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Robin Thicke - Something Else
| Allmusic |
| Looking like a Europop album from 1997 or 1998, Something Else's sleeve design would be much more indicative if it grafted a bunch of little Robin Thicke heads onto each dancing and playing body in Ernie Barnes' Back to Sugar Shack, the painting used for Marvin Gaye's I Want You. Not only would it be apt, it would play to Thicke's predilection for populating his covers with several images of himself. But it would obviously cause some problems. While a few songs do modernize the sound and feel of Gaye's steamy 1976 classic -- filled as they are with serene sexual energy and lush, impeccably layered arrangements built on rolling bongos, liquid basslines, and Thicke's acutely Gaye-indebted upper register -- there are several inspirations floating throughout, including indications that Thicke has a deeper understanding of Brazilian music, correctly believes that Philadelphia International did not flame out in the mid-'70s, and has transitioned into doing rocking R&B à la Van Hunt (cool, relaxed, natural) rather than pre-New Radicals Gregg Alexander (forced, awkward, unintentionally seriocomic). Following The Evolution of Robin Thicke, which went to the top of the R&B/Hip-Hop Albums chart and reached number five on the Billboard 200 (there was an Oprah appearance), Something Else features improvements in every aspect. From the tropical serenade opener to the album's quietly dazzling true close (the somber Lil Wayne collaboration "Tie My Hands" is really a bonus cut, having already appeared on Tha Carter III), Thicke has shed his affectations to the point where it's much easier to detect the sincerity he once obscured with hubristic tendencies. No longer a show-off, he sounds much more sure of himself; he would not have been able to pull off a socially conscious Southern-styled ballad like "Dreamworld," whether from a writing or singing standpoint, in 2003. Though his sources remain numerous, this is his most focused, least scattered, and least dilettantish set, and it benefits greatly from its brevity relative to The Evolution. That means everything has a deeper resonance -- especially the ballads, of which there are several. The man does know his audience....full text |
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A typical release from Robin Thicke, who broke big last year with his slinky bedroom ballad ''Lost Without U,'' isn’t so much an album as a survey course in Late 20th- Century Smooth. The 31-year-old L.A. native uses himself as a sort of musical medium, conjuring up everyone from ''Sexual Healing''-era Marvin Gaye (falsetto-swathed sweetheart ode ''You're My Baby'') to Curtis Mayfield (the strutting, horn-heavy ''Hard on My Love'') to Stevie Wonder (crooning piano anthem ''The Sweetest Love''), and even KC minus the Sunshine Band (''Something Else,'' a bona fide roller-skate jam). Thicke imbues the album with a bachelor-highlife vibe, all cuff links, cocktail glasses, and a Mad Libs shuffle of soigné seduction phrases. Yet what could come off like a bad lounge act on the lido deck is somehow elevated, both by Something Else's buttery production and by Thicke's own light-footed ease with the material. As a songwriter, producer, and general man-about-the-industry, he has made appearances on recent albums by 50 Cent and Lil Wayne, and penned songs for the likes of Christina Aguilera. On his own time, though, he relies much less on that kind of strident urban currency. It's not so much that Somethingis old-fashioned (both the sound and his videos clearly benefit from the best in current technology) as it is happily inclusive of the past. There may be very little here that is truly innovative, but Thicke proves that new dogs do old tricks pretty well. B+ Download This: Listen to tracks off of Something Else on the musician's MySpace page...full text |
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The most exciting thing about Robin Thicke’s music is its breadth, its clear-eyed vision of what R&B has been and can be. The least exciting thing is his propensity for repeating its mistakes. Thicke is, of course, the genre’s favorite white boy, filling a quota that has been occupied by less worthy and less accomplished artists in generations previous. But, like many of his predecessors, he rarely acts like it. Instead what you get is a strange, refreshing amalgam: Alexander O’Neal-ish openness, Luther Vandross-style swing, Smokey Robinson-esque falsetto, even James Ingram’s hokiness. That he is less technically gifted than any of those artists is of concern. His voice is thin, his production a revision of other eras. On Something Else, the influences are blatant: “Magic” is pure Quincy Jones, “Hard On My Love” stretches out with Gamble and Huff horns, even “Tie My Hands,” originally from Lil Wayne’s Tha Carter III (Cash Money/Universal, 2008), has a touch of Otis Redding dock-of-the-bay sad stroll in it. But on Something Else—a sharper, more concise follow-up to 2006’s breakthrough but spotty, The Evolution of Robin Thicke (Star Trak/Interscope)—songwriter and producer Thicke is using the tones and rhythms of soul music for a bigger idea: dissatisfaction. Evolution was sultry. And that’s here, too, leaning on matters of the heart on the late-period Marvin Gaye retread “Loverman” and plainspoken “The Sweetest Love.” But the album’s mid-period Marvin moves are way more interesting. “Dreamworld” is an unoriginal conceit—If I could live in a dreamworld this is what I want!—but with songwriting that is specific and personal, Thicke sounds like a man with depth. “There would be no black or white/The world would just treat my wife right/We could walk down a Mississippi/No one would look at us twice,” he sings, referencing his wife, the actress Paula Patton, throwing in a dose of John Lennon-style social musing. The title track is ostensibly a disco vamp, but behind the flash is a disaffection that rings true; that folks will be dancing to disillusion isn’t exactly new—Sly Stone comes to mind—but it’s relevant right now. Later, on “Shadow of Doubt,” Thicke sings, “I’ve had enough,” his voice fuller and more wounded than ever before. “I’m in flames/I’m on fire,” he bellows in his deepest register, before letting his falsetto swing through. It’s not an uncommon mode: happy when you’re sad, tears of a clown and all that. This is how to sell trouble. Thicke is a traditionalist, unafraid of sop, but he’s still looking for more. On Something Else, he’s found a few answers....full text |
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