Alicia Keys’ considerable talents are no secret six years after her auspicious debut, “Songs in A Minor.” However, those gifts shine with a ripening maturity and depth on her third studio outing. From the opening strains of the classical overture that introduces this aptly titled album, Keys continues to fearlessly resist the cookie-cutter norm. […]
Seven years after breaking out of Sweden’s eternal garage-revival scene, this color-coordinated quintet has somehow created its liveliest, most playable album. Its cartoon-tuneful energy pogos all over the place: an opening volley of blowing stuff up (”Tick Tick Boom”), an expert AC/DC homage about being broke (”Square One Here I Come”), equestrian Pixies new […]
Somewhere between brain music and body music sits Seal. His enlistment of former dance/electronic artist Stuart Price to produce his fifth full-length doesn’t represent a move in one of those directions. After Seal’s singular baritone — which is getting even more pleasingly throaty as he ages — the songs are the focus here. Some […]
Responsible for bestowing incredible harmony upon early-’90s R&B, Boyz II Men always sounded like they were straight outta Motown. So it’s only fitting that the quartet would cover classics from their Motown-era predecessors. Here, there are goodies like the Temptations’ “Just My Imagination,” Marvin Gaye’s “Mercy Mercy Me” and the Miracles’ “Tracks of My […]
Shaggy uses “Intoxication” to once again show that while he and his crew can crank out solid pop, they can match it with cuts that genuinely rock the dancehall. The thing is, everyone knows he can do pop. What he needs to do now is just crank out a full disc of bangers. It’s […]
After selling more than half a million copies in the United States of previous album “Pa’l Mundo,” reggaeton duo Wisin & Yandel needed to somehow evolve while preserving its fan base. The result is an album heavy on classic reggaeton dance tracks like first single “Sexy Movimiento” and “Ahora Es” (which quotes from Colombian […]
It’s often difficult transitioning from teen star to rub-’em-down R&B singer, and Chris Brown’s “Exclusive” feels those growing pains. Fortunately, the balance of ballads and danceable grooves is enough to string Brown’s audience from puberty to legal drinking age. “Take You Down” features frisky lyrics set to a winning melody. “Damage,” another standout ballad, […]
Refusing to limit itself to country conventions, this four-way-harmonizing Nashville group’s follow-up to its platinum breakthrough, “The Road to Here,” marks a huge leap in confidence — not to mention, maybe, the best Fleetwood Mac album in 30 years. “Fury,” the Eagles-riffed warning of a woman scorned, is basically hard funk; “Novocaine” and “Firebird […]
Ricky Martin’s “MTV Unplugged” found him singing in an acoustic, pared-down format. But this second live set in less than a year features him backed by a large ensemble befitting his recently ended arena tour. The sheer energy is radically different from the spiritual uplift of the “MTV” set. Martin includes tracks like “Living […]
Charlie Daniels and his famed namesake band are joined here by a diverse array of duet partners, including Brooks & Dunn, Gretchen Wilson, Vince Gill, Bonnie Bramlett, the Del McCoury Band, Dolly Parton, Darius Rucker, and Earl Gary and Randy Scruggs. “Deuces” opens with Daniels and Travis Tritt serving up a sizzlin’ version of […]
Senegalese world music icon Youssou N’Dour follows his Grammy Award-winning album “Egypt” (2004) with “Rokku Mi Rokka,” a collection of songs every bit as compelling as its predecessor. This time out, however, N’Dour focuses on tunes from the north of Senegal, the region bordering Mali and Mauritania. N’Dour wrote all 11 songs, which is […]
You may remember Sharon Jones & the Dap-Kings from such records as Amy Winehouse’s “Back to Black,” where they served as the house band for half the songs; Mark Ronson’s “Version” (where they were nearly everywhere); or a great cover of “This Land Is Your Land.” But while those projects lifted soul to the […]
Fans of Thievery Corporation’s lushly textured downtempo might be surprised to find the production duo’s Rob Garza sounding more crunchy than smooth on this, his first solo release, and his first as a frontman. Handing the production reins to Primal Scream’s Brendan Lynch, Garza erases almost all electronic marks from the album’s 11 songs, […]
A CD reissue of music originally released on vinyl and cassette in 1985, “The Knee Plays” collects short pieces that David Byrne created for Robert Wilson’s famously unproduced avant-garde opera “The Civil Wars” (which also featured music by Philip Glass). Much of the material is Byrne’s brainy version of New Orleans-style brass-band music; think […]
