Since some friends have told me that sometimes they’d rather just hear my opinion on albums instead of the entire track-by-track, this time I’ll be including both on my review of Bajan pop princess Rihanna’s sixth studio album, Talk That Talk.

Album: Talk That Talk

Artist: Rihanna

Released: November 18, 2011

Genre: R&B, dance-pop, pop

Length: 37:29

Label: Def Jam

The Quick & Dirty: While at first surprised that Rihanna was releasing a new album after Loud had been out just over year, I realized that she’s squeezed most every viable hit from that record already. With this new album, she takes her music in yet another new direction with sex-drenched lyrics and a mashup of electronic and West Indian styles. Like with many pop albums, I’m on the fence about purchasing this piece; there are obviously great songs mixed with what I feel isn’t much more than filler. Standout tracks are (1) “You da One,” (3) “We Found Love,” (5) “Cockiness,” (6) “Birthday Cake,” (8) “Drunk On Love,” and (11) “Farewell.” Check out the songs for yourself on Rihanna’s VEVO channel and head to the bottom for my final score.

Track-by-Track:

1. “You da One”—The album opens with this sleepy yet seductive track, a song that is just catchy enough while still holding very sexual undertones. Slathered in Caribbean flavor, this song both relaxes you and keeps you interested—a stark contrast to the over-the-top opener, “S&M,” of her previous album. 

2. “Where Have You Been”—To be perfectly frank, this song sounds like it’s already been remixed for the club, which can be both a good and bad thing. While I could definitely see myself getting entangled in the strong dance beat of this song on the dance floor, the actual song is devoid of lyrical content. This song takes the “pop” out of dance-pop, but is a good transition into the next song.

3. “We Found Love” feat. Calvin Harris—Most of us have already heard this song, and I must say that hearing this song was one of the reasons I decided to review this album. While I was a bit put-off by the “featuring” put for what was merely a producer, I’ve realized this song is a true collaboration between Rihanna’s vocals and Harris’s beat. The powerful chorus seems to actually battle against the hypnotic and changing beat, something that in my opinion makes this song so unique. This track manages to be as powerful as “Only Girl (In the World)” of Loud fame, but feels far more effortless on Rihanna’s part.

4. “Talk That Talk” feat. Jay-Z—The titular track on Rihanna’s album really failed to impress me. Despite being opened by a good (but not great) verse by Rihanna’s Roc-A-Fella mentor Hova, the rest of the song is rather humdrum and predictable. The relaxed tone of the first and third songs carries over here, but it fails to impress on this simple song.

5. “Cockiness (Love It)”—Producer Bangladesh has put together an captivating and oozing beat which, paired with Rihanna’s repetitiously hypnotic vocals, makes for an song that makes your want to “lick [her] persuasion,” all the while adding in the same Caribbean charm of “You da One.” Perhaps it is because this song clearly wasn’t designed for Top 40 radio like so much of Rihanna’s latest work, perhaps it is because she doesn’t actually “sing” in the traditional sense, or perhaps it is because Rihanna comes off as an underground R&B sex goddess in this song, but this track was definitely one of the standouts in my opinion.

6. “Birthday Cake”—Picking up where “Cockiness” left off, Rihanna glides in on some Arabian-inspired sounds and proceeds to plunge into a sex-crazed anthem comparing her body to a birthday cake. While definitely more pop than the previous track, this song keeps strong with the lusty feel of the last song and enflames the senses.

7. “We All Want Love”—This quirky track really doesn’t belong on this album, especially after “Birthday Cake.” While all the previous songs made me want multiple Rihannas at once, this track did just the opposite by having multiple Rihannas singing backup. Lackluster production and cheesy lyrics really put me off from this song, though it will doubtless be the anthem of both lonely high school girls and cat ladies alike.

8. “Drunk On Love”—After the soaring, animalistic highs of tracks six and seven, this song is the crashing of human emotion. I feel sincere regret in Rihanna’s belting vocals on this song, though I’m unsure about the moaning robots in the background.

9. “Roc Me Out”—While Ester Dean has written many hits for Rihanna in the past, this is her first work on Talk That Talk that I really felt her presence come through into a some very quality pop vocals. This song returns to the smuttiness of the earlier tracks and prepares you to take the rest of the album home.

10.  “Watch n’ Learn”—This sex lesson put to R&B doesn’t have much to say, but is a relaxing kind of song that isn’t a standout but isn’t quite filler, either.

11. “Farewell”—Maybe I’ve put Rihanna into a box, but I was expecting a sentimental power ballad to close up this musical orgy, and damn—I was right. Like Loud’s “California King Bed,” Rihanna’s voice manages to wrench my heart, even though I know deep down she’s only singing a piece written and produced by a machine of people in “the industry.” And that what makes this Rihanna—it’s damn good because it’s done by the best people, including but not limited to Rihanna herself.

The Verdict:

I’d be a fool to say this album doesn’t have some radio hits on it, and I’d be a fool to say this is a bad pop album. I applaud Rihanna for taking risks into new genres, they definitely paid off the most. While I don’t love every track, I will give Rihanna’s Talk That Talk a 70% for its beats and lyrics, both risqué and rewarding

★★★★★★★☆☆☆

ollaway:

Drake’s Take Care leaked last night and, while I was definitely looking forward to copping this album, I couldn’t resist listening to the leak first to determine whether or not I should actually buy dat shit. Let’s roll!

Album: Take Care

Artist: Drake

Released: November 15, 2011

Genre: Hip hop, R&B

Length: 74:07

Label: Young Money, Cash Money, Universal Republic



1. “Over My Dead Body” featuring Chantal Kreviazuk—This was a great introductory track. I enjoyed the unique style…this track really reminded me of “Lust for Life” from So Far Gone, just less pussified. I would call the chorus an interesting undertaking with Chantal Kreviazuk, but the lyrics of said hook were not as well thought out as the rest of the song. The lyrics were satisfactory on this track, but personally the “dim sum” Asian joke made this track for me.

2. “Shot For Me”—I’m not going to act like Drake’s never done the whiny-singing stuff before, but I wasn’t really impressed with this. I’m sure there will be chicks out there who dig this, but this sounded to me like Drake was getting it up the ass and really enjoying it.

3. “Headlines”—This single is already out and, while it breaks the slow pace of the first half of the album for a brief bit of excitement, the hook is beyond dissatisfying compared to the verses.

4. “Crew Love” featuring The Weeknd—So, um, this track is five minutes long and we don’t get to hear Drake until 3:40. As a song itself, this was interesting, but nothing I’d put up in the first three tracks. You should be trying to get people hyped for the rest of the album at this point, not winding down like this. The Drake part was by far the most captivating, but I would be embarrassed to put out a song on my own album that was 75% not me.

5. “Take Care” featuring Rihanna—This song seemed like something very deep—apparently Rihanna actually wrote the chorus herself on this track, an interesting change up from the typical “I want this song to be a hit, I’ll send Rihanna the hook and have her sing it” style. I’d say that having her write for this is kind of a big deal considering she didn’t pen a word of her last album.* There was a very compelling and hypnotic breakdown in the middle featuring a unique sample that I would’ve liked to have seen more of in the song as well. Overall, this didn’t stand out as much as it could have because it was located in the huge muck of slow songs in the forefront.

6. “Marvins Room”—I can’t say this is hip hop in the same sense of Jay-Z anymore, but this huge plunge into R&B territory proved a success in my eyes—nobody else right now is going to give you this vulnerability, though this is probably a bigger turn on for the uteruses than the duderuses. And besides, who’s sampled drunk calling before?

6.5. “Buried Alive (Interlude)” featuring Kendrick Lamar—I’m not really sure where Drake was going with this. This portion came on the same track as “Marvins Room” but seemed to be something completely different, aside from the same lethargic pace that has been dominating the album insofar. Like “Crew Love,” this track was dominated by another artist—the only reason I can’t say this song was all Lamar was because he merged this into “Marvins Room” on the album, although they seem to clearly be two separate works. I can’t say I love this because half of it was Lamar rapping about Drake’s problems, but I’m glad he’s brought the classic “BJ versus Church” debate back to the forefront.

7. “Underground Kings”—Yep. Liked it. Things picked up here and added some variety…and finally a song that had more BPM than my grandmother’s heartbeat. He could’ve slid this up near the beginning and I’m sure people would feel less dragged through the mud on the first few tracks.

8. “We’ll Be Fine”—It’s tracks like this that beg the question “Is Drake an alcoholic? I’m really concerned about him.” His verses were acceptable and the hook was killer, overall making for a great song to get pumped up to—as for Birdman’s outro…this was probably his idea of submitting a verse. I have no idea what he was thinking he contributed to the song by adding a full minute of empty shout out shit, but this is further proof that, no matter how much you dislike Drake, I’m pretty sure he can shit on everything Birdman’s ever done in one sitting.

9. “Make Me Proud” featuring Nicki Minaj—Before we begin, I’d like everyone to know that I’ve been a member of Team Minaj for over two years, so I may be biased. That being said, I really enjoyed this song. They have both had better verses in their careers, but the chemistry between these two never fails to impress me. I’ve always enjoyed that Nicki typically avoids bragging about all the shit she owns in exchange for stuff with deeper meaning, but here she turned that around and went right for it. She then transitions into a honeyed bridge about giving it all up, in effect giving more magnitude to said bridge by refuting everything she just mentioned. She then does some lines that are clever but pretty cornball. Overall probably the catchiest track on the album.

10. “Lord Knows” featuring Rick Ross—Nice sample, a song you should definitely hear for yourself. Drake had a few too many hackneyed lines on this; “To pull all your skeletons out the closet like Halloween decorations” was a bit much for me. I do not really like Rick Ross but his verse was good, though nothing new.

11. “Cameras”—Despite a repetitious and uncreative hook, this song has a nice sample and some solid verses.

11.5 “Good Ones Go (Interlude)”—Another slow one, although potentially better than some of the others had it been developed into a full song. Since it’s pretty bare, the majority is Drake moaning like some guy is doing him up right.

12. “Doing It Wrong” featuring Stevie Wonder—Oh…another slow one?????? Okay. He’s singing pretty high on this one and the chorus needn’t have been repeated, but Stevie Wonder made for a tinging and emotional harmonica outro.

13. “The Real Her” featuring Lil Wayne & André 3000—Slow Drake song featuring shout outs to strippers from Houston, Atlanta, and Vegas? Sorry, I’ve already got some of those. I’ll skip straight to the featured verses—Lil Wayne does an okay verse on this, though I’m personally tired of the Stevie Wonder/blindness lines. André had some good lines in his verse, but his flow + that beat = catastrophe.

14. “HYFR”—This stands for “Hell Yeah Fucking Right,” FYI. It was an interesting idea to have Lil Wayne on the hook instead of Drake, although it proved to sound horrifying. Wayne’s verse was better than I expected…terrible metaphors were rarer here. Drake was good, too, although I feel like I’m starting to notice a pattern with all these songs about being in love with hoes and not being real with them as much as you should.

15. “Look What You’ve Done”—This song is also about a hoe…a hoe that happens to be Drake’s mother. This track is about his mother and uncle, the two people who raised him, and how much he appreciates them. Although I feel like the sample in the background was a bit too much (just piano would’ve made for a simple beat to an emotional track), you can feel that this track came from the heart more than any of the others insofar and is a genuinely heartfelt track, I think.

16. “Practice”—Slow and about a hoe. Not bad per se, but nothing that anyone should be excited about because it’s just more of the same.

17. “The Ride” featuring The Weeknd—word is this is part of the album, but I couldn’t find it anywhere. I really searched, so I’m sorry to let you guys down, but I have no idea where to find this track. I will update the review accordingly when I do find this one…hopefully it has Drake on it, though.**

 

I was sort of expecting something a little harder than this (pauz), but I’m not really sure why. I guess I just thought everyone would be going HAM after Watch The Throne came out in order to show that they can keep up. Overall, this is probably one more for the ladies than the fellows. The slow serenading, however, seemed like something the alleged Florence + the Machine collabo would’ve been good for, but apparently both artists were just too busy hanging out. There are a number of tracks on here that I think are definitely worth getting, but listening to 17 in a row is just something that I cannot do more than once. His heart was definitely in the right place, but hearing slow songs sobbing over strippers happened too many times in this album. Drake’s Take Care gets a 60%.

★★★★★★☆☆☆☆

*Rumor debunked—this hook is actually from Gil Scott-Heron’s “I’ll Take Care of You.” Shout out to clintonhillchill for bringing this information to the forefront.

**Now this track is (surprise!) another slow one, but this one was definitely done right. It was a much better ender than “Practice” and I can see why Drake says this is his favorite album on the track. This one is slow, but a slow roaster that will slide down your ears, if you know what I’m trying to say. Much better finale, but the overall album rating will stand at 60%.

Drake’s Take Care leaked last night and, while I was definitely looking forward to copping this album, I couldn’t resist listening to the leak first to determine whether or not I should actually buy dat shit. Let’s roll!

Album: Take Care

Artist: Drake

Released: November 15, 2011

Genre: Hip hop, R&B

Length: 74:07

Label: Young Money, Cash Money, Universal Republic

1. “Over My Dead Body” featuring Chantal Kreviazuk—This was a great introductory track. I enjoyed the unique style…this track really reminded me of “Lust for Life” from So Far Gone, just less pussified. I would call the chorus an interesting undertaking with Chantal Kreviazuk, but the lyrics of said hook were not as well thought out as the rest of the song. The lyrics were satisfactory on this track, but personally the “dim sum” Asian joke made this track for me.

2. “Shot For Me”—I’m not going to act like Drake’s never done the whiny-singing stuff before, but I wasn’t really impressed with this. I’m sure there will be chicks out there who dig this, but this sounded to me like Drake was getting it up the ass and really enjoying it.

3. “Headlines”—This single is already out and, while it breaks the slow pace of the first half of the album for a brief bit of excitement, the hook is beyond dissatisfying compared to the verses.

4. “Crew Love” featuring The Weeknd—So, um, this track is five minutes long and we don’t get to hear Drake until 3:40. As a song itself, this was interesting, but nothing I’d put up in the first three tracks. You should be trying to get people hyped for the rest of the album at this point, not winding down like this. The Drake part was by far the most captivating, but I would be embarrassed to put out a song on my own album that was 75% not me.

5. “Take Care” featuring Rihanna—This song seemed like something very deep—apparently Rihanna actually wrote the chorus herself on this track, an interesting change up from the typical “I want this song to be a hit, I’ll send Rihanna the hook and have her sing it” style. I’d say that having her write for this is kind of a big deal considering she didn’t pen a word of her last album. There was a very compelling and hypnotic breakdown in the middle featuring a unique sample that I would’ve liked to have seen more of in the song as well. Overall, this didn’t stand out as much as it could have because it was located in the huge muck of slow songs in the forefront.

6. “Marvins Room”—I can’t say this is hip hop in the same sense of Jay-Z anymore, but this huge plunge into R&B territory proved a success in my eyes—nobody else right now is going to give you this vulnerability, though this is probably a bigger turn on for the uteruses than the duderuses. And besides, who’s sampled drunk calling before?

6.5. “Buried Alive (Interlude)” featuring Kendrick Lamar—I’m not really sure where Drake was going with this. This portion came on the same track as “Marvins Room” but seemed to be something completely different, aside from the same lethargic pace that has been dominating the album insofar. Like “Crew Love,” this track was dominated by another artist—the only reason I can’t say this song was all Lamar was because he merged this into “Marvins Room” on the album, although they seem to clearly be two separate works. I can’t say I love this because half of it was Lamar rapping about Drake’s problems, but I’m glad he’s brought the classic “BJ versus Church” debate back to the forefront.

7. “Underground Kings”—Yep. Liked it. Things picked up here and added some variety…and finally a song that had more BPM than my grandmother’s heartbeat. He could’ve slid this up near the beginning and I’m sure people would feel less dragged through the mud on the first few tracks.

8. “We’ll Be Fine”—It’s tracks like this that beg the question “Is Drake an alcoholic? I’m really concerned about him.” His verses were acceptable and the hook was killer, overall making for a great song to get pumped up to—as for Birdman’s outro…this was probably his idea of submitting a verse. I have no idea what he was thinking he contributed to the song by adding a full minute of empty shout out shit, but this is further proof that, no matter how much you dislike Drake, I’m pretty sure he can shit on everything Birdman’s ever done in one sitting.

9. “Make Me Proud” featuring Nicki Minaj—Before we begin, I’d like everyone to know that I’ve been a member of Team Minaj for over two years, so I may be biased. That being said, I really enjoyed this song. They have both had better verses in their careers, but the chemistry between these two never fails to impress me. I’ve always enjoyed that Nicki typically avoids bragging about all the shit she owns in exchange for stuff with deeper meaning, but here she turned that around and went right for it. She then transitions into a honeyed bridge about giving it all up, in effect giving more magnitude to said bridge by refuting everything she just mentioned. She then does some lines that are clever but pretty cornball. Overall probably the catchiest track on the album.

10. “Lord Knows” featuring Rick Ross—Nice sample, a song you should definitely hear for yourself. Drake had a few too many hackneyed lines on this; “To pull all your skeletons out the closet like Halloween decorations” was a bit much for me. I do not really like Rick Ross but his verse was good, though nothing new.

11. “Cameras”—Despite a repetitious and uncreative hook, this song has a nice sample and some solid verses.

11.5 “Good Ones Go (Interlude)”—Another slow one, although potentially better than some of the others had it been developed into a full song. Since it’s pretty bare, the majority is Drake moaning like some guy is doing him up right.

12. “Doing It Wrong” featuring Stevie Wonder—Oh…another slow one?????? Okay. He’s singing pretty high on this one and the chorus needn’t have been repeated, but Stevie Wonder made for a tinging and emotional harmonica outro.

13. “The Real Her” featuring Lil Wayne & André 3000—Slow Drake song featuring shout outs to strippers from Houston, Atlanta, and Vegas? Sorry, I’ve already got some of those. I’ll skip straight to the featured verses—Lil Wayne does an okay verse on this, though I’m personally tired of the Stevie Wonder/blindness lines. André had some good lines in his verse, but his flow + that beat = catastrophe.

14. “HYFR”—This stands for “Hell Yeah Fucking Right,” FYI. It was an interesting idea to have Lil Wayne on the hook instead of Drake, although it proved to sound horrifying. Wayne’s verse was better than I expected…terrible metaphors were rarer here. Drake was good, too, although I feel like I’m starting to notice a pattern with all these songs about being in love with hoes and not being real with them as much as you should.

15. “Look What You’ve Done”—This song is also about a hoe…a hoe that happens to be Drake’s mother. This track is about his mother and uncle, the two people who raised him, and how much he appreciates them. Although I feel like the sample in the background was a bit too much (just piano would’ve made for a simple beat to an emotional track), you can feel that this track came from the heart more than any of the others insofar and is a genuinely heartfelt track, I think.

16. “Practice”—Slow and about a hoe. Not bad per se, but nothing that anyone should be excited about because it’s just more of the same.

17. “The Ride” featuring The Weeknd—word is this is part of the album, but I couldn’t find it anywhere. I really searched, so I’m sorry to let you guys down, but I have no idea where to find this track. I will update the review accordingly when I do find this one…hopefully it has Drake on it, though.

I was sort of expecting something a little harder than this (pauz), but I’m not really sure why. I guess I just thought everyone would be going HAM after Watch The Throne came out in order to show that they can keep up. Overall, this is probably one more for the ladies than the fellows. The slow serenading, however, seemed like something the alleged Florence + the Machine collabo would’ve been good for, but apparently both artists were just too busy hanging out. There are a number of tracks on here that I think are definitely worth getting, but listening to 17 in a row is just something that I cannot do more than once. His heart was definitely in the right place, but hearing slow songs sobbing over strippers happened too many times in this album. Drake’s Take Care gets a 60%.

★★★★★★☆☆☆☆

Welcome, one and all, to my very first album review. Lady Gaga’s Born This Way was given to me as a gift from my friend Lauren (ZOMG follow hur blog guise) and I reluctantly accepted, not sure what I was in for. I was a Gaga fan a while back, but in recent times I’d seen her as sort of “off the deep end” and opted out of her latest album. With Lauren asking me what I thought of the album, I decided that writing out a whole review would be a perfect way to answer her and come closer to tumblr (and real) fame. Remember, this is just my personal opinion, but I’m ready to get cracking if you guys are!

Album: Born This Way

Artist: Lady Gaga

Released: May 23, 2011

Genre: Pop, dance, electronic

Length: 61:12

Label: Streamline, Interscope, Kon Live

1. “Marry The Night”—This song was exactly what I was expecting from this album. Classic pop derivations with a twist of weird. It would be a lie to say I love this or anything, but I feel like this is just Gaga enough to keep everyone interested and just mainstream enough to play on the radio.

2. “Born This Way”—I remember when this first came out and it was all over the radio. My thoughts on this song are still the same—not bad, just Gaga being Gaga. She’s got an anthem for all of her little monsters and I don’t hate them for it. It definitely has a positive message and I respect that, and I think it’s good…as much as I don’t like “positive anthemz 5 da kidz.” 

3. “Government Hooker”—Three songs through the album, I wasn’t expecting to have been liking it this much. It was probably a bad idea to have already decided that I liked the album only two songs in, as proved by my shock when I heard this song. I like the beat, but the actual content of this song is flim flam. I know that Lady Gaga doesn’t agree with all the policies of the US government, so maybe I was hoping for something with a message or a bold statement, but the fact that “Government Hooker” was just another silly pop song with a nice beat really turned me off from this. Why she felt the need to open the song with repeating “Gaga,” however, was by far the worst part of the song for me. 

4. “Judas”—I have obviously heard this song before, and it was my first impression from hearing it was that it was that she was just using the religious references to stir shit up and get attention for the song. After hearing the song more and viewing the video, however, I can actually appreciate this song as a piece of art that uses a classic biblical tale as an analogy for love and vice versa. This song is both catchy and deep, and I think it has gotten more flack than it truly deserves. Again, the only turn off was the repetition of her name in the track…we all know it’s you, gurl.

5. “Americano”—This song. It’s quite the conundrum to me. It has catchy lyrics and a hot Latin-inspired beat, and at first glance it’s “Alejandro 2.0.” Maybe I’m a musical snob, however, but I feel that, as much as nonsense songs can be fun, she didn’t seem to be going for that angle with song, yet the lyrics come off as nonsense to me. I feel like ultimately the Spanish was just a gimmick in this song, because the lyrics jump all over the board for what this song is about. Between love, cultural revolution, culture clash, and back to controversial love, I really didn’t get what this was supposed to be about. Why is it called “Americano,” anyway? It’s not a language as is implied and the hispanic woman would be Americana, right? I really don’t want to hate on this song as I would definitely get dólar (Spanish for buck) to this on the dance floor, but I feel like something with such an epic feel should’ve stuck to a theme. I was really intrigued by the little love story presented in the intro, but it basically ended there. Ultimately, the Spanish-theme was well played into a modern pop song, but it left me wanting for more plot or message to match the vigorous vocals.

6. “Hair”—I don’t think I can listen to this very many times. Maybe if I had a vagina I could, but I don’t love this. I feel like this one for all my bitchez out there, and it’s done the way you’d want it to be, but five minutes of this is just not my thing.

7. “Scheiße”—This song begins with Lady Gaga stating that she doesn’t speak German but she “can if you like” before jumping into a crazy repetitious German oath to a crazy beat. This song seriously got my motor going when it began. The first line makes it clear that it’s just a nonsensical dance track, a good enough excuse for the absurd quasi-German put forth on the post-chorus if you ask me. I was expecting some kind of club banger on this record by Gaga and I was glad she was doing it in superb Gaga style. Then came the chorus. At 1:10, the song jumps from a hot dance song into something else. I feel like maybe she was trying to make everything “radio-friendly,” because the bubble gum chorus that is a women’s empowerment anthem spoiled this track for me. I’m not opposed to women wanting to “be strong without somebody there,” but turning some bat shit insane electronic song I could rock to into something with a catchy little chorus for the ladies just wasn’t my thing. Removal of the chorus would make this song so much better.

8. “Bloody Mary”—This offbeat, quirky little track tucked away in the middle of the album was actually one of the ones I liked best. It’s not something you’d expect to hear on your favorite top 40 radio station, but this slow experiment is something I’ve nearly fallen in love with—it’s mixing of languages and biblical themes all made me like how unique this track is, and I feel like this is what she does best: tweaking with what we would traditionally call a pop song. This song’s biggest problem with me, again, is the repetition of the word Gaga. I get it, you’re Lady Gaga.

9. “Bad Kids”—While I found the chorus slightly lacking, this song felt like another gift to the little monsters and a gift Gaga worked hard on. It’s not my jam, though, and I really don’t appreciate that a self-described “Bad Kid” would not release an explicit version of a track with swearing. I wonder how much of such a message can be sincere considering the self-censorship on this track. Why swear on a track if not one of the millions of records you sell of this will feature the word? Seems like a waste of time, especially on this kind of song.

10. “Highway Unicorn (Road To Love)”—At this point in the album, things started to slow down for me in terms of excitement. This track could definitely be an inspirational track for someone who’s into this kind of stuff, but it ultimately was lacking to me. Nothing that stood out much from the rest of album.

11. “Heavy Metal Lover”—I feel the beat, but I don’t feel like this stands out much since it’s lost in this little muddle near the end. I don’t think this is good for much except dancing at the club very late at night when everyone’s just lost in the beat—maybe it’s placement is appropriate, then, as I could feel kind of lost in the album at this point. Not bad, just not special. 

12. “Electric Chapel”—I like the guitar riff and it has an interesting beat again, but it feels a bit recycled from the previous religion-based songs…not to mention the directly ripped term “holy fool” straight from the pages of “Judas.” Getting the same vibe as that from the previous song.

13. “Yoü And I”—With the exception of the goofy background “something” sang by computer-y background singers and a few too many sound effects (although that’s just Lady Gaga, isn’t it?), this song is a slow burning bonfire and is an all-American cheesy rock ballad that I love. This song proves that she really can sing any sort of genre well and her strong vocals are ultimately the anchor of this song. Well done, Lady Gaga, you’ve proven a much larger variety on this album than I had ever anticipated, and this song is damn catchy for what one might consider the “oddball” of the album.

14. “Edge of Glory”—Congrats, you’ve made something pretty good. Oh, what? There’s one more song you have after that grand finale? I guess I can hear it…oh. Well. This song didn’t really stand out to me as anything special and could’ve well fit in with tracks 10–12 leading up to the end. This song just doesn’t really tickle my fancy (the saxophone is pretty cheesy in my opinion) and seems more like a Gaga-fied P!nk to me. I feel where she was going with this as the great culmination of the album, but I feel like “Yoü and I” served as a bang, while she may have thought of it as closer to a whimper. It’s her album, not mine, however, and she went with this—though, it’s nothing we haven’t heard before.

I’d say that overall, I got a lot more than I expected from this album. It’s not a bunch of bible burning for attention nor is it an entire tribute to being yourself. I’m willing to say I underestimated her by thinking she sang herself over a cliff with her ego. Even though I really would’ve liked to have seen some collaborations (where’s the “Telephone” sequel with Beyoncé that we were all looking forward to?), the diversity that was lost at least allowed Lady Gaga to be herself at the fullest. At this point in time, you might not want to get this entire album, but check out the songs for yourself and I think there’s a little something for everyone here. This is not the “reinvention of music” as some purport, but this is a solid experimental pop album that I am not throwing on the shelf just yet.  A well-earned 70% for Lady Gaga’s Born This Way.

★★★★★★★☆☆☆