Season eight of American Idol, and the newly announced Queen frontman Adam Lambert has released his sophomore album, Trespassing. Lambert has lets his versatile voice paint this album with a multitude of colours from funk, house, rock balladry of 80’s hair rock proportions and just plain camp fun.
Contributors include Katy Perry collaborators, Dr Luke and Bonnie Mckee, BC Mcgee who has written for Beyonce, rock producer Josh Abraham who has worked with Courtney Love and Velvet Underground, and Ammar Malik who penned ‘Moves like Jagger’, so it’s fair to say this is not all Lambert’s vision.
The first three songs ‘Trespassing’ (Produced by Pharrell Williams), ‘Cuckoo’ (featuring the legendary Nile Rodgers) and ‘Shady’ with their Pharrell William’s style beats run into each other before the emotional opening of track four, ‘Never close our eyes’ (written by Bruno Mars), turns into a stomping Euro pop anthem. In the same vain as the title track ‘Kickin in’ has a strong Michael Jackson vibe while ‘Pop that lock’ takes a more electronic turn à la Gaga, with a nice touch of sass that Lambert seems a so proficient in producing.
‘Better than I know myself’ is the obvious sequel to ‘Whatya want from me’, and is a track that could fit neatly on his debut album, ‘For Your Entertainment’. ‘Broken English’ is a cooking pot of styles; his voices makes the ballad a rock/pop anthem but the beat gives it an Usher-like smoothness that is a new addition to the genre-bender album.
If the fans of his Idol journey, in which he came second to Kris Allen, miss hearing his faultless falsetto ‘Underneath’ and ‘Outlaws of love’ clearly demonstrates he doesn’t need autotune. He can take it from soft to mellow quicker than any contemporary artist I can think of.
If anyone is doubting he has the prowess to join Queen on tour, they should listen to this. ‘Chokehold’ starts of like a Linkin Park song before hitting guitar and then that dance beat comes in, disorientating listeners slightly.
With anyone else’s voice this could have ended up a confusing mutant of genres but somehow it works; taking you from a gay disco to a sober dinner party quicker than you can say ‘genuine talent’.