A Beautiful World

Amazon.com
Comparisons generally stink, but sometimes they're so obvious that they're inevitable. So it is with L.A. native and blue-eyed soul man Robin Thicke. Equal parts Remy Shand and Jamiroquai--though funkier than the former and less knuckleheaded than the latter--Thick's Cherry Blue Skies staggers through the speakers with moxie to spare. Opening track "Oh Shooter"--which finds Thicke drawling lazily while tires screech in the background--is a bait-and-switch for what's to come. By "Sugar Mama," Thicke is outfitted in the proverbial white suit and fedora, slinking around the edges of the groove and wailing in a falsetto like some funk-soul cat from the '70s. Levity plays an essential role in the formula, too; "Make a Baby" is as silly a love song as its title suggests, and "When I Get You Alone" steals wholesale from Walter Murphy's disco-era novelty hit, "A Fifth of Beethoven." But the dance floor is only one destination in Thicke's view. Earnest ballads also appear (notably, the sweetly sentimental, minor-chord lament "The Stupid Things"), and one is again inclined toward another comparison, this time to Stevie Wonder. Funky, jazzy soul-pop, with a touch of salsa in "Vengas Con Migo"; that's as accomplished as it is welcoming. --Kim Hughes

A Beautiful World,Thicke,Interscope Records,Adult Alternative Pop/Rock,Contemporary R&B,Pop,Popular Music,Rock,Rock/Pop,Singer/Songwriter

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