Arriving a discreet amount of time after
American Idol
winner
Kelly Clarkson
's chart-topping debut,
Thankful
, and just before the release of their movie,
From Justin to Kelly
,
Justin Guarini
's self-titled album is, at the very least, positioned for almost certain success on a massive scale. Fortunately, though,
has more than just marketing and calculation going for it -- much like
, the album is much better than might be expected, providing a smooth transition from his
AmIdol
roots into more adventurous musical territory. Of course, "adventurous" is a relative term when it comes to crafting an album that must appeal to as many different types of people as possible. At times, it just means putting a crunchy, slightly
urban
beat behind his signature
songs like
"Unchained Melody"
and
"Get Here"
to give them a bit of an "edge" without straying too far from mainstream
pop
territory. But considering that
RCA
could probably sell millions of copies of an album that featured nothing but songs like these, the musical risks that
Guarini
does take are welcome and work surprisingly well. Most of the album takes its cue from
teen pop
; indeed, songs like
"Be a Heartbreaker,"
"I Saw Your Face,"
"Thinking of You"
mix those styles so seamlessly that they suggest what
Justin Timberlake
's
Justified
might've sounded like if he'd had a less forward-thinking production team than
the Neptunes
at the helm. Likewise,
's most progressive-sounding tracks, such as
"Sorry,"
recall the futuristic spin on
Michael Jackson
Off the Wall
that the other
Justin
's album offered. Though it nods to
Latin pop
with
"One Heart Too Many,"
the majority of the album sticks to an
/
/mainstream
fusion that plays to
's strengths as a performer and a persona, which is a savvy decision by the people behind
. Along with its similarities to the variety shows of the '60s and '70s, the series' star-making process recalls old Hollywood's star system, where teams of experts would mold promising newcomers into archetypal performers, refining everything from their looks to the way they walked and talked.
's team cast
as the girl next door who occasionally takes a walk on the wild side, and
has been cast as a relatively chaste sex symbol. Granted, this role has been around since
music's infancy, but on
the singer occasionally seems overly confined by it, particularly on the limp
ballad
"Condition of My Heart"
and the album's low point, the cloyingly up-tempo
"Inner Child."
It's a little strange that
's sex appeal is curtailed as much as it is, since he was generally considered the sexiest (or at least, most conventionally sexy) of the finalists, and also since
made a point of emphasizing
Clarkson
's sexiness in a classy way. When
does get to let loose, it makes for some of the album's best moments, such as
"Doin' Things (We're Not Supposed to Do),"
a sultry song that sounds both appropriate for a
star in his early twenties to sing and for his preteen fans to hear;
"If You Wanna"
is a tougher, more
-flavored song that is all the more promising because
co-wrote it. In the end, this album isn't as surprising or diverse a debut as
was, but its solid quality proves that the forces behind
want their winners to make good
albums, as opposed to one mega-hit single backed by 11 throwaway tracks.
might be calculated, but it's not cynical. ~ Heather Phares