The Life You Save May Be Your Own: A Review of R Kelly’s Double Up

One of popular music’s most polarizing figures has recently released a new full player offering entitled ‘Double Up’: proof that Robert’s legal representation weren’t the only ones hard at work over the past year. And funnily enough, it has been during this most recent personal crisis that the R has enjoyed some of his greatest professional success; even going so far as to create a bizarrely controversial musical mini-movie, ‘Trapped in the Closet’, to further enhance his buzz. Much to the dismay of his detractors, Mr. Kelly has always tried to push the envelope to emphatically stress the unadulterated ‘realness’ he offers to the listener, often at the expense of any regard for tact.

"Uh, Kells - real talk about that whole tactlessness thing."

But this is what R Kelly has done to establish his own musical ‘lane’, an accomplishment in itself for an artist who was at one point musically and physically almost indistinguishable from a rival singer (but where’s Aaron Hall now, suckas!?). Even in an industry as cynical as the record biz where talent and image are often almost inseparable, Kelly’s songwriting skills has always been considered prodigious. However, it was only when he began to develop his narrative style featured on the ‘Down Low’ series of records that he began to differentiate himself from his R&B brethren on his way to becoming the current juggernaut of the genre. Now in 2007, R Kelly is giving rappers a run for their money, saturating the airwaves on a series of remixes that has him flexing the most desired quality of popular black music as of late: swag – hence the creation of the alter ego, ‘Kells’. I have already alluded to him being this generation’s Rick James (for better or worse): but the question that begs of his new album is one of boundaries: has this man gone too far. Kells, being enabled by his unique stylistic approach to musical story-telling, has already come dangerously close to becoming merely a caricature depicting some of the more outlandish negative stereotypes in his quest to keep it real. So far, his guest spots in remixes hasn’t left him with enough rope to hang himself, but with a whole album to himself, will he finally cross that line of extreme bad taste that will lead to his decline. Here’s a look at the album/potential train wreck song by song:

1. The Champ – featuring new best buddy Swizz Beatz in a quasi-dramatic introduction loosely based on the Jadakiss mixtape anthem. Robert addresses the two sides of that coin called fame, however, the haters get it here, mostly. Like it’s their fault you have video-taping tendencies…

2. Double Up feat. Snoop Dogg – Robert takes this mid-tempo track down the Roger Troutman/Teddy Pain route with some synthesized vocals in an ode to not limiting options. An uninspired Snoop comes through to deliver the usual placations. Hey, if you could live like this, you’d sing about it too…

3. Tryin’ to Get a Number feat. Nelly – This coulda been hot – six maybe five years ago. Funny, that Nelly’s sing-song rapping is very much what R is winning with now.

4. Get Dirty feat. Chamillionaire – You think Robert liked that Ridin’ Dirty song? Another mid-tempo, rap-stylized ode to stuntin’ with another Midwest/Dirty South type rapper. You get the feeling the R might stand for ‘redundancy’.

5. Leave Your Name – Finally, things change up with a ballad: R uses the synthesized vocal accents, again, to make a long-winded message for his voicemail. Kinda makes me wish I was listening to ‘Your Body’s Calling’ instead for some reason…

6. Freaky in the Club - a melodic dancehall-influenced little ditty. No Diddy, tho – which is good. Not much to say here; kept things surprisingly inoffensive given the title with only the allusion to Mad Cobra as a reminder.

7. The Zoo – Resembles a generic past Kells’ ballad until he takes it to the whole sex-jungle analogy. Recently, Robert seems to be partial to a little gorilla lovin’ but here, he’s a sexasaurus. Yes, it sounds like an ancient beast, but that may only be relative to his partner…

8. I’m A Flirt feat. T-Pain and T.I. - Club anthem, you’ve already heard this, cousin. Kells let’s you know he will steal your girl. Don’t hate. Just make sure she showers before she comes back…

9. Same Girl feat. Usher – The second single. It’s a testament to the power of Kells that every other R&B singer has to do Robert when they perform on a song with him; it’s like he’s...contagious. Mr. Biggs really needs to beat the hell out of both these dudes for getting played out by the same girl (possibly his girl...can someone say 'remix'?). It’s funny because Robert wants to make said girl his wife, while Usher’s just running on through: Kells makes it inescapably clear who the more ghetto individual is.

10. Real Talk – This may seem early for an album climax, but here’s Kells doing the most mind-blowing narrative of an argument with his girl. This has to be experienced to be believed: I’ll leave you with some choice lyrics…real talk:

“I’ve been with you five years and you listening to your motherf%cking girlfriends: I don’t know why you f*ck with them old jealous, no men-havin’-ass hoes anyway. Real talk.”

“You’re always running at the mouth telling your girls your motherf*cking business, when they don’t eat with us; they don’t sleep with us; besides what they eat don’t make us sh!t. Real talk.”

“You ain’t gotta worry about me no more and the next time your ass get horny: go f%ck one of your funky-ass friends - hell, you probably doing that sh!t anyway! You gonna burn what?!! Bitch, I wish you woooould burn my motherf%ckin’ clothes – with your triflin’ ass!”

11. Hook It Up feat. Huey – Kells looking for a hook up from the ‘Pop, Lock and Drop it’ dude. She probably mad young, cuz that dude couldn’t be out of high school. I’ll go as far to say that this is slightly better than the Nelly and Chamillionaire songs.

12. Rock Star feat. Kid Rock and Ludacris - Somebody must have told Robert there was a rock star theme going on this summer. Got an actual white guy to help prove his point.

13. Best Friend feat. Keyshia Cole and Polow Da Don – So Kells concocted the most hood scenario possible: a conjugal visit for a locked up Robert from wifey (hood songstress Cole) and his best friend (uh, Polow). Good time to accuse them of infidelity. You may think he couldn’t have made this more over the top, but he got Keyshia to finish the song by crying out ‘What about the KIDS?!!’ Much too late for that.

14. Rollin’ – Kells takes a break from hood depravity and the club to call out the haters while flossing. Ground-breaking stuff.

15. Sweet Tooth – Back to the slow up. Throwback R, with the throwback sex analogy.

16. Havin’ a Baby – Deliriously happy lunch pale Robert knocks up an unidentified singer. Oddly docile selection which, in itself, makes it sound like might have been court-ordered: ends with some pregnancy coaching.

17. Sex Planet – As indicated by its title, some more bedroom music. It may be a stranger element to his allure, but Kells continues with his tendency to speak about sex in metaphors: yes ladies, he’s about your black hole, but that doesn’t necessarily exclude a trip to ‘Uranus’. Don’t be scared…we haven't even gotten to the part about the meteor 'showers'.

18. Rise Up - Humanitarian Robert (oh, he exists) comes out to do an ode about the Virginia Tech tragedy. Does his best to do understanding.

19. I Like Love – R Kelly does reggae without ‘being about reggae’ in this shout out to his fans. Apparently, there’s a lot of things Kells doesn’t like but, in the end, he’s all about love. Me too, Robert. Me too.

It would be easy to blame R Kelly for somehow initiating the down turn of modern culture and trying to rope in this release as evidence, but that would considerably over stress the importance of this album (keep in mind, in a recent diatribe, Robert compared himself to such luminaries as Marvin Gaye, Bob Marley, Muhammad Ali and, for good measure, Martin Luther King Jr.) . For the most part, Kells rides slightly ahead of the current trend-setting curve for popular black music which is saying very little. There is a lot of forgettable material here, sandwiched between the moments of shock value (‘Real Talk’, ‘Best Friend’) and contrived blandness (and there’s something to be said about an artist when his most contrived efforts are not centered around shock but instead the mundane). If there’s anything Robert may have proved here, it’s that he can sing over the generic, radio-friendly rap track potentially making the actual rappers obsolete in that capacity (which should strike fear into the hearts of many a rap dude…I’m not not looking at you, Nelly). He could have lost at least two of the rapper collabos and a slow jam to tidy things up, while the lack of a more groove friendly ‘Step In the Name of Love’-type ballad really hurts the over all package. In the end, this is something that can be put in the CD player as background party-music while dodging the slower offerings (or just saving them for later, as it were). Even the biggest R Kelly fans will find this uninspiring – and that’s not hate Kells, just some real talk.