Ghostface Killah, “The Big Doe Rehab”Even while the Wu-Tang Clan was most active, Ghostface Killah was quietly establishing himself as one of the wickedest, least predictable MCs of this era. This is his third album in 18 months. But if there’s a bottom to Ghost’s lyrical well, he’s nowhere near it on “The Big Doe Rehab,” which is jammed full of dense, smoggy New York chaos. For street-gutter crime stories, it’s hard to beat “Walk Around,” whose blaxploitation horns belie the surprisingly compelling narrative within. For the club, there’s “Supa GFK” and “We Celebrate,” a hot-tempered party jam based on a left-field Rare Earth sample. And for the fan of fictional party rhymes, there’s “White Linen Affair (Toney Awards),” where Ghost lines up the current roster of hip-hop royalty and takes his place strong in the middle of it.
Thursday, “Kill the House Lights”This collection of Thursday material well-serves its likely purposes of keeping the band top of mind in the fourth quarter while giving screamo fans a new favorite thing for Christmas. Three new songs and nine previously unreleased ones, plus a documentary/concert DVD, make “Kill the House Lights” worth exploring. Instead of throwing in anything the vault offered, the CD is a cohesive play that flitters through a variety of beats, timings and moods. Among the best angst flailings are “Ladies and Gentlemen: My Brother, the Failure,” “Signals Over the Air,” “Panic on the Streets of Health Care City” and “Paris in Flames.” Topping this one-off for former label home Victory is a 12-song sampler of Victory acts in the same vein as Thursday (Aiden, Driver Side Impact) that takes care to catch them at their best angles.
Bow Wow and Omarion, “Face Off”Full-length pairups between R&B and rap/ hip-hop artists are nothing new. (See R. Kelly and Jay-Z’s “Unfinished Business.”) On this outing, teen heartthrobs and tour mates Bow Wow and Omarion team for an album that builds on their 2005 hit merger “Let Me Hold You.” The result doesn’t disappoint. One of the strongest tracks is the engaging groove of lead single “Girlfriend,” on which the two artists rhythmically and lyrically draw portraits of their romantic ideals. Omarion’s tender tenor perfectly complements Bow Wow’s energetic rap as they trade off on the equally catchy “He Ain’t Gotta Know” and “Can’t Get Tired of Me.” A couple of tracks sound derivative, but for the most part fans of the duo will embrace this album as well as the twosome’s maturing sound.
Various artists, “Sweeney Todd, Original Motion Picture Soundtrack”At first slice, the musical tale of a murderous barber doesn’t seem like appropriate Hollywood fodder. But if you think of it as Tim Burton’s answer to the stage-to-film adaptation craze that gave us John Travolta in drag, it makes some kind of sense. Helena Bonham Carter as the meat-pie-making Mrs. Lovett sings more like Little Bo Peep than the cockney wench Angela Lansbury originated in 1979. But Alan Rickman is memorably creepy as the pedophilic judge, and as the title character, Johnny Depp is pretty much perfect, selling the vocally strident “Epiphany” (“They all deserve to die”) and savoring Stephen Sondheim’s tricky wordplay. Oft-covered Sondheim classics like “Pretty Women” and “Nothing’s Gonna Harm You” are here too, but once heard in the context of the gory plot, you’ll never be able to listen to Barbra Streisand sing them again.
The Dream, “Lovehate”R&B rookie the Dream has already proved adept at penning ultra-catchy tunes. Exhibit A: Rihanna’s “Umbrella.” Exhibit B: J. Holiday’s “Bed.” The same elements that made those songs such irresistible hits are what make this singer/songwriter’s debut so impressive: lingering melodies, plenty of “ehs” and even a few “ellas.” Realizing that repetition is the key to catchiness, Dream transforms the simplest phrases (“Playin’ in her hair,” “Shawty is a 10!”) into memorable, sometimes unconventional hooks, bound by steady drums and “FutureSex” synthesizers. Such cuts as “Falsetto” and “Purple Kiss” reflect his sultry side. And like labelmate Ne-Yo, Dream knows to avoid cliche. Where others might go the nursery rhyme route, he opts for multisyllable mouthfuls and metaphors. Minus the last two tracks, one a Rihanna duet, “LoveHate” is a disc sure to stick in your head.