Mirror Of Your Soul

WOW! WHAT A WONDERFUL WAY TO STAGE A COMEBACK!

New Kids on the Block alum Jordan Knight is preparing to release his new album, 'Love Songs.' Who better to join him in the launch than fellow '80s pop star Deborah (Debbie) Gibson?

The two sang Knight's first single 'Say Goodbye' at a showcase at New York's Cutting Room on Tuesday. The album also contains several '80s covers including 'Careless Whisper,' 'Waiting For a Girl Like You' and 'She's Got a Way.'.

This is such a beautiful love song. They don't make them like this anymore. The track has been released to radio, so please request it as often as you can. I'd like to see this one up there!

Jordan Knight & Deborah Gibson : "Say Goodbye" (CD Single, 2006)

OTHER THAN MARIAH'S, THIS IS THE ONLY OTHER MTV UNPLUGGED YOU NEED!

With MTV's decision to revive its much-missed "Unplugged" series came a certain obligation: Whoever was going to kick the shows off needed to have the means to deliver serious heat, Grammy-vote garnering heat. The "powers that be" couldn't have chosen better than Alicia Keys. Throughout this consistent set, marked by warmth, sincerity and a powerful lack of inhibition, Keys convinces that if she's not the new Aretha Franklin, she's a force of equal might and measure.

All the favorites are here, the danceable "Karma" carries into the funky "Heartburn" and the give-it-up glory of "Unbreakable." "Fallin'," "If I Ain't Got You," and "You Don't Know My Name" come later, but interspersed are enough pleasant surprises to make even fanatical Keys followers forget the signature songs. Prince's "How Come You Don't Call Me," for instance, gets a playful work-up, complete with audience-aimed banter and an unbroken promise to "take it to the bridge," and a duet that on paper seems misguided works surprisingly well, as Keys resists any instinct to clobber Maroon 5's Adam Levine vocally.

Yowling, piano pounding, hip-hop tics (the ubiquitous, emphatic "unh"), and even a spot of theatrical poetry all have their places here, but Keys manages them with a master's sense of what's song-appropriate. Her band is spot-on, her arrangements soar, and her guests--count Mos Def and Common among them--complement the proceedings without even momentarily carrying them. The best "Unplugged" discs leave a listener wishing artists would kick the amps altogether; this is one of them.

Alicia Keys : "MTV Unplugged" (2005, HQ MP3, FULL CD)

AN UNDERRATED, UNDERAPPRECIATED R&B CLASSIC. GET THIS NOW!


Seven years after her debut at just 15 years old, Aaliyah assembled a third studio album that was astonishingly mature. Sadly, her death just a little over a month after its release stilled a promising voice in R&B. At 22, when most artists would just be getting started, Aaliyah had already progressed from pop to street to an unconventional retro-modern, risk-taking version of R&B.

While lead track "We Need a Resolution" is as mainstream as it gets, there are fewer hits on this album than on previous efforts. Instead, this collection is an extraordinary romantic exposition of passion and pain. While Missy Elliott is cranking out jams for all her "club freaks," Aaliyah is like a modern-day (if less vocally gifted) Minnie Riperton, exploring the pains of moving from child star to adult sex symbol. Tracks such as "Never No More" and "I Care 4 U" (featuring Missy) are slinky, twisted ballads imbued with film-noir sultriness, as diva Aaliyah steps catlike away from the bubblegum R&B of her contemporaries. There's also the obligatory rock track tacked on near the end ("I Can Be"), but even this excels above the standard hip-hop/rock/R&B crossover fare with its Prince-like influences coupled with Aaliyah's own instinct for seduction.

Aaliyah also signaled a move away from her long-standing musical relationship with producer Timbaland, who contributes just three cuts. Having started out heavily supported by R. Kelly, it appeared that Aaliyah was more than able to go it alone.

After not playing this for over a year, the fact has been proven true that only time can tell whether an album is more than just good but memorable and this is definitely, and without doubt, the latter. I'm still saddened by Aaliyah's unfortunate death back in August 2001, not only because the music industry lost a wonderful, talented artist, but because she seemed like such a genuine, down to earth, caring lady--all around beautiful, inside and out, and she'll forever be missed. Even though she probably could have excelled and improved as a determined singer/performer/actor (and who knows what else) beyond the material she was able to accomplish in her short yet hearty life, it's obvious she had an amazing gift. We are, however, fortunate enough to cherish the songs she did bestow us with.

Aaliyah may not have had a huge vocal range but I don't necessarily feel that that's what makes someone a great singer anyway. You can wail as high as you want and have no emotion whatsoever but there's something special about Aaliyah that I find to be very compelling. I personally don't care much for R&B music but this album will always be a highlight in my collection. I love the unconventional Timbaland influences that made Missy Elliot such a huge success and a uniquely diversified rapper by incorporating funky electronic beats to the usual formula. The only reason I drop a star is because many of the slower tracks are, in my opinion, far too sappy for my tastes...but that's just me.

Even if this isn't your thing, you just might be surprised and actually enjoy this.

Aaliyah : "Aaliyah" (2001. HQ MP3, FULL CD)

ALL THE WAY FROM NARNIA, A PIECE OF NEW ALANIS!

It took her forever, but she finally matches the beauty of her "Jagged Little Pill" album. Words just cannot describe the beauty of this new Alanis track, so find out for yourselves. The song is very much on the lines of her "Uninvited" from the "City of Angels" Soundtrack, which I still think is the best song she has ever recorded.

Alanis Morissette : "Wunderkind" (2006, CD Single, HQ MP3)

THIS WILL ONLY BE HERE FOR A MATTER OF HOURS, CONSIDERING ITS ONE OF THE MOST REQUESTED NEW LEAKED CDs. PLEASE DOWNLOAD BEFORE THE TIME RUNS OUT!


1. Intro
2. Bossy - Kelis, Too Short
3. What's That Right There
4. Till the Wheels Fall Off
5. Living Proof
6. Blindfold Me
7. Goodbyes
8. Trilogy
9. Circus
10. Weekend - Kelis, will.i.am
11. Like You
12. Aww Shit! - Kelis, The Smoke
13. Lil Star
14. I Don't Think So
15. Handful
16. Appreciate Me
17. Have a Nice Day
18. Fuck Them Bitches

Kelis released her first single, "Bossy" (featuring Too $hort) from her 2006 comeback album due in August 2006. It is achieving frequent airplay on urban radio and is the lead single from her upcoming album Kelis Was Here (originally due to be called The Puppeteer).

The album includes production credits by Scott Storch, Cee-Lo Green, Raphael Saadiq, Linda Perry, will.i.am, Swizz Beatz and Bangladesh. Shakira, Sean Paul and husband Nas have also recently claimed to have collaborated with Kelis for her fourth album. Kelis also collaborated with Busta Rhymes on the track "I Love My Bitch", the second single from his latest album The Big Bang.

This will be the second time Kelis has teamed up with Busta, with the first time being on his song "What It Is". Kelis is also featured on the soundtrack for the upcoming dance film "Step Up" with a song called "80s Joint".

The second single from Kelis Was Here has been comfirmed as Blindfold Me feat. Nas.

Currently, in addition to working on the upcoming album, Kelis is writing a cookbook and designing her own line of fashion accessories

Kelis : "Kelis Was Here" (2006, Advance Leak, FULL CD, HQ MP3)

A FRENCH EQUIVALENT TO NORAH JONES. YOU SHOULD DOWNLOAD THIS!

Carla Bruni Tedeschi (born 23 December 1968), is an Italian-French fashion model, songwriter and singer. She is the sister of Valeria Bruni Tedeschi.

Heiress to an Italian tyre manufacturing fortune, Carla Bruni was born in Turin, Piedmont, Italy.

She had no need to work, but by 1988 was among the 20 highest-paid fashion models, earning $7.5 million a year. She grew up in France from the age of five, and later attended boarding school in Switzerland. She eventually returned to Paris to study art and architecture, but left school at 19 to become a model full-time.

While modelling, Bruni became a tabloid staple by dating rock stars Mick Jagger and Eric Clapton; tycoon Donald Trump; and actors Kevin Costner and Vincent Perez. She is married to Raphaël Enthoven, who had been married to novelist Justine Lévy.

In 1998 Carla Bruni quit the world of fashion, and has since devoted herself to chanson. In 2002 her debut album Quelqu'un m'a dit, produced by Louis Bertignac, was released in Europe to great success.

A local radio station (one of the only english-based stations in my area that has the guts to play music not sung in english) one day played "Quelqu'un m'a dit" in the middle of a set of songs. I was hooked! What a great song! I sat through the entire set to hear who the artist was. They finally said her name, and I wrote it down to look up later. Now maybe I'm a bit out of it, but I had never heard the name "Carla Bruni" before that day. Here I thought the radio station had done a great service in introducing an obscure up-and-coming French Bob Dylan to the all too homogenous American airwaves. Images of a bumming coquette bouncing around the cafs of Paris bounced around in my head. What a find! A new voice! A beautiful voice! Trs romantique!

So I put her name into Google and was quite surprised. Hm! There must be another "Carla Bruni" out there who's an Italian supermodel. I kept searching for my dream ragamuffin musician but found only lots of nudes of Mrs. Bruni scattering the pages of my Google image search. Then the idealism was shattered like a thin chunk of obsidian: Carla Bruni the musician and Carla Bruni the supermodel were one and the same. Whoa.

I'm not a fan of the fashion industry. I don't want to support supermodels. I don't think a person should have an unfair advantage over others simply because they're beautiful. And I definitely don't want to give such people my money. So I was a little distressed, because the song wouldn't completely leave me. But I also wanted nothing to do with it.

Nonetheless, though Carla Bruni doesn't need a cent of my money or my support (the romantic ragamuffin probably would have), I relented and bought the CD. It was in the "Italian Music" section of a local CD shop. The song was just as great as I remembered it from the radio. And now the big surprise: the rest of the CD is also very good. Not only that, Carla Bruni herself had a major hand in most of the songwriting and wordsmithing on this lovely CD.

"Quelqu'un m'a dit" is simply a great song. Not much else to say there. Most of the album follows the mood of that song. Lots of nylon-stringed guitar, some strings here and there, minimal percussion, and Bruni's smooth voice sticking out over the mix. The music fits the French language perfectly (It's harder to imagine this music sung in Italian). The pace picks up in a few places, such as "L'excessive" with its bouncy jazzy beat. But the mood is mostly mellow, sensuous, and beautiful. The album closes appropriately with "La dernire minute" or "The Last Minute" which is, appropriately, a minute long.

This music apparently took some time to make it to the states. It was orginally released in 2002. That says droves about the english-centric mainstream music industry in the United States.

So in the end I completely relented, and I love the CD, though I'm still not thrilled that she's a supermodel. Though sometimes we forget that things work a little differently over in europe. They definitely have good taste in music!

Name of Tracks On 'Quelqu'un m'a dit'

1. Quelqu'un m'a dit
2. Raphaël
3. Tout le monde
4. La noyée
5. Le toi du moi
6. Le ciel dans une chambre
7. J'en connais
8. Le plus beau du quartier
9. Chanson triste
10. L'excessive
11. L'amour
12. La dernière minute


Carla Bruni : "Quelqu'un M'a Dit" (French Pop, FULL CD, HQ MP3)