J. Holiday, Street Soul

Often times, artists experience a sophomore flop...which translates in laymen terms, their 2nd project doesn't quite come close to the success as its precedent...after spinning J. Holiday's Round 2 a few times, I feel like he narrowly will escape this trend

This soulful DC native came out of nowhere, bursting through the industry doors 2 years ago with his smash hit "Bed", under the tutelage of The-Dream...he followed it up with "Suffocate" and his freshman project, Back of My Lac, garnered him a Grammy nomination

As impressed as I was with Back of My Lac, Round 2 finds itself falling into a comfort zone. J. Holiday took the very safe approach and delivered songs with his smooth-as-honey vocals and intermediate production. Round 2 opens with lead single "It Is Yours", produced by the same duo who did Ciara's "Promise" and Christina Aguilera's "Dirrty"...sort of an odd connection, but it works

"Don't Go" is reminiscent of old school 1990s in terms of lyrical content and production...It has that tone of the vintage strong call and repeat format, a style set coupled with its intro and hook, it'll remind you of K-Ci and JoJo. "Run Into My Arms", while it's too sappy for my taste, the midtempo beat makes it very likeable...If you close your eyes, you can picture a young Ralph Tresvant or young Tevin Campbell..."Sing 2 U" is by far my favorite cut...out of the entire CD, I feel this 1 is as close as follow up to "Bed" as he could've delivered...his part paying tribute to great r&b vocalists is off the hook...it's very smooth and the bass maintains its sensual tone

"Wrong Lover" is the only collaboration on Round 2...Truthfully the album would've been so much more cohesive w/out it...Rick Ross wasn't the right rapper to pair up w/ and the production doesn't do J. Holiday's voice any justice...the remaining tracks leave much to be desired...to put it mildly, the rest of the CD sounds the same, w/ the exception of "Homeless"...I think the long-term favorite for J. Holiday fans will be "Forever Ain't Enough"...you can go ahead and add that to the index of classic, beautiful wedding songs...I haven't heard a beautifully-produced song like this in awhile...for me, it's 1 of the CD's saving graces...it will be 1 of those songs that would sick in a live set! I hope he adds it to his upcoming tour


Strongest Cuts:

It Is Yours
Run Into My Arms
Sing 2 U
Forever Ain't Enough

Weakest Cuts:

Wrong Lover
Fly
I Tried

**The rest I don't care either way, but they don't take enough away from the overall CD to sway my opinion