Keri Hilson: "Turnin' Me On" (Feat. Lil' Wayne)

Keri Hilson has been around the music industry for quite a long time. Penning singles for a plethora of A-list pop and R&B stars from Britney Spears to Chris Brown, Hilson has been the lyricist behind a variety of hit singles. In spite of this behind the boards success, it has been quite a struggle for Hilson to launch her solo career. With her debut album "In a Perfect World" originally scheduled for a mid-2007 release date, the album has been delayed an indefinitely amount of times (currently scheduled for an early 2009 release), most likely due to her two stalled single attempts "Energy" and "Return the Favor", songs that were appealing yet failed to catch on with mainstream pop or urban audiences.

Now her third attempt at a breakthrough single, "Turnin' Me On" differs drastically from her first two singles both melodically and production-wise. Produced by the ubiquitous urban producer Polow Da Don, Hilson has gone street, adopting a suggestive, spoken-word flow on the verses and an equally evocative slang on the hook that is sparse yet addictive. The minimal drum beats, hand claps, and bass add a catchiness to this single that was missing from Hilson's first two attempts. Moreover, Lil Wayne adds a guest verse, an all too obvious ploy by her record label to generate more interest in the single. However, at this point in Hilson's solo career, this is an entirely savvy move, as this single's commercial sucesss will determine whether or nor Hilson's debut album will ever see the light of day. Time will tell whether or not this single becomes a hit, but in this reviewer's opinion, you need to add this song to your itunes immediately.

Jamie Foxx's "Intuition" Is a Tale of Two Halves

It has been nearly 3 years since Oscar and Grammy award winner Jamie Foxx has released a studio album. His 2005 record "Unpredictable" -- in spite of mixed reviews and entirely mediocre material -- was a surprise hit, certified double platinum (essentially due to his Oscar winning portrayal as Ray Charles in "Ray") and produced a #1 R&B hit of the same title. Now 41 years older and removed from the hype of his acting success, Foxx aims to replicate this commercial success with "Intuition", an equally star-studded affair featuring guest spots from a slew of A-listers including Lil Wayne, Kanye West, The-Dream, T.I., and Ne-Y0, just to name a few. In several interviews leading up to the album's release, Foxx asserted this unlike his previous record -- which features an overkill of slow-jams -- this album is "aimed more towards the clubs."

And, for the most part, Foxx wasn't lying, as nearly the first half of "Intuition" sizzles with thumping beats and addictive hooks. The Tricky Stewart-produced lead single "Just Like Me" takes an Usher leftover and transforms it into a sleek, skittering piece perculating with exuberance. The ensuing five song string of the album is a stellar showcase of modern R&B production, featuring funky, futuristic beats from Timbaland, Just Blaze, The-Dream, and newcomber Christopher "Deep" Henderson that are both radio and club ready. However, once the record reaches its titular interlude, it loses all of its momentum. Although the second half of the record features similarly professional production, its reliance on slow jams grows samely, particularly on the tedious and quite cliched Tricky-Stewart jam "Slow" and equally dull "Overdose."

Although Foxx is indeed pushing his mid 40s, his chameleon-like status and confidence really sells the stellar first half of the record, a party-ready stretch that sounds like a record coming from a twenty-something, nor a man of middle-age. From the beat-boxing bounce of Timbaland's "I Don't Need It" to Just Blaze's ingenious interploration of The Beastie Boy's "The New Style" on "Number One", there are a number of potential hit singles frontloaded in the album's first twenty minutes. Ironically, when Foxx plays the mature loverman role on the album's later half, he comes off awkward, stale, and just downright dull. Nonetheless, "Intuition" deserves a listen, regardless of its second half slump. Or at least for twenty minutes.

Brandy: Long Distance

Brandy has surely had a difficult last few years. After her 2004 release "Afrodisiac" failed to be a commercial success, Brandy struggled with many personal setbacks, the biggest of which included her 2006 car crash which left a bystander dead and Brandy facing a multi-million dollar lawsuit early next year. However, for now, Brandy's focus in 2008 is back on music, already delivering her first single from her new album (appropriately titled "Human", a not-so-subtle nod to her personal struggles) called "Right Here (Departed)" with moderate success across urban, rhythmic and pop radio platforms. Follow-up single "Long Distance" is an interesting departure for Brandy, for it is decidedly a reversion back to her late 90's big ballad smash "Have You Ever?" and is by far the least urban sounding record Brandy has put out in years. That said, it is a beautifully building record that features sweepingly dramatic choruses, an emotional refrain, and big orchestral instrumentation at the climax that wouldn't be out of place on a Josh Groban record. If this makes the record sound a bit dated -- well, it may be -- and this big ballad of a single will have a tough time finding its niche on Top 40 radio, with bouncy, upbeat records like Britney's "Circus" and Beyonce's "Single Ladies (Put a Ring on It)" dominating most of the airwaves lately. At the very least, it is nice to hear Brandy on record again, and for someone who has endured so much turmoil in recent months, she has never sounded more at ease.

Mims: MOVE (If You Wanna)

You have been warned: the new single from New York rapper Mims, best known for his ubiquitous crossover single "This Is Why I'm Hot" and quasi-hit follow-up "Like This", called "Move (If You 'Wanna'), is a blazing club bouncer, equipped with a hard-hitting drum loop and deliriously deliable hook that's sure to be a hit on urban and ryhthmic stations this coming month. Similar in production to Busta Rhymes' "Touch It", Mims brings something new to the sparse call-and-clap rap formula by revving up the single with a swirling, heavenly like strings, then switching up his flow on the verses. Produced by Chicago based producers Da Internz, this single was sent to radio in October but has only now started to see some spins on rhythmic radio. Although it may lack enough pop sensibility to generate major airplay on pop radio (the latest trend on Top 40 favors dance records over rap), it deserves to be heard. So go ahead, download this record (available now on itunes), and Move (but only if you wanna).

Kanye: 808's and Too Much Heartbreak!

2008 has been a difficult year for Kanye West; from the death of his mother to the splitting from his long-time fiancée Alexis Phifer, West has endured hardships that clearly have influenced his artistic vision. To add to these personal adversities, West has just come off a mentally draining hip-hop tour. Instead of opting for the more traveled path of a worn-out superstar — entering faux-retirement or simply seeking a low-profile — West unsurprisingly defied conventions and threw himself into the studio, rush releasing 808s & Heartbreak just in time for the holidays. His fourth album in five years, this record oozes with equal parts raw emotion and unfinished production. Whether West is lamenting the end of a romance or lashing out at his critics, 808s & Heartbreak is a bleak, utterly serious affair from an artist seeking a therapeutic release.

While this outpouring of emotion may be healing for West, his disarming joylessness makes for an uneven listen, as this album is as fascinating as it is flawed. For the first time, West sings every song on the record, (with the aid of the T-Pain-popularized auto-tune vocoder) a feat commendable for his fearlessness and not his vocal abilities. Nonetheless, West’ s equally heavy reliance on the Roland TR-808 drum machine (does the album title make sense now?) is overbearing, as nearly every track toes the line between innovative and lazily uninspired.

Promising album opener “Say You Will” and effective “Welcome to Heartbreak” are the former — featuring ominous drum loops, menacingly foreboding synthesizers, and hauntingly sparse piano riffs that are imaginative sounds for West. Lead single “Love Lockdown” is a fusion of efficiently melancholic verses and a climaxing, tribal-drumming chorus. The same applies for follow-up single “Heartless” and album closer "Coldest Winter” — both of which pair lingering drum loops with West’s anguished vocals.

All of this amounts to an album that, although it should be praised for its honesty and ambition, grows sluggish and plodding. Uptempo “Paranoid” — in spite of its burnished, buoyant ’80s synths — is bogged down by West’s woeful rhymes lamenting a relationship gone wrong. The hopeful strings on “RoboCop” are drowned out by an impossibly dense bass line. The intimate, bare-bones production of “Street Lights” attempts to build a personal rapport but ends up falling flat. Even album highlight “Amazing” — with its addictive, hypnotic verses — finds West admitting “I’m exhausted, barely breathing” in a dejectedly droning manner.

In the end, this record will be remembered as the work of an artist working through a trying transition personally and artistically. Ironically, West’s boastful on-record persona — a presence that has been detrimental to some of his previous work — could have provided this album with some much needed punch. In spite of its sizeable flaws, 808s & Heartbreak still deserves a chance, as it serves as a testament to West’s artistic audacity, however afflicted it might be.

American Idol Winner Cook Sizzles on Debut Disc

After I reviewed little David Archuleta’s debut -- which I gave a positive critique of -- I was spurned by a plethora of Archie-loving loonies, criticized for being too hard on the seventeen year old. One week later after Archie released his self-titled album, it was David Cook’s turn in the spotlight, and while I don’t anticipate the same back-lash from Cook extremists, treat this review as one of unbiased intention.

During much of his run last season on American Idol, David Cook drew many comparisons to season five’s resident-rocker Chris Daughtry. Not only was Cook’s style harder-edged than the competition — especially in the context of Idol — he even pulled the same advantage-grabbing stunts that Daughtry did. Cook emerged from the franchise’s most talented season primed to be the first contestant who can hold his own with his Idols.

Of course, the difference between Cook and Daughtry is that Cook won the freaking competition, a feat fourth-place finisher Daughtry could not achieve. This loss certainly didn’t diminish Daughtry’s multi-platinum success, and Cook’s win actually presents a significant challenge. Unlike Daughtry, who had nearly two years to distance himself from the show’s sugary-pop associations, Cook has no such luxury, needing to rush out an album that skirts the line between hard-rocking and Idol-appropriate — a record that solidifies his alternative, post-grunge rock credibility, while still catering to the vastly diverse Idol audience that supported him, from swooning soccer moms to angst-ridden teenagers.

And while this obligatory nod to all audiences has catapulted several post-Idol contestants into super-stardom (Carrie Underwood, Kelly Clarkson), it also has resulted in embarrassingly misguided debuts (Taylor Hicks, Bo Bice), demoting contestants that showed artistic vision on the show into second-rate pop-rock balladeers. Thankfully, Cook avoids this pitfall, as his eponymous debut is a diverse, winning combination of poignant pop ballads and rolling rock anthems.

Surging album opener “Declaration” sets the stage, as Cook effectively builds from a haunting, sparse guitar riff into a swelling chorus. Lead single “Light On” and “Heroes” follow suit, pairing professional songwriting craft by Chris Cornell and Cathy Dennis with Cook’s soaring vocals. Sweeping, U2-esque mid-tempo “Come Back to Me” and hardest-rocking gem “Bar-ba-sol” are arena anthems in the making — perfectly suited for stadiums filled with cell-phone waving, Cook-loving crazies. Nevertheless, the most indelible moments on David Cook are when he tones down the guitars and amps up the emotion, as is the case on the stirring “Lie” or on the compellingly uncomplicated “Permanent.”

Even when the album is lyrically uneven (“Life on the Moon”), feels sort of forced (“Mr. Sensitive”) or is slightly generic (“I Did It For You”), David Cook is held together by the winner’s charming growl and Green Day-producer Rob Cavallo’s welcomed rock flourishes. With a voice that is more versatile than nearly every artist to come out of the Idol machine, David Cook is a multi-format monster in the making, a record that stays true to Cook’s identity while still appealing to the same pop-rock and adult-contemporary-loving audiences that got him here.

Archuleta Amazes with Likeable Debut

If you were anything like me during last season’s American Idol, you wanted to violently vomit every time runner-up David Archuleta opened his mouth. His endlessly flowing earnestness and gosh-darn-it shtick eclipsed his tremendous vocal abilities on the show, as little David always seemed far older than his 17 years. And yet, it is this maturity level from Archuleta that makes his eponymous debut shockingly engaging. Even if it is undoubtedly the squarest record ever to come out of the Idol machine — Archie is about as hip and cool as Clay Aiken is straight — David Archuleta is an annoying indelible listen, full of swelling poppy choruses that become engrained into your subconscious.

Nowhere is this catchiness more apparent than in the record’s opening sequence, a string of five songs that each features an identifiable hook that won’t leave you no matter how much you try. From the charming lead single “Crush” to the soaring “A Little Too Not Over You,” Archuleta finds the balance between age-appropriate lyrics and adult-oriented musicality. Not everything works on his debut — the terribly trite ballads “You Can” and “To Be With You” just reiterate how hackneyed Archuleta sounded on AI — but when the melodies outshine the clichés, David Archuleta is a remarkably promising debut from an artist that seemed destined for a train wreck.

P!nk makes a "Fun" Divorce Album?

If you judged Pink’s latest release simply on its hilariously campy album cover or equally light-hearted title, you would think that the album is all goofiness and good times. And while there are a great deal of appealing melodies and addictive hooks to be heard here, Pink’s Funhouse is through and through a divorce album, saturated by themes of broken-heartedness, lamentation and resentment towards her ex-husband Corey Hart. This overarching theme also makes for a paradoxical listen, as Funhouse is an amalgamation divided between oversized, obnoxious pop and modest, earnest sentiments.

On the lovely, sincere ballad “I Don’t Believe You,” and the mournful, bluesy slow-rocker “Mean,” Pink takes the serious road to contemplate her break-up, wondering what went wrong in her relationship with unassuming string arrangements and subdued steel guitars. The same can be said for “Crystal Ball,” a Joni Mitchell-esque folk ballad that wonderfully skirts the divorce theme with elegance and subtlety.

And although these sincere moments are certainly appreciated, Pink is at her best here when she shrugs off all the niceties and cuts loose. On the Max Martin-produced lead single “So What,” Pink — proving she’s more than ready to get out of this relationship and ready to return to her thrilling life of rock stardom and afternoon drinking — belts out an undeniably catchy chorus similar to her last big hit “U + Ur Hand.” Deliriously defiant tracks “It’s All Your Fault” and “Bad Influence” feature schoolyard taunts for choruses, which make them instantly indelible. This kind of pop is where Pink’s heart is really at — she’s ready to party for as long as the tempo is high.

Funhouse is a wild ride that runs the gamut stylistically, featuring surging anthemic choruses one minute, then intimate, acoustic blues the next, empowered throughout by her post-divorce freedom.

Hudson Delivers Delayed Debut with Moderate Success

Since winning the Oscar for Best Supporting Actress in Dreamgirls, American Idol alumna Jennifer Hudson has spent nearly two years crafting her eponymous debut album. The final product is one that is as much of a vocal triumph for Hudson as it is an inconsistent hodgepodge of musical directions. From gritty urban soul to syrupy adult contemporary pop, Hudson tries to please every audience, an ambition exacerbated by the 11 different producers hired to helm the album’s 13 songs. At times the record gleams brilliantly, as with the sprightly lead single “Spotlight,” the punchy, Danja-produced “Pocketbook” and the Fantasia-assisted “I’m His Only Woman.” However, other moments are unremarkable, particularly on the hackneyed ballad “You Pulled Me Through” and the clumsy T-Pain duet “What’s Wrong (Go Away),” which distractingly pairs Hudson’s powerhouse vocals with T-Pain’s obnoxious vocoder. The one consistency in Hudson’s debut is her vocal prowess, which is as mighty and triumphant as her Oscar winning performance would suggest. Although Hudson’s debut isn’t perfect, its numerous highlights suggest there is still potential for Hudson to deliver a record more reflective of her colossal talents.

The Doll's Hardly Dominant on Latest Release, But Still Vapidly Catchy

Before I begin the task of critically examining the Pussycat Dolls’ latest album, let’s address the obvious: the Pussycat Dolls are the most blatantly manufactured pop group in today’s music scene, and their music is as deep and as credible as an episode of The Simple Life. Now that that’s out of the way, I will proceed.

In spite of selling over a million records and spawning six top-40 singles from their debut record, the Pussycat Dolls aren’t famous yet, a fact made all too clear by the doomed launch of head Doll, Nicole Scherzinger’s solo debut, Her Name is Nicole. Even with all of the sexy magazine and radio promotions, the record was shelved. (Although several songs from that release show up in Doll Domination, including “Who’s Gonna Love You” and “Happily Ever After”). Even though it’s possible the album failed due to shoddy single choices, it’s more probable that the solo attempt failed due to Scherzinger’s lack of star power: since her name was obscured in the liner notes to PCD’s debut, even fans of the Dolls may not have known who she was. In fact, all of the Dolls remained unidentifiable after their debut, each easily interchangeable with any Playboy Bunny.

As a result, the Dolls follow-up release, Doll Domination, is clearly intended by the powers-that-be at Interscope to catapult the girls into super-stardom. If the album’s title wasn’t enough of a hint, opening track “When I Grow Up” makes their intentions abundantly clear. “I wanna be famous / I wanna be a star,” the girls repeatedly chant over a hyper-synthesized beat that lingers in your head far longer than you’d like. This desperation for fame may make for some campy fun on the lead single, but it ends up significantly plaguing this exhausting affair of an album — if you count the songs on the deluxe edition, the album runs a mere 23 songs, or 86 minutes long — that otherwise features a drove of addictive, A-list produced beats that reign over the Pussycat Dolls listless on-record presence.

To be fair, the Dolls may lack a presence on Doll Domination because four of them are barely featured. As was the case on their 2005 release PCD, lead singer Nicole is designated with carrying most of the singing responsibilities, while the rest of the pinups (er, I mean, vocalists) are left to coo seductively in the background. To maintain appearances that this is a vocal group, they’re also charged with posing anonymously on the album’s garishly cartoonish cover.

So while the group remains a one-girl vehicle lacking any semblance of identity, the songs and guest appearances come from a multitude of high profile sources. Timbaland, Polow Da Don and Sean Garrett helm the album’s highlights — from the haunting, spacey “Halo” and “Magic,” to the bouncy, infectious “Bottle Pop” and “I Hate This Part.” Missy Elliott and R. Kelly also contribute some clever rhymes to the funky “Whatcha Think About That” and seductive “Out of This Club” respectively. While the album runs insufferably long and fails to solidify the Dolls’ domination of the music world, it does succeed as a piece of pure pop product that is as critically vapid as it is guiltily catchy.

LL's "Exit" Could Not Come at a Better Time

L.L. Cool J has always been a dualistic rapper, maintaining a hard persona for the streets while keeping his albums smooth for the ladies. Since 2002’s 10, LL’s releases have skewed towards the latter, with singles like “Luv U Better,” “Hush” and “Control Myself,” catering directly to his female fan base. Exit 13 — his 13th and final release for longtime label Def Jam — marks a complete departure from these sensual grooves, as this insufferably lengthy album features harsh, brassy beats accompanied by equally garish rhymes. Aside from the radio-friendly lead single “Baby,” the tracks lack any semblance of excitement or catchiness, as LL buries some appealing old-school grooves (“Feel My Heart Beat”) with nonsensical rhymes. This is no more apparent than on the embarrassing “American Girl,” where LL patriotically reasons, “You go, girl, you make me wanna holler / I’ll take George off and put your boobs on the dollar.” Uncomfortable moments like these are sadly far too common, which makes LL’s Exit all the more piteous.

New Grandpa's on the Block

Let’s get one thing straight: NKOTB is one elder boy band. With every member pushing the age of forty, these “Kids” are hardly new. Scoring their first hit single more than two decades ago, the boys have been dormant as a group since the mid-90s. Now grown up, they have re-emerged on the pop music scene. Lead single “Summertime” was a pleasant enough bit of nostalgia that radio lukewarmly received it, sending the song into the top 40. However, the group has not scored a top 10 single in 18 years, and the New Kids feel the pressure of winning back their chart success. These all too obvious realities make their 2008 reunion release The Block a squirm-inducing affair, as the group jarryingly tries to recapture its youth and desperately attempts to fit in with current trends.

The biggest flaw with The Block is the same problem that plagued the NKOTB’s last album — their ill-fated 1994 urban crossover Face the Music. The boy band’s members are no longer adolescents but they don’t know how to act like adults. On The Block, NKOTB equates maturity with sex, sex and more sex — a theme that pervades essentially every track on the record. On the uncomfortable tracks “Click, Click, Click” and “Lights, Camera, Action,” the New Kids offer homage to homemade pornography. The not-so-subtle come-ons “Put it on My Tab” and “Full Service” try to convince the ladies that they’re “the kind of cats that want to hit it tonight,” and charmingly equate getting laid with pumping gas.

Even when the songs are hook-filled (“Dirty Dancing”) and sonically appealing (“Sexify My Love”), the efforts are marred by crusty ’80s references (Patrick Swayze, anyone?) and dated ’90s lingo (girls looking so fly?). The ushering in of trendy guest stars doesn’t help the New Kids’ cause either. In spite of titles like “Grown Man” and “Big Girl Now” — tracks that attempt to both reconcile their age and that of their female fan-base — appearances by the Pussycat Dolls and Lady Gaga just make the group sound more out of step with modern music. The same applies to the New Kids’ latest single “Single,” (clever title, right?) a song that co-stars the red-hot Ne-Yo but features a cold, soulless beat that is more suited for Usher.

In the end, this disjointedness — and the accompanying embarrassing sexual innuendo — is exactly why The Block disappoints: the album is club-oriented pop featuring a sound that is sexy and modern but a group that is not. Try as they to might to convince you that they are smooth, mature lover boys willing to “try every position we can dream of,” these New Kids are really just dirty old men.

Madonna's "Hard Candy" Quite a Tasty Treat

Over Madonna’s 25-year career, it’s always been nearly impossible to separate her music from her image; the two reflect each other so much that it’s often difficult to discern which came first. This tendency worried me, as the garishly horrific — and eerily pornographic — cover to Hard Candy suggested that the singer’s new album would be an equally atrocious listening experience. Thankfully, Madonna — for the most part — breaks from her image-equals-music tradition, as Hard Candy is a relentlessly modern, savvy collection of hip-pop that gleams with sleek, silky R&B and disco influences. Thanks to production by the Neptunes and Timbaland, the grooves are incessantly appealing (“Beat Goes On”) and perfectly suited for both the clubs (“Dance 2Nite”) and radio (“Miles Away”). There are a few misfires here and there — “Spanish Lesson” is borderline embarrassing with its dictionary-esque translation of Spanish words, and opener “Candy Shop” finds the 49-year-old describing her privates as “sticky and sweet.” Nevertheless, the winning moments far outweigh the uncomfortable ones, and Hard Candy is perhaps one of the tastiest treats in mainstream music this year.

It's a "Bittersweet World" for Ashlee Simpson

There probably has never been an artist as shamelessly unauthentic as Ashlee Simpson. Whether aping Hilary Duff on her fizzy-pop debut or mimicking Avril Lavigne on her dourly angst-ridden follow-up, Ashlee Simpson’s sound has always been manufactured solely to follow the trends. Thus, it should surprise no one that Simpson has yet again transformed herself — this time into a Gwen-Stefani-meets-Nelly-Furtado hybrid — by trading in her angry guitar-riffs for electro-urban dance beats clad with ’80s synthesizers and incessantly catchy pop hooks. Produced almost exclusively by Timbaland, Bittersweet World is a thoroughly fun listen that gleams with addictive melodies (particularly in “No Time For Tears” and “Murder”) and ridiculously absurd lyrics (especially in “Rulebreaker” and “Hot Stuff”, where Simpson deliriously barks lines like “You ain’t got no beef” and “feels like I’m in Candyland” on a repeated basis). All the while, Bittersweet World feels modern, and if you can take it for what it is — a happily superficial, zero-credibility pop album by an even more happily insincere pop star — this record could not be any better.

Mariah Ain't An Einstein, But Delivers a Fine Mimi Follow-Up

Hate her or love her, you can’t deny that Mariah Carey makes popular records — she recently broke Elvis Presley’s all-time record for most #1 hits by a solo artist. Although her new album, E=MC2, is neither intellectual (don't let her titular nod to Einstein's theory of relativity fool you...this is still a Mariah Carey record after all) nor an artistic breakthrough — it faithfully follows the formula laid out on Emancipation of Mimi — it is by far her most enjoyable effort in over a decade. What’s refreshing here is how pristine Mariah’s voice sounds; her vocals doesn’t come off nearly as shrill as they did on Emancipation. She sounds like a powerhouse again, particularly on standouts “I Stay In Love” and “For the Record.” The breathy, indiscernible vocals of post-millennium Mariah are also missing — this record finds Carey belting out tunes almost like the old days. There’s a looseness to E=MC2 that we’ve rarely seen, with bouncy cuts like “O.O.C.,” “I’m That Chick” and “Cruise Control” exhibiting a carefree diva enjoying an amazing career revival. Although this record didn't deliver on radio like her previous record did, I would still check this record out.