Minggu, 27 Januari 2008

Carnival Ride


Editorial Reviews
Amazon.com
Carrie Underwood’s Some Hearts, hastily made and released some five months after she won the 2005 American Idol crown, was surprisingly solid and tuneful. For her follow-up, producer Mark Bright steers her toward the big Martina McBride skies, with a plethora of strings and huge emotional crescendos. Underwood co-wrote four songs, mostly with the tried-and-true tunesmiths who made Some Hearts soar. On the torchy heartache ballad "I Know You Won’t," she gives a beautifully nuanced and controlled performance, but if that song would suit any number of lush female pop stars from Celine Dion on down, "Flat on the Floor" rocks hard while preserving co-writer Ashley Monroe’s Appalachian angst. Still, there are missteps: the easy tears of the unlikely war ballad "Just a Dream," a too-obvious attempt to repeat the sass of "Before He Cheats" ("The More Boys I Meet"), and the Shania-ish bad-girl-on-Cuervo stomp of "Last Name." The big payoff, then, is how much 24-year old Underwood has improved as a vocalist. How often listeners line up for this Carnival Ride depends on their attitude about country music’s continual melding with pop, and how they feel about a princess upstart taking home the awards that used to go to her heroes. --Alanna Nash

Audio Day Dream


Editorial Reviews
Amazon.com
The strategy sessions over how to present Blake Lewis's post-American Idol debut must have been excruciating, as label-types scratched their heads, wondering: Is it possible to market a disc full of beat-boxing? If not, would the world warm to Blake Lewis, pop charmer? Or Blake Lewis, balladeer? The safest bet seems to have been to build a better post-prime time set by way of experimentation. Audio Day Dream unfolds much the way late-season American Idol shows do: It sets Lewis on a lot of platforms and lets him play up his charm, if not always his straight-outta-the-'80s musical predilections. Partially the brainchild of producer Ryan Tedder (One Republic), "Break Anotha" is pure beat-box Blake and, as such, it's demonically catchy. The same can be said for hip-hop and electro-tinged numbers such as "She's Makin' Me Lose It" and "Gots to Get To Her." Stabs at sentimentality surface, and they're not bad: "I Got U" may very well get you, if you like soft pop stylized with a nod in Adam Levine's direction. Overall, ADD demonstrates why Lewis blazed his way into AI's final round: He's out there, sure, but he's willing to reel it in enough to keep it real for the masses. -Tammy La Gorce

Symphony


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It Is Time For A Love Revolution


Editorial Reviews
Amazon.com
"We've all got our voice. And if I have this gift to play music, then I'm gonna talk about love," Lenny Kravitz says in a YouTube promo for his eighth studio album. Understood. Got it. The fact, though, is that Kravitz could be singing about old tires or bowling shoes in these songs and it wouldn't much matter, because in the basest and most primal way possible, they rock. Opener "Love Revolution" busts out a vibe that lingers, with Lenny barking a credo--clearly in his old-school element as drums pound and guitars get abused--and loving it. Breaks come in the form of quieter songs like the Beatles-esque chill-pill "Good Morning" and the vintage Queen-like "A Long and Sad Goodbye," but the mission of Love Revolution is mostly to move the masses. And that it shall: fists will pump, feet will stomp, and attitudes will be copped. As listeners flip through the track list and discern influences as far-flung as James Brown, the Black Crowes, and Jimi Hendrix, they will feel not disdain for the lack of ingenuity but appreciation for the good sense Kravitz shows in following those artists' leads. In jumbling them up and making them his own, he proves that love revolutions need not be tame. They can be fierce. The best evidence arrives two tracks in: though "Bring It On" features the soothing sitar of Anishka Shankar, it bashes its way through the speakers as though fueled by kryptonite. It is bad-ass, in a word. And so is this album. --Tammy La Gorce