Artist: Ke$ha
Release: Warrior
Release Date: 3rd Dec 2012
Love her or hate her you have to give Ke$ha some respect. People forget that aside from the slutty, Jack Daniels drinking, party girl image that most of us associate her with, she has managed to coin her own unique style of pop, conquered our charts and is one of the few pop artists who actually writes her own material; that deserves some credit. I’ll drink a shot of Jack to that – you go Ke$ha! I personally think she’s bloody awesome!
‘Warrior’ follows up her 3 million copy selling debut ‘Animal’ and carries on the Ke$ha theme of living live to the full with a few surprises. First thing you notice with this album is the guitars. Don’t get me wrong, all the electro-pop goodness you have learnt to expect are here but there is a very guitar/band based theme throughout the album and quite frankly, it works.
Tracks such as ‘Only Wanna Dance With You’ and ‘Dirty Love’, which features, in the words of Alan Partridge, “sweating lunatic Iggy Pop“, show a whole new side to our electro-pop drunken queen as she switches synths for guitars and gets her rocks off. The use of guitar and instrumentation is prominent throughout the album and works like chocolate spread on toast; the chocolate being the guitars and the toasty base being Ke$ha’s electro bread goodness. If you are wondering, the chocolate would probably be Nutella.
The album shows an overall more mature sound and seems to sway more towards her deeper, euphoric tracks rather than the pop cheese we encountered from ‘Animal’. There’s no ‘Stephen’ or ‘Dinosaur’ on this album. ‘Thinking Of You’ is probably ‘Warriors’ equivalent of ‘Kiss N Tell’ with it’s revenge theme, “Found out your full of it, I’m over it so suck my dick” but with cheesy synths now replaced by stomping live drums and a vocoder solo. ‘All That Matters’ and ‘Love Into The Light’, with its Phil Collins ‘In The Air Tonight’ feel, are also perfect examples of Ke$ha’s more mature sound being full of atmosphere, euphoria and beauty.
She even goes all out and rocks out a Lady Gaga ‘You & I’ style piano ballad in the form of ‘Wonderland’. After the grief she has received in the past for her use of auto-tune this should silence the critics as she proves she really can strip back to basics and, more importantly, show she really can sing.
With the obvious chart tracks such as ‘Die Young’, ‘C’mon’ and ‘Crazy Kids’ with its “Like A G6” vibe bringing the commercial appeal, ‘Warrior’ could quite easily be the next big pop album and, even with the slight change in sound, we still have the “don’t give two fucks” Ke$ha we know and love.
Her message is clear, “Fight for the fuck ups, Stand up for true love, We’ll never give up. Live like it’s our last night alive.”. Awesome!
8/10
Reviewer: Chris Hines
