I’m just truly confused what happened to NE-YO. He was the go-to man for smooth RNB meets pop songs that saw tracks like ‘So Sick’, ‘Miss Independent’ and ‘Sexy Love’ top the charts worldwide. He then for some reason decided to add electronic music to his sound and lost his spark. It worked once for him with the undeniably catchy anthem ‘Let Me Love You’ but other than that his recent material has been an absolute mess. And sadly his seventh studio album is no different. ‘Good Man’ is a collection of mediocre at best RNB meets electronic pop tracks that sees him frantically searching for a hit. It’s a bit desperate, embarrassing and I really think he needs to properly go away and re-find himself as an artist because at the moment he’s just sounding confused. When he performs live he’s this sauuve and sophisticated artist that impresses the crowd with his smooth vocal runs and dancing but as soon as he steps foot in the studio he seems to lose that. Tracks like ‘1 More Shot’, ‘Ocean Sure’ and ‘Push Back’ are just frantic RNB meets dance songs that are honestly confusing. While he tries to attempt to explore hip hop on the skippable ‘LA Nights’, ‘Breathe’, ‘Hotbox’ and ‘Good Man’. And don’t even get me started on the embarrassing latin inspired ‘Nights Like These’ because I won’t stop cringing.
The strongest moments on this record is when he strips it back completely and returns to his roots on ‘U Deserve’ and ‘Summertime’ but sadly those moments are rare as the rest of the RNB moments are forgettable. He does end up perfecting the groovy pulsating synth production on the bonus tracks ‘Pour Me Up’ and ‘Reset The Night’ but you have to get to the end of the album to hear those and something tells me most people wont even get past track 5. The album is saturated with way too much overproduction and is over compensated with 20 songs which really could have been refined. He has the potential and the talent to continue to impress but his execution just seems to be completely off. it’s a shame really.
You can purchase a copy of Ne-Yo’s new album from Sanity here; https://www.sanity.com.au/products/2375061/Good_Man