Let's Anticipate Usher's "Looking 4 Myself"

danja's two productions on the album are brilliant, it's great to hear him but it makes me wish he was doing more work

― lamborghini persie (J0rdan S.), Monday, 18 June 2012 15:18 (10 minutes ago) Bookmark

danja is not quite yet at the darkchild chronic stage of genius extraordinaire/lazy fucker syndrome but he's certainly the nearest latterday parallel i think

ok maybe lazy fucker is harsh but unrealised potential dominion at least

still think this album is less than the sum of its parts

i agree w/ this. most of the non-dance shit is great individually (well, except "twisted") but yeah idk it's not a great album, for whatever that's worth

i think maybe timbo taught danja how to price himself out of the game

i think i way prefer the bonus tracks to the album proper, it seems to finally relax at that point - they don't seem to have a taste-chess agenda in the same way

― star-spangled david banner (lex pretend), Monday, June 18, 2012 10:38 AM (8 minutes ago) Bookmark

what was the last pop album that wouldn't be greatly improved if you switched out the x number of worse tracks for the bonus tracks? i was thinking '21' & 'born this way' but those also don't even have bonus tracks.

first time i heard "can't stop" i thought pretty much the same as rtc re: silliness but that was only due to novelty, it's sounded gross every time since

― star-spangled david banner (lex pretend), Monday, 18 June 2012 15:38 (7 minutes ago) Bookmark

exact opposite for me, my cold heart melts a little each time quite frankly

i suppose i am a noted aficionado and apologist of will i am trolling by this point though

born this way had bonus tracks but in a surprise twist they actually were completely inessential

will.i.am's keenness to position himself as a member of the royal family has paid off in that i actually despise him as much as them now

the whole "fergie" thing just still confuses him

haha @ u both

i suppose i am a noted aficionado and apologist of will i am trolling by this point though

will you are

not v recent but the bonus tracks on christina aguilera's last album were almost without exception much better than what was actually on the album (which was truly awful in parts)

"monday morning" by xtina was properly amazing

still think this album is less than the sum of its parts

i agree w/ this. most of the non-dance shit is great individually (well, except "twisted") but yeah idk it's not a great album, for whatever that's worth

I hear a ton of good on this album, but not a lot of great. With the obv exception of "Climax," (and maybe lesser exceptions of "I Care For U" and "What Happened To U,") almost every track makes me wish it were better in some way. As a flawed album, it's pretty lovable, but it leaves this frustrating sense that it came this close to being a classic.

oh idk it's pretty far from a classic imo -- "good pop album in the skrillex era" is about as far as i'm willing to go

I guess it just has the spirit and feel of what I'd want a classic, late-period Usher album to sound like. Usher seems game, but the songs just don't rise to the occasion

I hear a ton of good on this album, but not a lot of great.

Yup.

that little prince flourish in the second verse of "say the words" !

am i the only person who considers "Dive" a major standout?

i think so

I hear a ton of good on this album, but not a lot of great. With the obv exception of "Climax," (and maybe lesser exceptions of "I Care For U" and "What Happened To U,") almost every track makes me wish it were better in some way.

you wanted a whole squinting through smoke album?

how about just an album without goofy garbage like "Twisted" and "Looking 4 Myself" and "Can't Stop Won't Stop" on it

I meant that choosing just those three tracks as exceptions to general disappointment seemed to allow for a very narrow aesthetic/emotional range.

I agree your hypothetical version would be much better sd.

I don't think I actively dislike any song on here, maybe "Euphoria" I dunno, but I just don't find it all that compelling.

i don't think i can actually make a track listing that "fixes" this album for me in the way could with nicki (which doesn't actually feel AT ALL disappointing or unsatisfying despite its own mess), a lot of the songs themselves are impressive but not quite compelling me to listen and listen on loop. i think usher's massive serious-artiste face all over the album is kind of off-putting, he tries to invest a lot of these songs with a profundity they don't have ("i care for u" and "looking 4 myself" are particular offenders here even though they're both ok songs). even "show me" slides off the brain a bit.

basically i enjoy usher's idea of disposable (the bonus tracks) way more than his idea of artistry

"what happened to u" is so boring, just go away squinting through weeknd smoke, really, fuck the fuck off now

that's a great song! i don't see what it has to do w/ the weeknd at all, aside from that it was produced by 40. but if you think the weeknd sounds like that, you should go back and listen to the weeknd again.

his singing on "what happened to u" is maybe the closest this album gets to 'confessions,' it's great. tagging it as a weeknd song is really not seeing the forest for the threes imo.

but if you think the weeknd sounds like that, you should go back and listen to the weeknd again.

no thanks

yeah sarge otm, even coming from the little prince of inane false binary hype that is just paranoid schizo nonsense

the one thing that really irritates me about that tune - and i know this is probably too inside baseball to qualify as any less rabid - is that first five seconds of the 'one more chance' remix sample just cos it reminds me of 40 saying in his fader interview about how his work is inspired by dj clark kent and 90s r&b/rap collabos which is hands down one of the most offensively deluded statements i have ever read

the sample reveal is itself unnecessary anyway of course, it's just such a smug little gesture

i love "dive"

i think that's where the album 'starts' for me instead of "Climax," up to fucking track 8 i'm pretty listless, practically covering my eyes in horror by the time Pharrell shows up, and then the clouds finally part and it's relatively smooth sailing from then on.

The "groove" on the title track is strong enough for me to ignore that it's underwritten (e.g. the "introspection" isn't well parsed on a song with already four writers).

the title track just makes me think of that goofy-ass video of him covering "Pumped Up Kicks"

Usher's music has never contained any "introspection" that didn't belong in scare quotes, for better or worse he's a showbiz kid

they don't give a fuck about anyone else

can we return to discussing how good "What Happened to U" is

― a regina spektor is haunting europe (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Wednesday, June 13, 2012 5:25 PM (1 week ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

otm

"Numb" is apparently the latest single, thus effectively guaranteeing that "Show Me" prob won't become one. Kind of a shame.

i dunno usher albums have a fuckload of singles

the little prince of inane false binary hype

daaaamn missed this

"show me" is one of my favs but it never really struck me as a potential single

most underrated on this album = "2nd round"

that bed of cut-up vocals is so feathery and then the way it explodes into the chorus

Yeah love "2nd Round". This album is great, fuck the haters.

haha i've actually forgotten what half the songs sound like, the try-hard all-over-the-place stuff killed it as a body of work for me

the bonus trax are the best non-climaxes by some distance

I listened to Confessions way more in 2012 than Looking 4 Myself ¯\(°_o)/¯

Tim was right to mention "Show Me" in his year-end list.

Though it's not really representative, I feel like more than any track "Show Me" is a bellwether for the rest of the album. You're either charmed by it or embarrassed for it

I think Lex is otm about the bonus tracks, too. They were assured in a way most of the album didn't seem to be

"show me" was what made me go back to the album because it was in tim's list and i literally could not remember it. it's an odd one to single out but it's ok enough, i'm neither charmed nor embarrassed. i'm probably not going to listen to it again.