All Articles Tagged "fortune"
“Chris Brown Hits Women. Enough Said.” Music Critics Bash Breezy’s New Album
Source: Billboard.com
More than three years after Chris Brown famously beat down his then-girlfriend Rihanna, in the eyes of music critics charged with reviewing his albums, the 23-year-old’s fortune still hasn’t changed.
Recently, the R&B singer released his fifth studio album Fortune. Normally, music critics review an album by waxing eloquent about the lyrics, melodies, vocals, production, etc. For Chris Brown’s new album though, Cityreview’s Chad Taylor simply had this to say:
Source: twitter.com/ChadTaylor
“Chris Brown hits women. Enough said.”
That was all he wrote!
Chad wasn’t the only music critic to use the opportunity to tell us he really feels about Chris Brown. As Take 40.com reported, in a scathing “No Stars Ever” review, Chloe Papas took a cue from the black belt’s treatment of Rihanna and held no punches:
“Chris Brown has released his fifth studio album — a 19-track repugnant record that we can only hope will be his last!”
“The whole album is skitzy and has two themes: unprotected sex is super fun and partying is cool.”
“Regardless of whether Chris Brown has any musical talent (he doesn’t) or whether this album is any good (it isn’t), the man recently brutally assaulted a woman, and is still regularly invited back to award shows and worshipped by ‘Breezy’ fans worldwide. Which is, frankly, disgusting… Final words: don’t buy this album.”
Countless other publications reviewed Chris’s album including CNN, LA Times, Billboard Magazine and HipHop DX. Though most steered clear of making the 2009 incident their focus, not a single review failed to mention Rihanna.
Telling readers “Don’t buy it”, Time Magazine’s Melissa Locker had this to say:
[...]
With his track record, some fans may hesitate to plunk down cash for Brown’s latest album, Fortune. However, a truly great album could push wavering fans to pay, despite their trepidations about supporting Brown himself. Fortune, however, is not a great album. It has a few stand-out tracks that show Brown’s potential as an artist, but for the most part, the album is boring. It manages to combine elements of electronic dance music, dubstep and R&B with talented producers, skilled guest stars and a huge budget to create one of the blandest R&B albums in recent memory.
But being boring is not the worst thing about the album. Writing an album of love songs when you’re on probation for beating your famous girlfriend is nothing short of hubris, and like most Greek heroes it’s also Brown’s fatal flaw. The cycle of domestic violence is marked by something that the domestic abuse community calls “the honeymoon phase.” It’s a period after a violent outburst that is marked by apologies and promises that it will never happen again, or that the abuser will do his or her best to change. This album feels like Chris Brown’s musical equivalent of a honeymoon phase, except for the fact that it’s completely remorseless.
Brown seems so determined to ignore his past crimes that his album comes across as brash at best and, at worst, insulting. The end result is retch-inducing lyrics set to a party beat.
Chris Brown may elicit more sympathy if he didn’t continue making headlines for his controversial behavior following the horrific 2009 incident. It seems every other day, he is into something else. Clearly from his Fortune record sales though, he still has fans — probably an equal amount as the people who don’t like him. For her part, Rihanna never seemed to hate him for what he did, but maybe she found it easy to quickly forgive him because so much of the public clearly hasn’t.
What do you think of these Chris Brown Fortune reviews? Do you think it’s time to review his music without bringing up the Rihanna incident?
Follow Alissa on Twitter @AlissaInPink
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Vain is Your Middle Name: Celebs Who Love Themselves as Much as Their Fans Do
By Desire Thompson
Like the late Christopher Wallace once said: “More money, more problems.” However, he never said that with more money, your head has to get bigger and egos will spin out of control. Everyone’s favorite celeb psychiatrist, Dr. Drew Pinsky, studied over 200 celebs in 2006 using the Narcissistic Personality Inventory, which studies narcissistic tendencies. The study rates people on a 1 to 40 scale, with 40 being “extremely narcissistic.” On average, celebs scored a not-so-surprising 17.84, which is higher than the general public. While all of this may be obvious news to some, it isn’t to all. Celebs want to keep their names out there, so just know that with every Twit pic, status post and club appearance they do it isn’t for the fans…it’s for themselves. Take a look at some celebs that have let their egos get bigger than their paychecks.
Source: The Fashion Bomb Blog
Keri Hilson
The R&B singer/songwriter hit the scene in 2008 with her song “Energy,” and eventually received a great deal of mainstream appeal with her hit, “Turnin Me On.” While she was finally beginning to be known for her own music rather than the songs she penned for Ciara, Beyonce and other R&B divas, she decided to take jabs at all of those individuals in 2009 on the remix for “Turnin Me On.” Lines included things like, “Go head tell these folks how long I been writing your songs… I been putting you on… check the credits hoe!” When confronted about her comments she simply reversed all of her words, but continued to talk smack about other singers (who can forget when she refused to pose with a magazine that Bey was on the cover of?). But hey, as long as you don’t hate her cause she’s beautiful…
