Album Review: "JoJo"—JoJo
This article was originally published as part of the joke issue on 12.4.2014
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This article was originally published as part of the joke issue on 12.4.2014
And for the Morning after:
If anyone’s forever bound to win in pop music, it’s Taylor Swift. The country flair is a thing of the past as she embraces pure pop with “1989.” She gives plenty of warning on opener “Welcome to New York” as she proclaims atop its twinkling synths, “it’s a new soundtrack; I could dance to this beat.” On ‘80s pop–inspired “Out of the Woods” or the breathy delight “Wildest Dreams,” it’s clear that she’s doing what she wants and is doing it quite well. Imogen Heap lends crisp, angelic backing vocals to “Clean” in an unexpected but great collaboration. The only missteps in the set are lead single “Shake It Off” and “Bad Blood,” which both sound like uninspired cheerleader chants. Overall, it’s not so much of a change for Swift as it is a brilliantly deep dive into a sound of which she’s been scratching the surface up to this point in her career.
The former Jack's Mannequin and Something Corporate frontman has branched out on his own. Click on the picture for a retrospective of his career.
You may think of her as the British Katy Perry, but Jessie J wholeheartedly promises to “do it like it ain’t been done” on her new effort “Sweet Talker.” Despite her dynamic vocal stylings which rival the R&B genre’s finest, it’s clear that she is catering to a pop audience (see lead–single “Bang Bang”). Even her ballads are big, string–laden affairs that complement the raw power of her voice (“Fire”). Still, there’s something much more resonant in the tender, quieter moments of the record (“Personal”). She advocates for self–love on “Masterpiece,” and the unlikely collaboration with De La Soul “Seal Me With a Kiss” channels old–school funk with its Funkadelic–sampled beat. Overall, it’s her stellar vocals that add edge and spunk to otherwise basic pop songs.
White Sea (Morgan Kibby of M83) affirms The Weeknd's (whose Canadian government name is Abel Tesfaye) sexual prowess on her remix of his latest single "Often". Understated and suggestive, her layered vocals effortlessly bleed into Tesfaye's hazy recollection of affairs. From their harmonies alone (check 3:00), it's clear he should add collaborating with females (in the studio, not just the bedroom) to his list of things he does often. His song “Love Me Harder” with Ariana Grande showed this earlier, but this track takes it to another level. It's the dark, millennial equivalent of what an Annie Lennox and Michael Jackson collaboration might have sounded like.
On his sixth LP, Chris Brown constructs a soundscape that spans quite a bit of stylistic terrain despite being too long (clocks in at 60 minutes) and redundant at times. It ranges from satisfyingly bouncy club bangers via summer smash “Loyal” and the Akon–assisted (yes, Akon) “Came To Do” to a seductive R. Kelly tribute “Songs On 12 Play” featuring the maestro’s raunchy descendant, Trey Songz. His duet with Kellz himself “Drown In It” is a dull, oversexed afterthought in comparison to the former. Brown invites us to his place of exile on the tense, semi–electronic opener “X”, and the moody “Autumn Leaves” has a passionate verse from Kendrick Lamar. The rapper captures Breezy’s troubles in one lyric: “and they won’t let me live even when remorse that I give”.
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