The daughter of two music industry vets (her mother sang backup for Barry White and her father wrote songs for and collaborated with Kool & The Gang) releases her debut CD of soul music.
The album opens with her already released single "Only Wanna Give It To You" which features rapper J. Cole and has ranked as high as #20 on the U.S. R&B charts. For the uninitiated, it's a beguiling song whose big hook and catchy refrains that leave a good immediate impression although, sadly, not a lasting one.
On that track and on most of the album, Varner's strained timber to her otherwise silky vocals is the main draw of the album because she is able to emote a certain melancholy that immediately affects the listener's emotions, like a poor man's Alicia Keys.
While her vocals may live up to that comparison, her songwriting at this point of her career is just poor with uninspired R&B melodies that almost come off as generic standards with arrangements that could use more life.
Overall, Perfect Imperfect, lives up to its name with Varner's perfectly emotive vocals mixed with imperfect songwriting and layout. Varner is able to showoff her singing chops and they leave her songwriting skills in the dust.
Hopefully the next time around she hooks up with a producer who can elevate her arrangements to the level her vocals are already at. Still, for a debut album, there's enough good on the disc for me to recommend it to Soul and R&B lovers, especially if they like slow jams.
Score: 7/10
Song(s) to Sample: "Only Wanna Give It To You" and "Sound Proof Room"
The electronic music maker and former member of Cop Shoot Cop releases his debut solo album.
The physical disc for this album doesn't get released until September but you can purchase the MP3 version of it beginning this week from most online retailers.
The tracks given to us on this album are somnambulistic ambient tunes without any structured melodies or cohesive beats to keep the music moving along as you would find in most modern songwriting. It's basically what I imagine the soundtrack to Brian Eno's or Vangelis' dreams must sound like.
It's very high in both mood and atmosphere from beginning to end although the song titles seem to have been chosen at random. For example, the third track "Summer Heat" which you might think would have some type of quicker tempo is instead a slow synthesizer exercise that doesn't elicit much heat.
Trees ends up being more plodding than entrancing even considering the slow nature of the genre this album fits in. It's a moody album that would be more appropriate if it were released around Halloween or during the winter due to its slow, Blade Runner-esque sound. As a late summer release, this album can't see the forest or the trees.
Score: 3/10
Song(s) to Sample: "In To Another Place"
No comments:
Post a Comment