Title - ‘A.K.A.' (Capitol/EMI)
Artist - Jennifer Lopez
Moving to Capitol/EMI after a one-off record at Island/Universal, Jennifer Lopez seizes the opportunity of a new label to jump-start her career with A.K.A. It isn't quite a complete reboot, however. Its executive producer is RedOne, who worked on 2011's Love?, but this record attempts to push J-Lo further into modern dance, by having her duet with T.I., Pitbull, and Rick Ross; not to mention Iggy Azalea, who is currently the hottest rapper in the U.S. today!
We begin with the stop-start, buzz edge title track, ‘A.K.A.’ featuring T.I. A track that features the “You don’t know me now” spoken vibe throughout, it’s a dance floor fist pumper, for sure. The back-to-basics JLo track ‘First Love’ is next, with ‘Never Satisfied’ and (the highly repetitive) ‘I Luh Ya Papi’ (featuring French Montana) both continuing to represent the album’s versitle musical landscape.
Along next are both ‘Acting Like That’ (featuring Iggy Azalea) and ‘Emotions,’ which as much as they are solid songs they are neither anything special. Up next on this album that JLo herself has overly stated she wanted to get back to her roots on, is ‘So Good’ which builds slowly to a pleasant old school JLo sound, before the orchestral, soaring ballad ‘Let It Be Me.’ ‘Worry No More’ featuring Rick Ross is more about the latter than the former, and is followed by (the possibly confessional) ‘Booty’ (“Big big booty, ‘cause you’ve got a big booty; Throw up your hands if you like a big booty”) featuring the usual collaboration suspect, Pitbull.
Featured guest Jack Mizrahi opens up ‘Tens,’ a song about runway supermodels and the walks they have to perfect to become, well, ten out of ten perfect! The deluxe version of this new album continues onwards with ‘Troubeaux’ featuring Nas, a song that has some serious hip-hop beats contained within it the album is brought to a close with both ‘Expertease (Ready Set Go)’ and then finally ‘Same Girl’ (once again featuring French Montana.
Reviewed by: Russell A. Trunk
www.JenniferLopez.com