I can honestly say I have never gone mad on a Missy Elliot album, there always cuts on her albums for example the amazing “Pussycat” on her last outing, but I can honestly say that I always end up skipping more tracks than I play on one of her albums. Not since she was with the group Siata have I actually liked as many or more tracks than I have disliked on her albums. This album is a typical Missy album, or should it be a typically messy album. It has all those jiggy groves, Missy’s qwerky rap styles and lyrics. Track’s like “Partytime”, “Loose Control”, “We Run This”, “Can’t Stop”, “Mommy”, “Click Clack” and “Bad Man” will keep the faithful happy, you know the MTV crew happy, no-one will ever convince

me to the contrary that it is the video’s and not the music that makes a Missy record a hit. Good news for the record label is there is a stack of typical heard it all before safe bet Missy hits on here, how many times can one person use the words freaky, freaky, bling, bling etc in a rap and get away with it. How long can someone rap like a six year old’s poem, where every word on every last line has to rhyme and get away with that too. Well Missy does and good luck to her because I have no gripe with someone earning money. But if you dig deep into a Missy album there is always a glimpse of what a real talent she is. Missy is a business woman and no one knows how to work the crowd like Missy, she knows what makes her market place tick and she delivers it. But behind all the make up there is a real fresh clean and classy side of Missy that has been evident since the days of Sista. Tracks like the Slick Rick featured “Irresistible Delicious” this opens in pretty typical fashion but suddenly it turns into the most breathtaking classy radio friendly smoothed out slice of soulful funky music. “My Struggles” is Missy at her lyrical rapping best, featuring two icons from hip-hop grand Puba and from the world of R&B Mary J Blige. All three tell stories of how they struggled before they made it. “Meltdown” shows Missy in two styles at her smooth rapping best and singing, which apparently is something she doesn’t really enjoy doing, I don’t know why she always sounds good to me. Produced by Scott Torch and musically baring an uncanny resemblance musically to Mario’s “You Should Let Me Love You”. “Remember When” is a sublime, breathtaking smoothed out sawyer and really has everything I love about Missy rolled into it. More smoothed out biz comes via “My Man” and features American Pop Idol winner Fantasia. Finishing off the set is more smoothed out grooves on Time and Time again. Like all Missy albums this is a bit of roller coaster ride it has it highs but it has some serious lows too.

3/5

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