Black Eyed Peas - TRANSLATION (Review)
So, the Black Eyed Peas are back... yay...
19th June 2020
Epic
My Rating:
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0.8
/10
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REVIEW
What do we have here? A washed up 2000's party artist making a comeback in 2020, a year in which parties are near impossible? Well, I can't lie, I was definitely intrigued going into it, after all, this is without a shadow of a doubt one of the worst artists of the 21st century, and it shouldn't be of any surprise to anyone when I say that this album is absolutely atrocious. I mean you can see the score.
In spite of all appearances, this is not technically a comeback album. No, that title goes to their 2018 release Masters of the Sun Vol. 1, an album that flew under most people's radars for the simple fact that it was an absolutely lacklustre attempt at returning to the group's more hip-hop centric roots. It is a release that's best forgotten, but also one that stands out probably among the group's strongest releases; despite failing to leave a mark commercially, the album was a boring and dull affair without the frustrations usually inescapable when the name Black Eyed Peas is mentioned, and the fact that is the biggest compliment I'll be giving the group just goes to show the low expectations I have for them. Nonetheless, I went into this new album of theirs with as open of a mind as I could muster, and what was I greeted with?
"The Rhythm of the Night".
What is it? Are you confused? What does it mean? Well, let me explain. The Black Eyed Peas' big comeback party album begins with lead single "RITMO", a song featured in the film Bad Boys For Life but, more importantly, a song that heavily samples the 1993 debut single from Italian Eurodance group Corona, the huge hit that was "The Rhythm of the Night". Now, regardless of your opinions on that song, will.i.am's use of it within "RITMO" is one of the most basic and uninspired samples, an impressive feat given his history with atrocious sampling. What comprises the rest of the song? Well, a typically overblown and repetitive bassline and a reggaetón beat because, as I forgot to mention, this new album of theirs is a reggaetón album. Yikes.
Perhaps the most notable element of this album comes in the form of the vapid performances of the core group, as well as the countless features that fly by like trains through a station, not stopping to leave any kind of impression other than a bad taste in your mouth and the unshakable feeling of wanting to leave the station as quickly as humanly possible. I could easily end the review here, that description alone perfectly summing up how I feel about the record, but it isn't often I detest something this much and I want to capitalise on that with a full review, so here goes.
Every single performance on this album comes across as lazy, unengaged and flat, to the point where the notoriously melodramatic Shakira sounds as if she'd rather be taking an afternoon nap than working with the Black Eyed Peas on the track "GIRL LIKE ME". Worse, on the same track the rapper Taboo (one of the Peas themselves) includes the line "hips don't lie" during his verse. That would be like if Abba were featured on a Drake song in which he mentioned the girl he was singing about was a "dancing queen", something that now I've typed it sounds unsettlingly plausible and perhaps less ridiculous than I first thought. Still, the song remains a perfect example of how tasteless this album is, and just a song later things are kicked into overdrive with an awkward sample of "U Can't Touch This" in which will.i.am changes that song's titular phrase to "it's my life b**ch", a decision that left me in fits of giggles the first time I heard it, a truly embarrassing moment on an already ignominious album.
As entertaining as it may or may not be for me to criticise each and every one of these awful songs, I'd rather just skip to the album's final three songs where the already low quality takes an almost inconceivable nosedive with the pain-inducingly obnoxious "GET LOOSE NOW", a song that seems to be comprised entirely of will.i.am improvising the same three catchphrases over and over again, on top of one of the ugliest beats of his career, a solo moment to show of his talents(?!) that manages to sound both like it was made by a toddler putting together loops in Garage Band and a middle aged man on a lot of cocaine messing about in a studio - honestly you've got to help me out here, because I still haven't figured out which one describes will.i.am best.
Skipping the completely forgettable "ACTION" and moving onto the album's closing track "NEWS TODAY" we arrive at arguably the most humiliating song in the group's career. I would describe this song as the Black Eyed Peas' attempt at remaking John Lennon's "Imagine", only for whatever reason they thought it would be a good idea to make an anthem for the people all about Covid-19 and the state of the world. See the problem with that is the absence of any kind of politics in their music before this point and their single minded focus on partying, although perhaps it's due to that last point that they felt a song like this was important, considering the song's absolute confusion at what's going on. I can only imagine that the Black Eyed Peas emerged from total isolation in the studio and into the world of Covid for the first time before writing this song, as the cluelessness that perpetrates this track is astounding.
One of the lines that stood out the most from this track was "There's a nightmare going down from the Bronx to Queens/and everywhere inbetween", something that is not clearly filler but also just plain stupid, considering the Bronx and Queens are right next to each other in New York. The rest of the song is overflowing with more poor lyrics such as this, but at the end of the day just knowing the Black Eyed Peas made an acoustic ballad is enough information to steer clear of this song. In fact, it reminds me of what Pete Davidson said about Kanye being a music genius, but not someone you ever want to hear talk about politics. The same is true of the Black Eyed Peas, except for the part where will.i.am is clearly no musical genius, so honestly I'd just rather not hear him at all.
TRACK RATINGS (/10)
1. RITMO - 1
2. FEEL THE BEAT - 1
3. MAMACITA - 2
4. GIRL LIKE ME - 1
5. VIDA LOCA - 0
6. NO MAÑANA - 1
7. TONTA LOVE - 3
8. CELEBRATE - 2
9. TODO BUENO - 2
10. DURO HARD - 1
11. MABUTI - 1
12. I WOKE UP - 1
13. GET LOOSE NOW - 0
14. ACTION - 0
15. NEWS TODAY - 0
BREAKDOWN
Ambition: 1
Atmosphere: 1
Catchiness/Enjoyability: 1
Content/Ideas: 1
Emotion/Engaging: 0
Execution: 1
Production: 2
Structure: 1
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Lyrics: 0
Vocals/Flows: 0
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Total: 8
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