Jessie J - Sweet Talker | Album Review

Jessie J burst onto the music scene winning the prestigious Critics Choice award at the BRIT Awards in 2011. Following her debut album “Who You Are” that spawned an impressive 6 top ten hits and has since sold 2.5 million copies. Fast-forward to 2013 a bald-headed Jessie releases her 2^nd studio album “Alive” which fails to make an impact with fans and critics alike, with only one moderately successful song “Wild” which was evidently not enough to prevent it from flopping with poor sales worldwide. Good, you are up to date with Jessie J’s career and now in 2014 she is back with her latest offering “Sweet Talker”.

“Imma do it like it ain’t been done. Imma do it like it ain’t been done” are the first lyrics (rather annoyingly) rapped on the albums opener “Ain’t Been Done”. Someone ought to tell Jessie that when she does her obnoxious ‘rapping’, she has a tendency to sound like Catherine Tate’s comedy sketch character Lauren Cooper. It wouldn’t sound out of place if Jessie was to blurt out “Am I bovverd doe?” which is never a good thing.

Songs like “Fire” and “Personal” are enjoyable ballads – less melodramatic than some of her previous ones which gives us listeners a chance to focus on the meaning and raw emotion of the songs, rather than getting a headache because Jessie won’t stop yelling. “Bang Bang” the albums lead single featuring Ariana Grande and Nicki Minaj has already proven to be a relentless hit topping the charts a few weeks back, but is unfortunately one of the few highlights off “Sweet Talker”.

Overview: Sweet Talker lacks any authentic charisma, it’s like talking to someone hot(or in this case Sweet) and forgetting what they said immediately after the conversation because they didn’t say anything that grabbed your attention, so you get bored and started thinking about other stuff like “what shall I have for dinner tonight?”

Recommend Tracks: Fire, Personal, Sweet Talker, Masterpiece 

4/10