Norah Jones ...Featuring Norah Jones - The New York born and Texas raised jazz/pop/adult contemporary singer-songwriter (and daughter of legendary Indian musician Ravi Shankar) releases a new compilation album. ...Featuring brings together collaboration songs Jones has performed for other artists' albums and features a wide range of performers from different musical genres. A few of the songs are from her side project bands (El Madmo and The Little Willies), some are with classic R&B/jazz artists (Ray Charles and Herbie Hancock), a couple she teams with modern rock/indie bands (Foo Fighters and Belle and Sebastian), a number with veteran country musicians (Willie Nelson and Dolly Parton), and finally a handful of tracks are with modern hip-hop acts (Outkast and Q-Tip). In total there are 18 tracks with no collaborator working on more than one song. Some of the collaborations are better than others. Her voice, already so silky smooth and sexily brusque, naturally pairs well with on the Jazz collaborations. "Court and Spark" (w/ Herbie Hancock) features subdued vocal work by Jones but the composition of the song, especially the piano work, makes it one of the highlights of the album. Another Jazz artist's cover (Charlie Hunter's) of the 10,000 Maniacs song "More Than This" is another great use of Jones vocal control as she is able to wring out a maximum amount of emotion from a relatively subdued singing tenor on a version of the song that contrasts well with the original. The other songs I really liked were her hip-hop collaborations. "Take Off Your Cool" from Outkast's Speakerboxxx/The Love Below album and "Life is Better" from Q-Tip's The Renaissance album are great, although most fans of that genre (like me) will already have both those albums.
All in all, it's a good album for Norah Jones fans as it brings together a lot of tracks that were only available on other artist's releases. However, for non-fans of Norah Jones, there isn't a lot of variety in the music presented to us on this album as even to songs with bands/artists like Foo Fighters, Dolly Parton and Q-Tip all fall into the jazz/adult contemporary arena. Only the Talib Kwali track would fit into another genre (hip-hop) and even then it's still not a fast-tempo song.
Score: 6/10 (fans of Norah Jones can add two points to the Score)
Song(s) to Sample: "Take Off Your Cool" and "More Than This"
As I stated above, this is an electropop band so there are vocals on each song to accompany the electronic beats and synthesized tones. The singing is done in a downtempo manner throughout the entire disc, like you might find in a Depeche Mode album although the singing voice is nowhere as good as Dave Gahan's. The album opens with "Four Four Letter" which has a trance beat and a funky bass line at the beginning. As the song progresses, the beat and rhythms work well together creating a very danceable song. "Pheromone" has a slower, sexier backing beat to create a more sultry sound. "Wanna Be Dancin'" has a trance beat but subdued vocals that fit in relatively well with the beat and synthesizer work. It's a dance song that seems well fitted for raves but the tempo might be too slow for the song to get regular play at your more hip clubs. "Washed Up" was one of my favorite songs with the vocals on that track doing its best to match the sweeping energy of the song without sounding too over eager.
Overall, it's a well crafted and catchy debut electropop album, although there's definitely more "electro" than "pop" to the album. Most of the songs are very danceable to with hard working trance and house beats. However, the vocal work was a bit too subdued on some of the tracks and I thought it would have been a better fit for a downtempo electronica album. The track layout was very logical though and that songs flowed well as the album progressed. There were a few songs where they try to go all industrial on us with the beats that don't work as well ("Superhero" being one example) and the monotone singing and vocals don't always match up perfectly with the songs ("Atmosphere") but those are minor qualms to a very respectable debut album.
Score: 8/10
Song(s) to Sample: "Washed Up" and "Surrender"
"Accomplished but Dead" opens the album well with a catchy electronic hook and a quiet but inviting meloday that draws you in to the album decently. "Every Love That Ever Was" has a slower, downtempo sound that tries to bring more emotion into the song with techno beats by the time the bridge is upon us. "The Smoke" has some toe-tapping drum work and a catchy hook but the song gets monotonous after a while.
The music they present to us is passable but there wasn't much that was outstanding or groundbreaking about it. The tracks at the beginning of the album does it's best to invite the listener in but there's not much to keep the listener there as the album progresses. It's similar to watching a well shot movie with no plot--it seems okay when you're in the moment but there's not much to discuss when you think back about what you just digested. There's nothing really wrong with the album but, on the same token, there isn't anything that I loved about it either.
Score: 6.5/10
Song(s) to Sample: "The Smoke"
