P.O.D.
Testify (2 stars)
The band for people who find Linkin Park too edgy, P.O.D. returns with its fourth album, Testify, full of the bland, overproduced rap-metal with which they've made their name. Teaming with producer Glen Ballard, the band delivers 13 tracks of varying intensity, some of which have a blunt, simple-minded appeal. "Lights Out" is a catchy, energetic anthem that should find a home on the radio.
But even the better songs are derivative and rarely memorable, with P.O.D.'s relentlessly positive, faux-tough, pro-Christian message already overplayed in their past hits. Guests, including Hasidic Jewish dancehall rapper Matisyahu and members of Boo-Yaa T.R.I.B.E., bring some diversity to the sound, but they also tend to overwhelm P.O.D. frontman Sonny Sandoval, making the band sound like guests on their own songs. The Boo-Yaa track, "On the Grind," is easily the album's worst, a turgid recitation of gang-life clichés.
Most of all, P.O.D. sounds like its time has passed. No one's clamoring for warmed-over braggadocio delivered over unoriginal riffs anymore. Linkin Park may have signed a massive new deal, but they're clearly the exception, and all P.O.D. can look forward to is picking up the scraps.
Josh Bell
Cat Power
The Greatest (4 stars)
Cat Power's 2003 disc, You Are Free, not only earned my pick as that year's top release, but, some six years in, remains an easy choice as my favorite album of the decade. So it's with that formidable backdrop of anticipation that follow-up The Greatest arrives, hardly an ideal recipe for a glowing evaluation.
Chan Marshall proves equal to the task, however, constructing a project that—while no match for the otherworldliness of its predecessor—proves a worthy addition to a Cat Power catalog clawing into its second decade.
This time, Marshall is supplemented by a crack team of veteran Memphis musicians, including one-time Al Green guitarist Mabon "Teenie" Hodges. The result is a laid-back, back-porch affair, one that glides between a soulful Stax vibe ("Living Proof," "Could We"), a twangy Southern style ("Empty Shell," "Islands") and Marshall's own wistful delicacy.
As with all Cat Power undertakings, though, it's Marshall's shadowy, smoky voice that elevates The Greatest above most female singer-songwriter fare. "There's nothing like living in a bottle / Nothing like ending it all for the world," she purrs midway through "Lived in Bars," rendering even the most hardened listener prone before her charms.
The Greatest suffers slightly from a quiet sameness over its first 11 tracks, with Marshall's rock instincts muted until the apocalyptic closer, "Love & Communication." A few more songs in that vein and she might have challenged herself atop my 2000s pantheon.
Goapele
Change It All (4 stars)
Oakland-born Goapele (pronounced Gwa-pa-lay) makes music for the grown and sexy, but also for the love-struck and romantic, the community-minded and politically astute, the socially active and spiritually attuned. The problem with being so versatile is that you defy easy categorization—is she hip-hop or neo-soul? A musical hippie or a revolutionary?
Inhabiting these multiple spaces has been less a personal conundrum than a professional one: Goapele remains virtually anonymous, despite rave reviews.
Change It All could change it all. Or not. Sony's backing doesn't guarantee more radio spins or sales, but it should help people to see her for what she is: the evolution of the neo-soul-R&B singer, a blend of Jill Scott, Indie.Arie and Erykah Badu.
The choicest cuts: "You," a surreal love song with Dwele; the spiritually edifying "Change It All"; and "Battle of the Heart," whose overcast beats and haunting lyrics signal inner turmoil.