerful, thought-provoking album". Giving it 4½ out of 5 stars, Allmusic writer Andy Kellman cited The Love & War MasterPeace as "one of the most grippingly conscious major-label R&B albums of the last 30 years", viewing its love-themed songs as "imaginative and excellent" and praising its socially-conscious material. The Washington Post

The Washington Post

The Washington Post is Washington, D.C.'s largest newspaper and its oldest still-existing paper, founded in 1877. Located in the capital of the United States, The Post has a particular emphasis on national politics. D.C., Maryland, and Virginia editions are printed for daily circulation...

s Sarah Godfrey called it "a masterpiece" and compared DeVaughn to soul musician Marvin Gaye

Marvin Gaye

Marvin Pentz Gay, Jr. , better known by his stage name Marvin Gaye, was an American singer-songwriter and musician with a three-octave vocal range....

, writing "like Gaye, he can deliver songs for both babymaking and movement-building". Ken Capobianco of The Boston Globe

The Boston Globe

The Boston Globe is an American daily newspaper based in Boston, Massachusetts. The Boston Globe has been owned by The New York Times Company since 1993...

praised DeVaughn's vocals and called the album a "smartly executed set". Toronto Star

Toronto Star

The Toronto Star is Canada's highest-circulation newspaper, based in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Its print edition is distributed almost entirely within the province of Ontario...

writer Ashante Infantry gave it 3½ out of 4 stars and called it "a grooving, unconventional and utterly compelling album".

Despite viewing its thematic concept as flawed, Washington City Paper

Washington City Paper

The Washington City Paper is a U.S. alternative weekly newspaper serving the Washington, D.C., metropolitan area.Founded in 1981, and published for its first year under the masthead 1981, taking the City Paper name in volume 2, by Russ Smith, it shared ownership with the Chicago Reader from 1982...

writer Ben Westhoff praised its "wild ambition" and musical quality, stating "it instead works in the realm of the lush, the dark, and the dramatic, striving for a chiseled-in-granite sound. There’s not a note out of place here; the music is at times sweeping and blustery, at other times cautious and foreboding". Detroit Free Press

Detroit Free Press

The Detroit Free Press is the largest daily newspaper in Detroit, Michigan, USA. The Sunday edition is entitled the Sunday Free Press. It is sometimes informally referred to as the "Freep"...

writer Brian McCollum gave the album 3 out of 4 stars and wrote that it "dances a careful line between oldfangled soul and commercial R&B". Jon Pareles

Jon Pareles

Jon Pareles is an American journalist who is the chief popular music critic in the arts section of the New York Times. He played jazz flute and piano, and graduated from Yale University with a degree in music. In the 1970s he was an associate editor of Crawdaddy!, and in the 1980s an associate...

 of The New York Times

The New York Times

The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...

wrote that The Love & War Masterpeace is "destined to be split into separate love and war playlists", but ultimately praised DeVaughn's themes of "social consciousness and seduction", writing "at least Mr. DeVaughn has more than one thing on his mind". The Philadelphia Inquirer

The Philadelphia Inquirer

The Philadelphia Inquirer is a morning daily newspaper that serves the Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, metropolitan area of the United States. The newspaper was founded by John R. Walker and John Norvell in June 1829 as The Pennsylvania Inquirer and is the third-oldest surviving daily newspaper in the...

s A.D. Amorosi viewed its skits by Dr. Cornel West

Cornel West

Cornel Ronald West is an American philosopher, author, critic, actor, civil rights activist and prominent member of the Democratic Socialists of America....

 as "confident and paternal", and wrote that the album "finds DeVaughn embracing his political side with a sociocultural vision that's subtle, sharp, and never loses track of its contagious songcraft".

The album was nominated for a Grammy Award

Grammy Award

A Grammy Award — or Grammy — is an accolade by the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences of the United States to recognize outstanding achievement in the music industry...

 for Best R&B Album

Grammy Award for Best R&B Album

The Grammy Award for Best R&B Album is an honor presented at the Grammy Awards, a ceremony that was established in 1958 and originally called the Gramophone Awards, to recording artists for quality works on albums in the R&B music genre...

, presented at the 53rd Grammy Awards

53rd Grammy Awards

The 53rd annual Grammy Awards were held on February 13, 2011, at the Staples Center in Los Angeles. They were broadcast on CBS with a rating of 26.6 million viewers. Barbra Streisand was honored as the MusiCares Person of the Year two nights prior to the telecast on February 11. Nominations were...

 in 2011.

Track listing

Musicians

• Algebra – vocals
• Eugenia "Chinablac" Bess – background vocals
• Bilal – vocals
• Mike Ciro – bass, guitar, sitar
• Citizen Cope – vocals
• Phil Cornish – keyboards
• Rudy Currence – vocals
• Dave Darlington – keyboards
• Alfredo de la Fé – strings
• Chico DeBarge – vocals
• Raheem DeVaughn – executive producer, vocal arrangement, vocals
• Dwele – vocal arrangement, vocals
• Anthony Hamilton – vocals
• Patrick Hayes – guitar

• Shelby Johnson – vocals
• Debbie Knapper – guitar
• Ledisi – vocals
• Ludacris – vocals
• Damian Marley – vocals
• Chrisette Michele – vocals
• James Preston – keyboards
• Luisito Quintero – percussion
• Jill Scott – vocal arrangement, vocals
• Jerard Snell – drums
• Leonard "E-Flat" Stephens – keyboards
• Wale – vocals
• Shawn Whitley – bass, keyboards
• Malik Yusef – vocals

Production

• Ivan "Orthodox" Barias – engineer, keyboards, producer, programming
• Leslie Brathwaite – mixing
• DJ Wayne Williams – A&R
• Kenny Dope – producer
• John Drye – mixing
• Jeff Fenster – A&R
• John Frye – mixing
• Carvin "Ransum" Haggins – engineer, producer
• Yas Inoue – engineer
• Ronnie "Lil Ronnie" Jackson – producer
• Jaycen Joshua – mixing
• Jamil "Face" Johnson – engineer
• Larry "Rock" Campbell – A&R
• Chris "Symfonikz" Lewis – programming
• Giancarlo Lino – assistant

• Joyal McNeil – make-up
• Jackie Murphy – art direction
• Ne-Yo – producer
• Richie Owings – prop stylist
• Herb Powers – mastering
• Mike Pratt – assistant
• Tennyson Richards – groomer
• Nick Roache – engineer
• Brea Stinson – stylist
• Randee St. Nicholas – photography
• Stereotypes – producer
• Symfonikz – producer
• Big Bob Terry – producer, programming
• Denise Trotman – art direction, design
• Jerry Vines – executive producer, management, producer

Charts

Chart (2010)	Peak position
U.S. Billboard 200 Billboard 200 The Billboard 200 is a ranking of the 200 highest-selling music albums and EPs in the United States, published weekly by Billboard magazine. It is frequently used to convey the popularity of an artist or groups of artists...	9
U.S. Billboard Digital Albums Billboard charts The Billboard charts tabulate the relative weekly popularity of songs or albums in the United States. The results are published in Billboard magazine...	11
U.S. Billboard R&B/Hip-Hop Albums Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums is a chart published by Billboard magazine that ranks R&B and hip hop albums based on sales compiled by Nielsen SoundScan. The name of the chart was changed from Top R&B Albums in 1999...	3

External links

• Raheem DeVaughn: Class Act at Blues & Soul
  Blues & Soul
  Blues & Soul is a British music magazine covering black music. Genres covered include soul, R&B, jazz, hip hop, reggae and world music. It was first published in 1966 and is known for first using the term Northern Soul....
  
  
• R&B's Raheem DeVaughn... 'Masterpeace' at The Washington Post
  The Washington Post
  The Washington Post is Washington, D.C.'s largest newspaper and its oldest still-existing paper, founded in 1877. Located in the capital of the United States, The Post has a particular emphasis on national politics. D.C., Maryland, and Virginia editions are printed for daily circulation...