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Saw Joshua Minsoo Kim describe this as "Taylor Swift backwash" on Twitter and I don't think I could do much better than that. God I hope the rest of the album doesn't sound like this.

Kylie Minogue, aka, pop's foremost pleasure seeker. I think the reason why I hold her in such high esteem is her commitment to trying to be palatable to as many people as possible. There's something so generous about it; the platitudinous and vaguely clichéd lyricism, the constant joie de vivre. It's not so much that she's obsessed with being liked, but that she understands that pop music is, in its purest form, meant to feel cathartic and accessible. This is a woman ... read more

Completely singular. In an era where intensely confessional songwriting is considered the only way for women in pop to be taken seriously, it's hard to really appreciate just how ahead of the curve The Velvet Rope was: the best song on this album (and in Janet's discography) is a house banger about a friend who died from AIDS; there are songs about domestic violence, infidelity, depression, and that doesn't even cover the abundance of sex (would it be a Janet album without it?) ... read more

Been on my radar since it was released, but I'm glad I checked it out now though 'cause I'm currently going through a Janet phase (more on that in a forthcoming review) and listening to this and The Velvet Rope at the same time helped contextualize the some of the sounds this was reaching for. Palladino's vocal performances are just brilliant. She has a deceptively expansive range, at once doing soft, seductive sing-talking on songs like "Closer," and "Can You ... read more