Adam Lambert
For Your Entertainment
(RCA)
During his run as an American Idol contestant, camp theatrics and gratuitous glam were important weapons in Adam Lambert's arsenal: stratospheric vocal runs, flamboyant costumes, stage-lighting fusillades. This out-and-proud rocker's weekly re-invigoration of the hoariest standards was nothing short of awe-inspiring. So it's hardly shocking that For Your Entertainment plays like a gender-bent hit parade, celebrating Lambert's performance personae while saluting the pop prerogative of co-songwriters/producers like Pink, Weezer's Rivers Cuomo, the Darkness' Justin Hawkins, Lady Gaga and Max Martin.
For Your Entertainment
(RCA)
During his run as an American Idol contestant, camp theatrics and gratuitous glam were important weapons in Adam Lambert's arsenal: stratospheric vocal runs, flamboyant costumes, stage-lighting fusillades. This out-and-proud rocker's weekly re-invigoration of the hoariest standards was nothing short of awe-inspiring. So it's hardly shocking that For Your Entertainment plays like a gender-bent hit parade, celebrating Lambert's performance personae while saluting the pop prerogative of co-songwriters/producers like Pink, Weezer's Rivers Cuomo, the Darkness' Justin Hawkins, Lady Gaga and Max Martin.
Everything is on the table: stirring-despite-itself MOR tear-jerkery ("Time for Miracles"), Elton John-maudlin, California-comedown weariness ("Soaked"), trippy space-rock operatics ("A Loaded Smile") and hard, fake Queen destined to surplant Kevin Rudolf's "Let It Rock" as sports-arena fist-pimping anthems ("Music Again," "Sure Fire Winners.") On "Broken Open," Lambert revisits the sumptuous, buttery croon he nailed while covering Tears for Fears' "Mad World" on Idol. Inspiring and varied, Entertainment nonetheless loses points for playing it a bit too safe.
Kid Sister
Ultraviolet
(Downtown)
"Ain't nobody out there making shit/Quite like me, quite like this," boasts Chicago MC Kid Sister on "Big N Bad" from her debut album, Ultraviolet. That's debatable. Quite a few people make shit like this, and many more made it in hip-hop's formative years: It's known as party rap. For some genre purists, the oft-delayed and re-contextualized Ultraviolet will kindle fond memories of Monie Love, Salt-N-Pepa and other femcee veterans, as Kid Sis sprays Romper Room synth-lollipop club beats with squirts of lyrical Cheez Whiz even mentor Kanye West would know to leave on the cutting-room floor. Why? Largely because 2009 isn't 1989, a time when attitude, shamelessness and the ability to string together rhymes — any old rhymes — were all a person needed to declare him or herself an MC. Here, gleeful, middling ineptitude scuttles our heroine's regular-Jane bona fides, infectious personality and promising singing voice. One thing's for sure: These tracks will sound awesome when real mixtape rappers spit on 'em.
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