[Leaving Las Vegas ]
Celine Dion
Taking Chances
** 1/2
If there’s one person who should definitely not be taking chances, it’s Celine Dion. The adult-contemporary juggernaut has achieved her massive success thanks to the bludgeoning force of titanic (and Titanic) ballads like “My Heart Will Go On,” “Because You Loved Me” and “It’s All Coming Back to Me Now.” Her music is inherently safe and conservative, appealing to as wide and international an audience as possible. So an album on which she recruits hot producers and songwriters of the moment (Linda Perry, Ben Moody, Kara DioGuardi) and tries to ape pop stars half her age sounds like a horrible idea.
Luckily, Taking Chances is, for the most part, not that album. No, there are no Diane Warren compositions, but there are still plenty of big, stupid ballads, even if Dion makes an effort to rein in her trademark wail a bit. Her attempts at guitar-driven pop-rock à la Kelly Clarkson (“Surprise Surprise,” “Fade Away,” the surprisingly credible title track) are mostly painless, and although she asserts that she’s “a chameleon” on “Surprise Surprise,” she never sounds like anything other than Celine Dion.
Which is a problem on the songs that drift further from her familiar sound: the almost-goth of “This Time” almost works, but she pretty much butchers the soulful Perry tune “New Dawn” and the gritty blues-rock (!) of “That’s Just the Woman in Me,” can’t pull off the smoky lounge vibe of “Right Next to the Right One,” overwhelms the airy Ne-Yo-penned “I Got Nothin’ Left” and turns the retro hair metal (!!) of “Can’t Fight the Feelin’” into the worst song Lita Ford never recorded.
The bloated 16-track album’s highlight actually comes in the second song, a cover of Heart’s “Alone.” It’s cheesy, it’s catchy, it’s overproduced, it’s unabashedly in-your-face: It’s pure Celine Dion.
–Josh Bell
[Robot rock]
Daft Punk
Alive 2007
***1/2
It’s a shame EMI opted to list the 27 cuts that constitute Alive 2007 on its back cover, since playing spot-the-song has been one of the coolest aspects about bootlegs from Daft Punk’s wildly successful, nearly completed pyramid tour. In and of itself, that freshness of sound speaks to the quality of material on the French electronic duo’s new concert CD (a complete Paris show from June), which resembles typical “live” albums in name only.
Those familiar with Daft Punk’s three studio LPs will recognize most of Alive 2007’s main ingredients, but the confections forged from those old parts feel more like newly composed pieces than jammed-out renditions or brushed-up DJ remixes. The seamless melding of well-known singles “Around the World” and “Harder Better Faster Stronger,” for example, pays off more dynamically than either original, and that’s saying a lot. Likewise, “Television Rules the Nation” and “Crescendolls” improve tremendously through marriage—and a brief injection from “Around the World”—while “One More Time” and “Aerodynamic” come together in a way barely hinted at by their placement in succession on 2001’s Discovery.
That said, it’s hard to hear Alive 2007 without yearning for the accompanying visuals—the pulsating pyramid, light show and video screens—that made the live experience so over-the-top momentous. In other words, where’s the companion DVD, robot dudes? Not forthcoming, apparently, which means listeners will have to imagine their own, synching text lines for “Touch It” and creeping fluorescences throughout “Too Long” to get the full, mind-melding experience.
–Spencer Patterson
[Metallic]
Dillinger Escape Plan
Ire Works
***
The title of “When Acting as a Particle,” one of the more experimental tracks on the drama-plagued, techcore madmen’s latest, pretty much explains it all: seemingly chaotic and unpredictable yet fully controlled movement, often kinetic, highly reactive. Lose part of the nucleus (in this case, founding songwriter/drummer Chris Pennie, guitarist Brian Benoit), alter your elemental makeup with gained replacements (Gil Sharone, Jeff Tuttle). Is it an accident that this cut in particular lacks vocals? Doubtful; every metallic clang, synthy squiggle and progged-out about-face on the album is painstakingly premeditated. Thus the symphony of noise emanated from “Particle” and seamless predecessor “Sick on Sunday” (skittery insect mimicry, strings, chimes and percussion waves) speaks volumes without words.
While the minimal, futuristic, characterless blocks constituting the liner notes remain a mystery, “Party Smasher” and “Horse Hunter” continue the signature hardcore vocal assault introduced on Calculating Infinity and marginally dissected on Miss Machine. “Black Bubblegum” is a falsetto-spiked, loud-quiet-loud radio rocker, “Dead as History” is nearly a Black Sabbath B-side, and “Milk Lizard” is a final nail in screamo’s coffin, but throughout, much of the abstract subject matter deals with shattered dreams and the price of fame. Darned if there isn’t a resounding message in all that fury.
–Julie Seabaugh
[Tribute]
Rufus Wainwright
Rufus Does Judy at Carnegie Hall
** 1/2
Rufus Wainwright’s last few solo records have grown increasingly opulent. 2003’s Want One (and its 2004 companion, Want Two) featured soaring orchestras, Broadway pizzazz and operatic flourishes; this year’s Release the Stars, while more sedate, was just as flush with horns and strings.
The problem was that Wainwright’s songwriting often felt propped up by this grandiose instrumentation, whereas on his self-titled debut and 2001’s Poses, the music succeeded solely on the strength of his velvet voice and sparse accompaniment. Nevertheless, a taste for extravagance fits Wainwright’s latest indulgence: Rufus Does Judy at Carnegie Hall, a two-album live recording of his 2006 track-for-track homage to Judy Garland’s 1961 Grammy-winning release.
Backed by a 36-piece orchestra, and featuring cameos from sister Martha Wainwright and Garland’s daughter, Lorna Luft, Hall features brisk big-band numbers, torchy jazz and classic show tunes. A peppy “Zing! Went the Strings of My Heart” smokes, while Wainwright shows off a delicate falsetto croon on “Do It Again.” Garland’s signature tune, “Over the Rainbow,” shines as a lovely collaboration between Wainwright and his mother, Kate McGarrigle.
Wainwright feels born to tackle Hall, his agile voice and flair for theatricality perfectly suited to the varied material. Still, anyone who’s not a fan of Broadway (or show tunes) will likely find this a difficult listen; heck, even Wainwright obsessives might find it challenging. While a beautiful and well-orchestrated tribute, it’s much more a Judy Garland covers album than a Rufus Wainwright release. –Annie Zaleski
[R&B]
Chris Brown
Exclusive
*** 1/2
Chris Brown is one of the biggest crossover artists of the moment, appealing easily to R&B, pop and hip-hop fans. The NKOTB/B2K demographic cottoned to his eponymous 2005 debut, but on Exclusive he stakes out a claim to an older fan base, and largely succeeds.
It’s easy to see 20- and 30-something hipsters digging “Kiss Kiss” and “Hold Up” in the same way they appreciate Justin Timberlake. The beats are spotty in parts, such as on “Picture Perfect,” co-produced by Will.i.am and Brown himself. (It doesn’t help that Will drops one of his predictably depraved verses.) On “Nice,” Scott Storch tries to reignite the hard-driving fervor of his song on Brown’s debut, “Run It!,” which featured Juelz Santana. Here, he enlists The Game for the task, but “Nice” fails because Game’s gangster cadence seems out of place.
Nonetheless, Exclusive succeeds in many other ways. “Wall to Wall” is a slightly outdated, if still charming, “Yeah!” sound-alike, while “With You” is perhaps the most charming pop ballad of the year. It’s not often a song makes you wish you were in high school again, but that deliciously corny chorus—“There’s hearts all over the world tonight”—invokes warm post-homecoming memories of snuggling in a blanket alongside an awkward co-ed.
–Ben Westhoff