REVIEW: LADY GAGA - MAYHEM

4/5

Beauty Behind The Mayhem

A star is reborn...back the way she used to be. Like 'Abracadabra'. Lady Gaga is back for one of the biggest albums and New Music Fridays of the year...and we've only just marched. Releasing the 'Mayhem' of her new album that takes us back to the good old 'Fame' days of her pop art like Warhol. Going head-to-head, but also in togetherness, with 'Sour Candy' BLACKPINK collaborator JENNIE and her new 'Ruby' album. And, no doubt, there's little between Stefani and K Pop sensation, coming one week after her bandmate LISA. Both albums are just that brilliant. Like these women in music, word to the new Haim material coming soon, back a half decade ago in 2020. That candy, like Pink's 'Ice Cream' with superstar Selena Gomez, came off Gaga's 'Chromatica'. An album that shower the Oscar winning star of Bradley Cooper's 'A Star Is Born' could still make music as good as her movies, like the recent Grammy, going out of this world with a smile, showed.

Going Gaga on 'The Chromatica Ball' world tour, this Lady couldn't be stopped. Even coming here to Tokyo, Japan, coming out of corona. Just like Tom Cruise's massive 'Maverick' megahit sequel to 'Top Gun', spearheaded by Gaga's single from it, 'Hold My Hand'. I'm not ashamed to say, I shed tears when I saw this live in concert...it had been a rough time, and it just sounds so epic. Germanotta was such a sure thing when it came to movies ('House Of Gucci'), she was cast as legendary Batman villain, The Joker's love interest Harley Quinn in Todd Phillips' sequel to the Joaquin Phoenix Oscar win, 'Joker: Folie à Deux'. With big pink stilettos to fill after 'Barbie' blockbuster superstar Margot Robbie made it her own, putting the hammer down. It was a great bit, but critics didn't get the gag. Still, amongst all this mayhem and madness, daddy's little fame monster still didn't stop. Scoring a Grammy with Bruno Mars for their definitive 'Die With A Smile' duet, whilst the pop prince was making 'Apt.' anthems with other members of Blackpink (Rosé).

Then 'LG7' was announced. Lady Gaga's seventh studio album, following the huge successor of its predecessor and the more personal 'Joanne' before that. Crazy when the 'Five Foot Two' singer had just released her own personal songbook for her Joker character in the 'Harlequin' album, that went next to the 'Folie à Deux' soundtrack, which felt like another actual album in itself akin to her 'A Star Is Born' duet big-score with 'Maestro' Bradley. Heading for 40, and still the Queen of 'Artpop' like LeBron James is the King of Basketball. Recorded at Rick Rubin's Shangri-La studios in Malibu, California, and armed with Hollywood hits and music videos (the delightful 'Disease' and amazing 'Abracadabra') in all their classic chorography that breaks a whole new hallowed ground, 'Mayhem' also features the Bruno bonus, when originally this Grammy winning best original song was not going to feature on either artist's album. You best believe both have the hits to leave it on the cutting room, but Mars should make it on his own one too. The inspired inclusion to all this 'Mayhem' here seals Lady Gaga's seventh heaven of an album as an actual classic as the rest of the world catches on.

Yet, even without it, this sensational slice of synth-pop and beautiful genre blend still hits. Like the boundless bloom of the next one in the 'Garden Of Eden' for all you Adam and Eve's in the Big Apple. "I could be your girlfriend for the weekend/You could be my boyfriend for the night/My excuse to make a bad decision/Bodies gettin' close under the lights", she sings to chorus conclude this big-three grand opening. From the black and white, back to the basics cracked reflection of a classic cover, to the epic experimentation of these beautiful blends of album artwork, Gaga goes back to how she always used to do it...pushing the envelope like no one before. Whether it be the 'Perfect Celebrity', or the 'Shadow Of A Man'. Even the lavishing lyric videos to these songs actually feel like music ones. Especially 'Zombieboy' or 'The Beast' for all you beautiful monsters. French DJ Gesaffelstein assists a 'Killah' track like Ghostface on the ones and twos, but it's 'Vanish Into You' where we see and hear Stefani Germanotta at her most beautiful and personal.

Prince. Bowie. Electronic and industrial music. They all help inspire one of pop's best, greatest albums to date. All the way to bonus tracks like 'Can't Stop The High' (Japan etc) and 'Kill For Love' (Target, HMV and them). From a magic, 'Spellbound' sampling opening, Gaga takes the mic again like this was 'The Hunger Games', and we show our allegiance like two kissed fingers high to the sky. Like a 'LoveDrug', how bad do we want her? Well, how about "She's on your mind, like, all the time/But I got a tattoo for us last week/Even good boys bleed." Still, the 'Telephone' singer hold her own and the phone, telling us 'Don't Call Tonight'. The pop icon like Beyoncé returns to her roots and grows even more from these fresh cuts like a 'Blade Of Grass', inspired by a heartfelt moment with her fiancée Michael Polansky. "Lovers kiss in a garden made of thorns/Traces of lonely words, illusions torn/You said, "How does a man like me love a woman like you?/ I said, "Hold me until I die and I'll make you brand new"." Even far from the shallow now, Lady Gaga shows she's still a pure pop songwriter first and foremost. And a force of nature amongst all this mayhem. Dying and smiling, now how's that for some magic made together? TIM DAVID HARVEY.

Playlist Picks: 'Disease', 'Garden Of Eden', 'Die With A Smile (Feat. Bruno Mars)'.

Spin This: Lady Gaga - 'Harlequin'.

REVIEW: JENNIE - RUBY

4/5

love JENNIE

Ruby Rose. One week after LISA gave us her 'Alter Ego', BLACKPINK are back on that solo thing once more with the release of JENNIE's 'Ruby'. Now, after 'Number One Girl' Rosé's 'Rosie' album, we're just waiting on my favourite, Jisoo. 'The Idol' to Lisa's 'White Lotus', Jennie from the Seongnam block (with the best name. Oh hey, sis!) gives us banger after banger, like her Blackpink sister. Keeping the charts ablaze like when the BTS brothers did their solo stuff. Even if Rosé's album, armed with its own 'Apt.' anthem with pure pop hit maker Bruno Mars, hits even harder with its deeper cuts. The alter-ego of 'Ruby' is the best album since 'Rosie' and brings out the big guns, too, for your new number one girl. Recorded in the same 'Seoul City' studio (the inspired Ingrid) and Paradise Sound Recordings in LA as Lisa's set, probably dropping in and supporting each other's sessions, 'Ruby' is as Hollywood as it's massive music videos, or Rose namesake.

Alongside strong singles, like the new empowerment 'Mantra', and the 'like JENNIE' anthem you'll instantly love and recognize as iconic, Jennie has some monster collaborations on the rest of the radio ready, big-budget singles. Flossing in grills over teeth as white as her suit, lent back with the Grammy winning Doechii for an 'ExtraL' song that doesn't take a single one. Riding 'Handlebars' with megastar Dua Lipa and waking up from a 'Love Hangover' with Dominic Fike. Not to mention a hilarious Godzilla drive-in movie video with more bad first dates than Bumble. Just watch her bowl. Jen is bringing the music video back to this post MTV generation more concerned with a TikTok. She knows nostalgia, even referencing the sing along to Mariah Carey's 'Sweet Fantasy' during 'Rush Hour'. Like Jennie? Nah! You're going to love her.

From the anything but plain 'JANE' intro with FKJ, to the Ruby 'Twin' that inspired this stage setting red on black album artwork of finding yourself, Jennie is in a world and concept of her own. Coming into a spaceship at zero gravity with the coolest ruby red astronaut suit that could have been made by Maybelline. Or maybe she was born wi...never mind. I don't want to 'start a war'. For all the big hits that are here, 'with the IE (way up)' (speaking of 'Jenny From The Block') and no 'Filter', it's 'Atlanta's' very own Donald Glover AKA, Childish Gambino playing Mr. Smith to a song featuring Kali Uchis that really hits. Your 'Damn Right' with lines like, "Candy-cane blue sticks bump in the Range (You make me feel so good)/Gettin' top notch means the simpler things/Playin' hopscotch but she landed a square (You make me feel so good)/He never even tried to put her legs in the air (Ooh-ooh)/He never even tried to put a baby in that." This is Jennie's moment, mind you. And on the same New Music Friday that Lady Gaga returns to the 'Mayhem' of her dance floor, Jennie bests even that pop art icon. Let alone her K Pop sister's own landmark album, last week. Feeling like the nostalgia of coming through corona with the 'Sour Candy' of a BLACKPINK collaboration off of Gaga's 'Chromatica' ball. 

A dynamic, dynamite debut, Jennie's 'Ruby' shines like Tuesday for this rolling stone. Or by 'Starlight' with lines like, "You say you see the starlight in me/Shining so bright and pristine/What about the moments in between?/You said you see the starlight in me/What about the black mystery?/What about the moments you don't see?/It's way deeper than what you think" after the neon gleam of 'Seoul City' like a souvenir tee. Achieving a state of midnite hour 'ZEN' with a moment of truth and "On that energy, yes/I am what you think about me/Cross me, please/I'ma keep it Z, Zen/Presence, bless/Money can't buy sixth sense." More mantras making their way through every hook. Line and sinker. 'F.T.S.' ("whatever happened to freedom and honesty") and all the rest. With so many genre alter-ego's like Lisa and Rosé, Jennie shows she is a straight solo artist in her own right. Just like the 'Ruby' name she took when the Korean was growing up in New Zealand. From a Kiwi, to a blood burgundy gemstone of real durability, Jennie is showing us the real her. Before we go back to black, red runs even deeper than pink. TIM DAVID HARVEY.

Playlist Picks: 'like JENNIE', 'Damn Right (Feat. Childish Gambino & Kali Uchis)', 'Seoul City'.

Spin This: Lisa - 'ALTER EGO'.

REVIEW: ALOE BLACC - STAND TOGETHER

4/5

Stronger Together

Back to Blacc, Egbert Nathaniel Dawkins III, AKA, Aloe Bacc, returns to the mainstream after a half decade out of the game (2020's 'All Love Everything' following his 'Christmas Funk' album). The 'I Need A Dollar' (off of his sophomore set 'Good Things') megahit singer has already proven that he is 'The Man' (from his 2013 'Lift Your Spirit') when it comes to harnessing huge hits from his hooks. No one hit wonder. Remember the late, great Avicii's 'Wake Me Up'? But now, he may have just given us his best album since his 'Shine Through' debut. Spearheaded by the soldiering solidarity single 'Don't Go Alone', 'Stand Together' is a call to arms that embrace in the face of all that is going on in the world right now. It's something we all need this New Music Friday, especially after what happened in The White House last week. This American singer and rapper from the boundless beauty of Laguna Hills, California, even tells the President to go to hell on a protest anthem in the face of all this disgrace. The not so United States of America may look like The Statue of Liberty in the Adrien Brody Oscar winning movie 'The Brutalist' right now, but Aloe it telling us, 'Not On My Watch'.

Watch this, and witness a pure and important poet of our generation telling us like it really is, in a time when we all need the word of God, or something just as spiritual. Blacc even covers a beautiful rendition of Marvin Gaye's ultimate protest song 'What's Going On', just like he did reworking The White Stripes' legendary 'Seven Nation Army', all to his own. From the single opening, to the titular close, 'Stand Together' is full of anthems of affirmation, painted like the worked denim carried on his shoulders, like the album artwork. 'Grow Together'. 'Daddy Told Me So'. Not to mention, love in the face of all this hate, like 'Love In Control', or the vision of 'My World'. Like his Emanon act with producer Exile, Aloe knows how to escape through the music, and this genre bender is truly special in its spiritual soul. Each of the dozen tracks come with a cause of philanthropy. With all this unifying sympathy, striving for more, name an album more important right now?

"What does it take to move a mountain/That no one wants to climb?/When they tell you there's no answer/How do you change the heart and mind?" Aloe asks, searching for 'One Good Thing'. Whereas the beat of 'Breakthrough' will inspire you towards your own one, as he adds, "Everyday is another chance for redemption/I paid my debts for the dirty deeds that no one needs to mention/For all the pain l've caused I apologize/With deep regret please forgive but don't forget/l've opened up my eyes/I'm not the same that I was way back/But now I'm getting my life on track/When it feels like everything's breaking down." Admitting his own flaws, that have made their way into the home that is his life, Blacc does not shy away from the shadows and the dark corners of his past. If he can make change like Obama, then surely we all can, like POTUS should.

On an album cover that looks like a clothing commercial, collaborated with the typography of a cosmetics company, Blacc is back in fashion, coming up like roses. Watch him 'Shine' like 'Aurora's Anthem' as the biggest soul star with chart crossover potential since Anthony Hamilton. Blacc's boldest and most beautiful work, marches forward when some of us are still forlorn about what happened in February. Alas, all broken hearts will be healed after this. Aloe Blacc vows to 'Never Let You Down' like Ye, before he went the other way. "Everyone deserves a little happiness/It's hard to find in these modern times/Where our minds are filled with all kinds of stress/But when therе's someone who's by your side/It makеs you feel like you can heal/And everything will be alright/There is somethin' about love/That you need to know/The more and more you choose to give/The more it grows." Wiser words have barely been sung. Now if we can only sing along...together. It's time to make a stand. TIM DAVID HARVEY.

Playlist Picks: 'Don't Go Alone', 'Not On My Watch', 'What's Going On'.

Spin This: Anthony Hamilton - 'Ain't Nobody Worryin''.