Kelly (Deluxe Version)

Album Review

Four and a half years after releasing a contemporary gospel album on Gospocentric, Kelly Price returns to secular R&B on producer Warryn Campbell's My Block label. On Kelly, Price collaborates extensively with Campbell (Mary Mary, Alicia Keys, Brandy), who comes up with some of his biggest-sounding productions in order to match her voice. The cathartic, closet-cleaning “Tired” and the following song, a club throwback based around War’s “Galaxy” (with a touch of Michael Jackson's “Don’t Stop ‘Til You Get Enough”), are highlights, as is the relaxed “Speechless” — adroit synth-funk that recalls the early-‘80s productions of Leon Sylvers III and Prince. A handful of other producers, such as longtime Price associate Shep Crawford, contribute in smaller capacities; on “Not My Daddy,” Price and Campbell are joined by Mint Condition's Stokley Williams and Lawrence Waddell (if not the rest of the band), and the result sounds just like classic MC — a vibrant, almost live-sounding song filled with hooks that deserves to be one of the bigger adult R&B singles of 2011.