Mary J. Blige's Sun Goddess Pinot Grigio
Put on your little sunglasses girls, we're getting empowered!
I know many of you have been clamoring for my take on 90s hip hop, like how everyone is waiting for the New York Times to tackle Drill music.
I once saw Mary J. Blige perform at a Hillary Clinton fundraiser in 2015 that I made my mother buy tickets for. We, of course, are part of the Jewish international cosmopolitan mafia and let’s just say we needed to talk to Hillary about some things.
I recognize that Mary J. Blige is generally a very boring celebrity. You will never find her asleep on a couch at the Beverly Center or saying something offensive about the Yazidis. She is polished, carrying a swagger of self-confidence she has maintained since the VH1 days. Her dribble dancing meme is funny, sure, but she has ascended the heights of the Establishment — be it the Oscars, the Grammys or the Jewish lizard international mafia — which sort of precludes her from having any sort of outsized personality.
Mary’s music has always come from a place of brown-lipstick wielding moroseness, a triumph against the men who have played her. What’s The 411?, Share My World and Mary really cemented her 90s legend status, which also caused a slow descent into legacy artist territory.
She has now reached the venerable auntie cultural status. Everyone loves her. They trot her out for every 90s hip hop throwback performance (like at the Super Bowl last year). As Anderson .Paak said to Essence on the occasion of MJB getting a lifetime achievement award at the BET Awards, “she can sing her ass off and she looks like she could smack the shit out of somebody.”
But she is not really in the market of releasing hits anymore. Nor does it seem like she wants to. She is all about self-actualization and mental health and loving yourself and blah blah blah. She has a children’s book coming out next month about living your dreams. Her new album, Good Morning Gorgeous (which got its title from the mantra MJB utters to herself every morning… can you imagine) is a collection of mid-tempo feel good badass mama tracks heard by exactly 7 people. R&B now stands for Rhythm & Brené.
Mary’s career stage in the Hillary-Clinton-Fundraiser-ification now requires she shill a lot of stuff. Her wine brand, Sun Goddess, is the epitome of the boring, banal celebrity product of someone who lives in a New Jersey mansion even Teresa Giudice would find gauche.
Mary J. often repeats a similar story of how her wine brand was founded. She was backstage on her tour with Maxwell drinking white wine, when one of his friends — an Italian winemaker’s son — suggested she make her own wine.
And thats a lesson for all of you: when you’re on tour and Maxwell’s friends tell you to do a white wine, you say YES!!!
And that’s what she did. Mary partnered with Maxwell’s friend’s father Marco Fantinel, who runs an eponymous wine label in the northern Italian region of Friuli, known for its white wines. Fantinel is one of the larger-scale wine labels in the area, catering to an international market with its moderately-priced white wines.
Anyways, Mary spent some time learning about wine and grapes: as she said in a promotional Zoom launch for the wine, “Learning that pinot Grigio is a grape, that was amazing to me. And sauvignon blanc was a grape. So a lot of information.” Listen, everyone starts somewhere.
And then there is the name Sun Goddess. Apparently, this is the nickname her family gave her as a child because she liked… the sun.
So Mary J. Blige’s biggest passion is… sunlight. Plants found dead!
Sun Goddess released its first vintage in early 2020, a Pinot Grigio Ramato. She now produces a few varietals, including a Prosecco, a Merlot and a Sauvignon blanc. But the most popular remains the Pinot Grigio Ramato, which is essentially Pinot Grigio macerated with longer skin contact, creating a rosè.
It is funny to see her contextualize — or legitimize — this brand within her larger music career: as she said in that Zoom interview, “This is what I’ve done with my career from the first time I stepped up in the music business: I’ve opened up a new lane for women all over the world to do what I'm doing. So here we are again, Mary J. and Marco opening up a new lane for Pinot Grigio Ramato”.
So, she’s both a champion for Black female Emcees and also … Pinot Grigio Ramato. Fight the good fight!
So how was MJB’s groundbreaking Pinot Grigio?
Honestly, it was better than I thought it would be. It was refreshing, with a pleasant crispness and acidity. It was easy drinking, and a lot cleaner than other buttery Pinot Grigio.
But of course, it’s overwhelming tasting note was: boring. Made with such a large producer, it felt like this wine was just sort of nondescript. This doesn’t feel like a “labor of love” or a deeply personal product from someone who puts out deeply personal products. I could have bought this wine from anyone.
But as Mary said, “Wine tasting is one of my passions. Wine is culture. Wine is community. Wine is lifestyle. Wine is emotion.” Which is also something I said at 19 drunk off of boxed wine.