He winds up with a modern sound -- it's a busy digital production, filled with skittering drum tracks and thick overdubs -- but The Speed of Now, Vol. 1 almost feels old-fashioned in how it turns 2010s sounds into adult contemporary.
A bloated, overproduced, and unnecessary eleventh studio album by the country stalwart Keith Urban. The Speed of Now Part 1 is an album that is better left in the past. (4.2 / 10)
Track picks: "With You," "Better Than I Am," "We Were" (both versions), "Live With," "Forever"
Tracks I don't like: the ones I haven't already mentioned, with a specific highlight on "Soul Food"
I wish I could say it's better than Ripcord and Graffiti U. But even though it is, I feel like it's a little too praising to an album that's more of the same. To be fair, though, its rating would be a little higher if he had learned from Ripcord that country music just doesn't fit Nile Rodgers's groove.