Pulling a middle finger to the spiritual, sensual side he's shown in the past, this is a hardcore hip-hop slew of tracks about shining in the club, freaky bitches, and shining in the club. Oh, and freaky bitches. And shining in the club.
Enter 1996. Michael Jordan and Bugs Bunny, together at last, jointly starring in the film Space Jam. Logically, this union resulted in the biggest hit in a career made of big hits, R Kelly's "I Believe I Can Fly." Epic, cheesy and irresistable, "I Believe I Can Fly" ate the world, showcasing one of the smoothest most sellable voices alive today. Did you like I Believe I Can Fly? Want to hear more of that? Then run away screaming from his new album, Double Up, Robert Kelly's latest studio offering. Pulling a middle finger to the spiritual, sensual side he's shown in the past, this is a hardcore hip-hop slew of tracks about shining in the club, freaky bitches, and shining in the club. Oh, and freaky bitches. And shining in the club.
After a fairly terrible intro where Kelly aggrandises himself while Swizz Beatz shouts "motherfucker", we get to the title track. What does Double Up mean exactly? Sleeping with two women at once. R Kelly and Snoop Dogg, best chums after "That's That Shit," swap misogynistic lyrics about getting into a threesome over a thin, repetitive beat, which left me scratching my head as to why this is the title track. A better and more honest choice would've been, "Freaky In The Club." More fun than the title cut, "Freaky In The Club" is cheap and cheerful but a little more easy-going than some here, and the bit where the music cuts out and Kelly announces "TIME TO HAVE SEX" will make anyone smile.
Unintentional comedy is a stock-in-trade of R Kelly albums, a fact known the world over post the Trapped In The Closet fiasco. It can be found in "The Zoo" which has a bare, sexy beat and a sensual performance from Kelly, which is slightly spoiled by him continually saying things like "Like Jurassic Park, except I'm your sexasaurus" and the use of monkey noises. Like "The Zoo," the near six minutes of "Sex Planet" is a great background mood soundtrack for making love, but don't concentrate on it or his childish space/sex metaphors are too much to bear.
"I enter into your black hole", "This will be painless, we'll take a trip to Planet Uranus." By the way, Mr. Kelly is 39.
The ladies will also be served by "Sweet Tooth," a familiar but enjoyable lover-man number. But, they will be disappointed by the Usher collab, "Same Girl." Usher and Kelly should be huge but Same Girl is just bleh- the plink-plonk piano thud beat goes nowhere, the lyrics are boring and the dialogue approach makes it more a voice acting exercise than a song.
Getting back to the club joints which are the meat of the album, you wouldn't turn off the radio for them, though few are special. I quite liked the bouncy "Hook It Up" which is rather similar to "Double Up" both in subject and structure, but it's livelier. The song "Rollin," held down by Kelly himself with no guest rapper, is a truly excellent song for driving too- he doesn't just sing about how great his car is, the beat is lazy but sure and begs you to cruise down the strip to it.
Elsewhere in this vein, the big hit "I'm A Flirt" has a supremely catchy track, the unstoppable piano melody ingraining itself permenantly in any brain that hears it. This is the remix version with Bow Wow cut out and replaced with TI and T Pain. TI's a better rapper than Bow Wow so that's an improvement, but T Pain's guest spot just serves to show that he has no chance against a real singer like Kelly. Thank heaven Kelly's in great form, sounding like he's really having fun.
A song that mixes up the production is, "Rockstar," Featuring Ludacris and Kid Rock. Luda's flow sounds right at home over Rock's huge guitar riff and the huge storming beat, not to mention Kelly is no vocal slouch on the track. Actual rock fans may be a bit puzzled by the song's definition of a rock star, which turns out to be a woman with a big butt.
When he cuts the shit and does something real it remains special, but he barely does that at all throughout the lengthy run time. A much needed exception is found in "Havin' A Baby" as Kelly roleplays a father who finds out his wife is expecting. Charming, sweet and genuine I wish this track had been expanded or he'd visited this territory more. He comes close with "Leave Your Name," a lovely, intimate track where he admits how wasted he is from his opulent lifestyle. The most sincerious song on the album is, "Rise Up," dedicated to the victims of Virginia Tech. It's a nice gesture but it sounds like something from a Disney soundtrack, and is not the convincing emotional climax you want.
Double Up's problem isn't that the songs are horrible. In fact, only the potty-mouthed and musically dull "Real Talk" is garbage. The problem is, that it doesn't work when listened to in its entirety. The songs individually are acceptable for soundtracking your living room or going off in the club, but sit through the whole 76 minutes and you'll be exhausted and bored. The hip-hop beats he's using are not conducive to his classic spotlight singing, so he doesn't do much of it, going for a ho-hum sing-song talking style.
Kelly's old fans may be horrified, though youngsters are liable to be satisfied and titillated by the clutch of competent club bangers and sex songs.
Rating: 3/5
