Something Else

Performer: Robin Thicke
Artist: Lil Wayne
Engineer: Bill Malina
Distributor: Universal Distribution

Notes: Personnel: Robin Thicke (vocals, acoustic guitar, piano, Fender Rhodes piano, glockenspiel, shaker, sleigh bell, background vocals); Bobby Keys (guitar, acoustic guitar, banjo, sitar); Pro J (guitar, drums, congas, bongos, tambourine, percussion); Andrew McKay (guitar); Alfredo Rivera (flute); Jerahm Orozco, Dan Higgins, Kamasi Washington (saxophone); Chuck Findley, Gary Grant, Josef Leimberg, Brian Warfield (trumpet); Isaac Smith, Charlie Morillas (trombone); Larry Cox II (Fender Rhodes piano, organ, Wurlitzer organ, synthesizer); Sean Hurley, Greg Malone (bass guitar). Audio Mixers: Richard Travali; Fabian Marasciullo. It would almost seem like an insult to call Robin Thicke's SOMETHING ELSE "neo soul." That term is often applied to slavish retro rehashes, and Thicke's fourth album is anything but that. SOMETHING ELSE assimilates the influences of everything from Marvin Gaye to Prince to Philly soul to disco, and puts them in a sonic blender that delivers a distinctive, original-sounding end product. While this album isn't a wild stylistic divergence from what Thicke has done previously, it's a more singular, atmospheric experience, an album of mellow blue-eyed soul that you can really sink your teeth into, from the Jeff Buckley-meets-Otis Redding "Dreamworld" to the romantic, horn-punctuated falsetto-fest "The Sweetest Love." Think of Thicke as something like a hipper, alternate-universe version of Justin Timberlake.

Rolling Stone (p.73) - 3 stars out of 5 -- "The music is a lush, louche swirl of strings, congas and Fender Rhodes that flaunts its debts to Marvin Gaye, classic disco and PHilly soul." Entertainment Weekly (p.75) - "Thicke imbues the album with a bachelor-highlife vibe....[E]levated, both by SOMETHING ELSE's buttery production and by Thicke's own light-footed ease with the material." -- Grade: B+

The son of soap actress/singer Gloria Loring and TV actor Alan Thicke, Robin Thicke got his start as a songwriter, providing numbers for artist such as Christina Aguilera and Usher. He recorded an album under the name Thicke, but when it didn't go anywhere, he promptly returned to writing and producing. In 2006, Thicke teamed with super-producer Pharrell Williams for his album THE EVOLUTION OF ROBIN THICKE, and the combination of slick hip-hop production and soulful songs did the trick, landing the album on the pop and dance charts and rendering Thicke an unlikely R&B sensation.

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