μblog reviews

Reviews of recent and not-so-recent CDs

 

Fergie – The Dutchess January 7, 2008

Filed under: Album reviews— Tags: , , , — hugo @ 9:49 pm

Rating: ★★½☆☆

Fergie – The Dutchess cover

My journey into pop music land continues with The Dutchess by Fergie. I became fond of the Black Eyed Peas, so I was wondering how much I would like Fergie, as she’s been one of the main personnas in the band. However, the style of her album is fairly different, not as edgy as what the Black Eyed Peas would do. That means less interesting, in my opinion.

I did not get into Fergalicious, London Bridge, Pedestal or Voodoo Doll. The beat of the music is too overwhelming.

All That I Got (The Make Up Song) makes me think of a Mariah Carey song, even though I’m no Mariah Carey expert (nor fan); it turns out that the song isn’t actually bad. Clumsy and Velvet are interesting, but my favorite songs are Big Girls Don’t Cry, Losing My Ground and Finally. This last song made me think of a tune coming straight out of a Walt Disney movie.

Overall, the album is uneven: it sometimes sounds like a number of different influences battling each other, but there are a number a number of interesting songs.

Listen to: Losing My Ground

Listen to: Finally

Click here to buy The Dutchess by Fergie .

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Nelly Furtado – Loose January 3, 2008

Filed under: Album reviews— Tags: , , , — hugo @ 11:34 pm

Rating: ★★☆☆☆

Nelly Furtado – Loose album cover

Loose from Nelly Furtado is an album that I bought as a gift to my wife. I would not have bought it for me to start with, but as I am curious when it comes down to music, I wanted to listen to her more carefully and give this album a spin. This basically was not setting this album for success in my rate-o-meter to start with.

The music is too much dance-oriented to my taste, so I had problems getting into it. Songs like Maneater or Maneater are not my cup of tea, neither musically nor when it comes to their respective themes. I found Glow very repetitive. Te Busque reminded me of some songs that Santana wrote for some reason, but without the cool guitar parts, and the looping keyboard bits on Do It are just too much.

I did appreciate a few songs though. Afraid, which opens up the album, is actually pretty nice. I do like Say It Right; maybe it is because I heard it many times on the radio, but I quite like the different parts with the different pitches of her voice, and the background voice effects. In God’s Hands is a mellow, enjoyable track, and the closing track – I’m ignoring the Spanish version of Te Busque, since it was earlier in the album –, All Good Things (Come to an End) is also pretty nice.

Basically, I didn’t dislike the lighter, slower songs, but I’m far from being in love with this album. It might not be a fundamentally bad album, it’s just not my style, I guess.

Listen to: Afraid

Listen to: Say It Right

Click here to buy Loose by Nelly Furtado.

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