SUNDAY, JUNE 6, 2010 Recordings MUSIC REVIEW Between Gaga and blah blah
Aguilera’s mechanical offering ignores her strength: that voice
by Allison Stewart “Bionic” is Christina Aguil-
era’s first album since the birth of her son and the rise of Lady Gaga, events it seems to regard as equally significant. For Aguil- era, the mere existence of Gaga must be infuri- ating: Gaga the interloper, who has cribbed from Aguilera
for
years, despite the public per- ception that
it’s the other way around; Gaga the space cadet, who appears to have dropped in from Mars but still seems more earthy than the cool, crisp Aguilera, who sings about sex like she was reading from the manual that came with her refrigerator. On “Bionic,” Aguilera tries to do it all: to revel in her new- found domesticity, to wrest her crown from Gaga and to reestab- lish her sex kitten bona fides. It’s a tall order, and “Bionic” — noisy, robotic and overstuffed — goes about filling it in exactly the wrong way. It buries Aguil- era’s copious charms — that voice, those flashes of playful- ness, intelligence and grit — un- der pedestrian electro-pop beats that could belong to anyone, and occasionally do. “Bionic” is larded with guest stars — Le Tigre, M.I.A., Sia — whose combined weight suffo- cates. The more they labor, the less distinctive Aguilera sounds. The first half of “Bionic,” the would-be edgy-electro half, pos- sesses some great moments. There’s the blazing “Not Myself Tonight,” which sounds better when divorced from its infa- mous video. And “Elastic Love,” a nifty bit of neo-futurist ’80s pop co-penned by M.I.A., and
floor fare like “Prima Donna,” which Aguilera sings if she didn’t realize that anonymous, Tricky Stewart-made pop tracks are the reason God invented Cia- ra.
One of the disc’s greatest dis- appointments, at least in its first half, is its virtual abandonment of Aguilera’s voice. Gone is the melismatic trilling imitated by countless amateur national an- them murderers and “American Idol” contestants, replaced by undersinging (undersinging!) and overuse of the already tired robo-voice. The disc’s limpid second half mixes a handful of slow songs (like the obligatory but still goose-bump-raising inspiration- al ballad “Lift Me Up”) with tame, hand-clappy, Gwen Stefa- ni-inspired pop (“I Hate Boys,” “My Girls,” upon which a guest- ing Peaches can inflict little damage). None of these seems to be direct expressions of Aguil- era’s personality, but who knows? Artists should be mov- ing targets, but the real Aguilera remains unnecessarily elusive. She may not know either. The astringent album closer
VINCE BUCCI/FOX/PICTUREGROUP/REUTERS
WHERE’S CHRISTINA? Aguilera’s “Bionic” buries her charms under pedestrian electro-pop beats.
“Glam,” which, though it sug- gests “Vogue” if Gaga did it, is really the only overtly Gaga- esque track. There are also some not-so-
great moments, like the strained Nicki Minaj collaboration “Woo- hoo”; “Sex for Breakfast,” a joy- less to-do list of a song; and plenty of standard ’09 dance-
“Vanity” positions her as a harmless, mirror-kissing vamp. “Every day I see myself / I love me even more,” explains Aguil- era, who is kidding, but not real- ly. Like many tracks on “Bionic,” “Vanity” is an ode to the great- ness of Aguilera cloaked in a paean to female empowerment (We’re all great, seems to be her line of thinking. I’m just a little bit more great). “Who owns the throne?”
Aguilera asks as the song lurch- es to a close. “You do, Mommy,” coos a small child, presumably her son Max. He’s very, very lucky he didn’t say Lady Gaga instead.
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Recommended Tracks “Lift Me Up,” “Elastic Love”
Allison Stewart is a freelance writer. Words and Music inspired by TEMPEST Readings from TheTempest by
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AN EVENING WITH LOVE ON THE RUN
REO SPEEDWAGON WITH SPECIAL GUEST KEATON SIMONS
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JULY
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THE GOAT OR, WHOIS SYLVIA?
Directed by Kasi Campbell NOW– JUNE 27
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ANDTHE MINISTERS OF MUSIC
Teresa Ferrarra, Soprano AliaWaheed, Soprano
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at The Music Center at Strathmore Tickets from $25
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