Bonafide Magazine @ MSN: Review: Kelis – Food

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Review: Kelis – Food Posted: 15 Apr 2014 12:24 AM PDT   Kelis has been releasing albums for over 15 years now, a fact that seems remarkable when listening to her breakthrough single, Caught Out There. There is still something fresh about the chorus' melody, a swoop of melting keyboard lines that wouldn't be out of place on most contemporary electronica records. It has been a career marked with a number of stand-out songs, often facilitated by production from The Neptunes. Whatever pop success Milkshake may have enjoyed, it remains an inherently strange arrangement with its monster keyboard and chiming beat. This has often been the hallmark of Kelis' best material, a marrying of soulful pop with the punch of the Neptunes' angular instrumentation. With Food, Kelis' fifth album to date, this combination is eschewed in favour of collaborative production and song writing with David Sitek (TV on the Radio) and Todd Simon. It certainly feels different, with lush, far more conventional arrangements that recall some of the later work of TV on the Radio. The brass and percussion combination on Cobbler feels like it could have been lifted straight from Dear Science, albeit with Kelis channelling Curtis Mayfield's delivery throughout the verse. As a singer, she does not display an especially dynamic range, though it has a distinctiveness of tone that sets it apart from many of her peers. Bless the Telephone shows it off in an uncommon light, a measured ballad, set against a male counterpart and guitar. Unfortunate then that the lyrics are saccharine, and that the song feels underdeveloped. For the large part, Food is an unsatisfying affair. It offers little other than off-the-peg soul work-outs, comfortably trundling down the middle of the road. The lyrical themes are tedious explorations of love and faithfulness (or lack thereof). Songs such as Floyd feel so enthralled with convention that it is hard to reconcile it with the same assertive presence that sang Trick Me. Sitek's production is also a galaxy away from the texture he brought to Return to Cookie Mountain or Desperate Youths, Blood Thirsty Babes. Individual songs have trace moments that beg further development, the rolling piano chords and spat defiance of Rumble could have been excellent if it weren't for the lush chorus. Hooch opens like Ol' Dirty Bastard should be slurring through a lewd intro, yet it fails to reach any form of ignition. It feels like a missed opportunity, with both Sitek and Kelis having compromised something that made them such powerful individual forces. There is little of the uncommon or alien, a feature present in their music in the past, and consequently the album is a set of songs that emulate without offering much in the way of novelty. Words: Andrew Spragg