snap reviews

Album: Life on a Rock Artist: Kenny Chesney (Blue Chair/Columbia Nashville)

Kenny Chesney opens his new album Life On A Rock with the hit Pirate Flag, a rowdy beachbum anthem reminiscent of his many fun-in-the-sun party songs of the last dozen years. While most of the rest of Life on a Rock references island life instead of rocking out, the songs are about unplugging from the chaos of the daily grind and reflecting on quieter pleasures. Writing four songs by himself and cowriting four more, this is the East Tennessee singer’s most personal album since 2005’s Be As You Are (Songs From A Blue Chair). There are light moments, as in the duet with Willie Nelson on Coconut Tree, but the focus is on offbeat, reallife characters (Lindy) and on taking a moment to count one’s blessings (the title song). It’s a bold move, considering that a new crop of country rockers are selling millions of albums modelled on Chesney’s pounding arena-rock sound. But to his credit, Chesney follows his muse and offers up an album that exposes his weathered soul. The result is as appealing as it is surprising. Michael McCall, Associated Press

Album: To Be Loved Artist: Michael Bublé (Reprise)

You don’t listen to a Michael Bublé album expecting anything groundbreaking. You want Bublé to do two things: Nail the covers of songs you already know and love (which he routinely does, with a disarming smile to boot), and give you a couple of radio-friendly singles. Guest appearances? Let’s have a few of those while we’re at it. To Be Loved does all these things well enough to become one of the three CDs middleaged listeners who still buy CDs will purchase this year. Brassy, roomy, big-band re-ups of You Make Me Feel So Young, the Bee Gees’ To Love Somebody, Dean Martin’s Nevertheless (I’m In Love With You) and the Elvis classic Have I Told You Lately sound warm, retro and authentic. All the while, radiooriented singles like happygo-lucky breakup tune It’s a Beautiful Day and the Bryan Adams duet/duel After All are mixed with easy-rock stations and car radios in mind. The tracks Bublé co-penned tend to stick out like a sore thumb (It’s a Beautiful Day, After All and Close Your Eyes), yet producer and longtime collaborator Bob Rock, who worked with Bublé in Los Angeles and Vancouver on this, finds a happy middle ground that should leave everyone satisfied. There are a few letdowns: A duet with Reese Witherspoon (Frank and Nancy Sinatra’s Something Stupid) feels a little bit too much like a novelty, and the deep-throated, strangesounding I Got It Easy (do we sense a whiff of Auto-Tune?) somehow feels strained and forced. Still, To Be Loved is exactly what it should be: A middle-of-the-road jazz-pop crooner record that sparkles in your ears like a million little fizzy sugar-pop bubbles and is just cookie-cutter enough to please the masses. Francois Marchand, Vancouver Sun Kenny Chesney exposes his weathered soul on his new album Life on a Rock, his most personal since Be As You Are in 2005. Album: The Terror Artist: The Flaming Lips (Warner) Oklahoma psych-rockers The Flaming Lips’ 13th studio album is not for the faint of heart. If the Lips made their name in the first decade of the millennium as the purveyors of neo-New Age rock wisdom, over the past three years they have re-emerged as a cross-pollination of their acid-soaked early days and the futuristic rock of their masterful trilogy (The Soft Bulletin, Yoshimi Battles The Pink Robots, At War With The Mystics). The Terror makes for a jarring first listen. The Lips go for wobbly textures and stream-of-consciousness noisemaking, from opener Look ... The Sun Rises, turning into the Stereolab-esque Be Free, A Way. Four songs in is usually where an album hits its stride, but instead Wayne Coyne and friends go for a 13-minute psychedelic trip that could have belonged on the second platter of Pink Floyd’s Ummagumma. Francois Marchand, Vancouver Sun

Album: Reincarnated Artist: Snoop Dogg (Vice)

So Snoop Dogg gave up gangsta rap, spent a month in Jamaica and made a reggae album, even claiming he carries the spirit of Bob Marley. While the premise is absurd, the album isn’t half-bad. A good deal of credit goes to producer Diplo a.k.a. Major Lazer, who crafts a varied bed of reggae riddims for Snoop to sound off on – dub, dancehall and electro-hip hoptinged grooves under feel-good hooks. The single Here Comes the King has steady bass and a breezy chorus; Lighters up and No Guns Allowed bring messages of peace (the latter with a guest rap from Drake); while the rootsy Smoke the Weed requires no explanation. Nothing is reinvented, here, but Snoop doesn’t embarrass himself. T’Cha Dunlevy, Montreal Gazette

Album: #willpower Artist: will.i.am (Interscope/Universal)

Leaving Black Eyed Peas and what’s left of his self-respect behind, the rapper-producer aims somewhere between top of the pops and an Ibiza mega-rave dance floor with his fourth studio album and latest solo release. Beats are streamlined clubby, lyrics mind-numbingly dumb and melodies singalong simple. Britney Spears is used in moderation for electro thumper Scream and Shout; despite being a gauche choice, Chris Brown brings melodic depth to Let’s Go; will’s new homeboy Justin Bieber helps rip off Daft Punk on anthem #thatPOWER; Miley Cyrus appears on acoustic dance-pop ditty Fall Down; and Nicole Sherzinger adds radio-friendliness to Far Away From Home. It’s at once ridiculous and ruthlessly effective. Will.i.am is a master of mass appeal; you wish he would put those hit-making powers to better use, but you’re not sure he can, or would if he could. T’Cha Dunlevy, Montreal Gazette