Gentleman is both an Africa 70 and Afro-beat masterpiece. High marks go to the scathing commentary that Fela Anikulapo Kuti lets loose but also to the instrumentation and the overall arrangements, as they prove to be some of the most interesting and innovative of Fela's '70s material. When the great tenor saxophone player Igo Chico left the Africa 70 organization in 1973, Fela Kuti declared he would be the replacement. So in addition to bandleader, soothsayer, and organ player, Fela picked up the horn and learned to play it quite quickly -- even developing a certain personal voice with it. To show off that fact, "Gentleman" gets rolling with a loose improvisatory solo saxophone performance that Tony Allen eventually pats along with before the entire band drops in with classic Afro-beat magnificence. "Gentleman" is also a great example of Fela's directed wit at the post-colonial West African sociopolitical state of affairs. His focus is on the Africans that still had a colonial mentality after the Brits were gone and then parallels that life with his own. He wonders why his fellow Africans would wear so much clothing in the African heat: "I know what to wear but my friend don't know" and also points out that "I am not a gentleman like that!/I be Africa man original." To support "Gentleman," the B-side features equally hot jazzy numbers, "Fefe Naa Efe" and "Igbe," making this an absolute must-have release. [In 2000, MCA released Confusion and Gentleman as a two-fer.]© Sam Samuelson /TiVo

The album cover to Fefe Dobson's third studio album, Joy, is most likely symbolic. Picturing the young performer collapsed on her own stage, it's likely representative of the five years of drama that Dobson endured after her second album, Sunday Love, was ultimately shelved days before its release and Dobson was dropped from her label. In the time that Dobson was label-less, she was certainly keeping busy, still occasionally touring and songwriting, most prominently with Disney teen prodigy Selena Gomez. Though Dobson saw her career halt and found herself forced to work with artists who can hardly touch her in terms of talent, she never gave up -- and neither did her fans. After releasing two singles independently -- the ever so spunky "I Want You" and the slick and spicy "Watch Me Move" (very clearly a big f-you to her former label) -- she was re-signed to Island Records, and got an independent distribution deal with Universal at the same time. Dobson had gone from has-been to hot commodity. The question remains, is Joy a great album? The answer is an unequivocal yes. The album could have been a sappy collection of moody ballads, a collection of all the dark tunes that Dobson penned during her time without a label. However, if Dobson was ever not producing top-quality, charismatic pop/rock radio smash tunes, we would never know the difference. Dobson had a hand in writing each of these power numbers, which represent her strongest body of work to date. From lead single "Ghost" (co-written by Kara DioGuardi and produced by Kevin Rudolf) to the follow-up midtempo chart burner "Stuttering," Dobson proves she's on top of the pop market, with some immaculate writing and production that keep her fresh with the contemporaries who sprang up while she was away from the game. However, the strength comes in the non-singles, which slide farther from radio fodder and into a greasier, grittier set that is often too absent in pop music these days: Dobson bites back against her vices on "Thanks for Nothing" and sends a rival woman running on the Howard Benson-produced "You Bitch"; it's these tracks where Dobson's fire blazes strongest, and she catapults herself into the ranks of spitfire pop artists like Kelly Clarkson and P!nk. Not to mention, just when you think she's kept herself guarded, Dobson rips herself open on "Set Me Free," making it clear that the hardships she's endured because of the music business have truly left her scarred; it's these scars, however, that make her ballads so bruising and her spunk and charm so fresh and believable. Joy may not be such a cheerful album, but it stands to be an epic comeback for a genuinely talented pop artist who was shafted by the industry that would welcome her back with open arms, and that is definitely a joyous story.© Matthew Chisling /TiVo

On his official full-length debut, Dummy Boy, troubled New York rapper 6ix9ine delivers much of the same exaggerated and empty content that assisted his speedy but controversial rise in the late 2010s. Issued while the divisive figure was imprisoned for a number of offenses, Dummy Boy mirrors its creator in its overly energized, cartoonishly aggressive, and ultimately soulless presentation. Growling and yelling, 6ix9ine spends much of Dummy Boy making threats and puffing his chest, employing explosive gun blasts and intense production to get his hollow points across. In the process, he also manages to pull a decent bunch of high-profile guests into his problematic orbit, including Lil Baby, Tory Lanez, A Boogie wit da Hoodie, Gunna, and even Nicki Minaj and Kanye West, who both double-down on their already critically maligned years by contributing a pair of collaborations each. One of those, "Mama," is one of the album's standouts, mostly for its union of three of 2018's most headline-grabbing hip-hop stars. Elsewhere, rowdy cuts like "Stoopid," "Tati," and "Wondo" inject Dummy Boy with mosh-worthy vitriol, while lighter, island-inspired breaks with Anuel AA ("Bebe" and "Mala") offer respite from the overwhelming obnoxiousness found elsewhere on the album. Dummy Boy is unlikely to disappoint 6ix9ine fans, but for everyone else, there's little to back up the hype and controversy associated with the self-professed "King of New York."© Neil Z. Yeung /TiVo

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Working closely with producer Jay Levine, Fefe Dobson created a rousing debut that, despite being a highly melodic and relentlessly effective pop album, is rescued from flavor-of-the-moment dissipation by a schizophrenic rock crunch and her own attractively bad attitude. The histrionic kiss-off "Bye Bye Boyfriend" lurches like Tracy Bonham's "Mother Mother," whipping wildly between a headbanging chorus and shuffling, atmospheric verses. "I remember how it was when we started off/With your tattoo and your lip pierced/And the raggedy style you used to rock" -- Dobson doesn't pause between these words. Instead she lets them tumble, stumbling over one another in a giddy summation of the relationship's salad days. This is just one instance where Dobson's diction, dicked-over anger, and damn huge voice goose her debut past its popternative tendencies. She coats the couplets of bombastic pop-punk opener "Stupid Little Love Song" in layers of jaded sarcasm -- just like a frowning punk rock girl would do if she had to reveal her crush to the captain of the football team. "Everything" marries the Red Hot Chili Peppers' "Under the Bridge" to Michelle Branch, but it's just Fefe making that unholy union work. She has to move a bit faster on "Rock It Till You Drop It," a strange studio shape-shifter that strips down and urbanizes Eric Clapton's "It's in the Way That You Use It" while referencing Backstreet Boys' "I Want It That Way." It also features a cameo from...Tone-Loc? Yes, it's this kind of freestyle borrowing and reassembly that might marginalize an artist who was something less then herself; fortunately, words like "less" and "marginal" mean little to Fefe Dobson. She inserts a touching piano breakdown into the rousing rock plea of "Kiss Me Fool," and swallows whole the crunchy, muted power chords of "Unforgiven." Some sugar pop albums would ask a deadbeat dad for his love, if such a song were even included. "Unforgiven" is that song, but it staunchly refuses any kind of forgiveness. "Where were you when I plugged in my first guitar?" Dobson spits during a litany of absentee moments, and the track's beautifully atmospheric breaks only make the subsequent urgency of its stiletto power chords more palpable. Fefe Dobson definitely has an opportunistic streak, and its stylistic cherry-picking can be trying. But production niceties and savvy marketing can't fake the talent Fefe has. It's her willingness to inject pop with pluck and rock as much as she flutters that makes Dobson's debut much more than just a popternative clone. Best of all, it still caters to those casual fans who won't know any better.© Johnny Loftus /TiVo

On her sophomore sampling, Sunday Love, Fefe Dobson, a Canadian pop/rock princess whose career was affected by the ever-increasingly popular Avril Lavigne, makes it clear she wants to do something different this time around. Like Lavigne, it is clear that Dobson hopes to establish herself as an artist rather than a singer; within a minute of listening to the first track on the album, "As a Blonde," Dobson shouts about trying different things and changing up her personality. Well, at least she tried. Sunday Love isn't a radical change in Dobson as potentially expected. Rather, it is, in essence, another copy of her debut album, which promoted hard rock sounds over whiny pop vocals. The results on Sunday Love are no worse than Dobson's self-titled debut; they just don't stray far from the formula. There are more ballads this time around, such as the emotional "This Is My Life" or the pleading "Get over Me," but the upbeat songs are much less catchy than those found on her original set (with one exception, "The Initiator"). "As a Blonde" toes the line between singing and shouty, and "If I Was a Guy" just crosses over the aforementioned line. However, Dobson doesn't quite understand that shoutier tracks with more "meaningful" ballads don't represent a change in the artist, or a standard in an artist; it just means you can shout and pen a track. In the end, Sunday Love is not a bad album in the least; as a formulaic, generic sample, it works just fine. And on a track by track score, it probably would fare better than her debut. However because it's the second album by Dobson, and we are aware of her ability to coin really great tracks, Sunday Love pales in comparison because it adds nothing new to the table. Ultimately, there has to be a more definitive Dobson before she can try to take on Avril Lavigne. Heck, there has to be a more definitive Dobson before she can try to take on Lillix! Change is great, if you can pull it off in the right direction. Dobson claims she tried, but it's hard to see the effort here.© Matthew Chisling /TiVo