She may be 21 now, but Christina Aguilera seems to be playing dress-up on the follow-up to her 8 million-selling 1999 debut. On this sprawling set, the singer tries on pop-rock, hip hop, R&B, Latin, heavy metal, jazz, gospel, even a bit of classical. In attempting to be all things to all people, though, Aguilera fails to bare her own personality on Stripped. (Overly long at nearly 78 minutes, the disc could have also used some major paring down.) Even so, give Aguilera points for stretching out from her teen-pop past, although she tries too hard to be sexy on cuts like "Dirrty." With her powerhouse pipes, she emphatically belts out the head-banger "Fighter" (featuring former Jane's Addiction guitarist Dave Navarro). But it's "Impossible"—a retro-soul ballad written and produced by Alicia Keys, who also plays piano and sings backup—that truly reveals Aguilera's artistic possibilities.
Bottom Line: Blonde overambition yields mixed results
Justin Timberlake (Jive)
Album of the week
Apparently Justin Timberlake has more in common with Michael Jackson than the fact that they both used to sport Afros. Proving that he was more than Justified in stepping out from his boy band 'N Sync, Timberlake's soulful solo debut recalls Off the Wall-era, pre-wacko Jacko. He funkily updates Jackson's "Rock with You" with "Rock Your Body," a bass-heavy dance number that sounds like one of those roller-skating jams from the late '70s/early '80s. Timberlake's R&B makeover should not come as a complete surprise, though. You could hear hints of it coming on "Gone" and "Girlfriend," the last two singles off 'N Sync's 2001 smash Celebrity, both cowritten by Timberlake. Here, the 21-year-old singer, who cowrote all 13 songs, unveils a creamy falsetto on both smooth slow jams and hip-hoppish party cuts such as the thumping first single, "Like I Love You." Ironically, the normal Jackson (Janet) supplies guest vocals on "(And She Said) Take Me Now," a hot and sleazy grinder that should lay waste to Timberlake's squeaky-clean Tiger Beat image and make Britney awful jealous.
Bottom Line: A surprisingly soulful success
The Wallflowers (Interscope)
It's as clear as front man Jakob Dylan's crystal-blue eyes that the Wallflowers are in full bloom. Midway through their fourth album, the pop-rockers nail back-to-back tracks that sum up why this is a red-letter disc. First there's "If You Never Got Sick," a shiningly melodic guitar-pop ditty with an instantly catchy chorus and a witty, warped lyric: "Baby if you never got sick/I wouldn't get to hold you." Then, in a clever bit of sequencing, they turn around with "Health and Happiness," a brooding beauty of a ballad on which, against an eerie, electronicatinged backdrop, Dylan cuttingly offers, "I wish you health/ I wish you happiness/ But absolutely nothing else." Ouch. In those cold words, he speaks for everyone who has ever been on the bitter side of a breakup.
Bottom Line: Standout Wallflowers
Deborah Cox (J)
House remixes, resulting in six No. 1 dance hits, have turned Deborah Cox into a disco-ball diva who would do Donna Summer proud. The singer's third album includes pumping club versions of "Mr. Lonely" and "Absolutely Not" (which, in its original form, appeared on last year's Dr. Dolittle 2 soundtrack). Unfortunately, though, the party pretty much stops there. Alternating between light hip hop (with guest turns by rappers Kurupt and Jadakiss) and R&B-pop ballads in the vein of her 1998 chart-topper "Nobody's Supposed to Be Here," the disc is more for chilling out the morning after a night on the town. The result is nothing that Mary J., Toni and Brandy haven't done before—and done better. Still, the cool mid-tempo groove of "Up & Down (In & Out)" will surely soothe any hangover.
Bottom Line: A not-quite-good Morning
Keith Urban (Capitol Nashville)
Urban's paintings and prints, which he sells on his Web site, are full of idyllic tableaux and suggest a Norman Rockwellian universe. Fortunately the 35-year-old New Zealand native is a lot more nuanced and introspective as a country singer and songwriter than he is as an artist. This, his second album, includes the rueful "You'll Think of Me" and a thoughtful paean to getting older, "Song for Dad." The disc also features two overtly religious tunes.
Elsewhere Urban lightens up on the effervescent, contagious love song "Somebody Like You," a No. 1 country hit, and the video-ready "You Look Good in My Shirt." Urban's singing can be a bit nasal; his voice is hardly the mellowest instrument in Nashville. But his guitar work is nimble and inventive—as is his banjo playing—which helps make for a consistently musical CD. Except for the crass "Jeans On"—which, as Urban admits in the press materials, he did for its marketability—this is a Road well worth traveling.
Bottom Line: You'll take your cowboy hat off to Urban
- Contributors:
- Chuck Arnold,
- Ralph Novak,
- Lorenzo Benet.
Saved by the Bell Reunion
The hookups, the meltdowns, the memoires
The case reveals what was really going on what they think of each other now!
