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Rihanna
Rated R
Campus Correspondent CD Review by Alyssa Vincent,
North Central College
The fact that Rihanna was able to release any sort of album in the aftermath of her attack at the hands of Chris Brown is remarkable. However, with weak tracks like “Rockstar 101,” “Hard” and “Stupid in Love,” Rated R sounds premature at best. On one hand, it may be interesting for longtime fans to hear her work through her issues on this album. On the other hand, it’s going to be very difficult for her to find new fans with such relatively lukewarm material.
She sounds so concerned with getting a message across—the message being “sure, I was with a dumb, mean guy. But now I’m tough! Don’t mess with me!”—that she seems to have forgotten how to write interesting lyrics or even lay down some decent beats. On her first single “Hard,” she sings about how no pain is forever and that she’s tougher than all the rest. But her lackluster delivery, which is apparent on all the tracks, leaves something to be desired. While this probably won’t be marked as a step backwards, she’s not bringing anything new to the table besides a lot of pain. And in this case, that’s not enough to carry an album.
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