“This Christmas, my gift to you…is me,” says R. Kelly on his new album 12 Nights Of Christmas, and what a gift it is. If, like many others, you’ve been wishing R. Kelly would apply his smooth beats to songs about Christmas, all your prayers have been answered.
This album is exactly what you expect. It’s like Michael Bublé found a hip hop drum machine and decided to put it on all of his tracks. Lots of piano, lots of background harmonies, surprisingly, if you can get past the fact it’s an R. Kelly Christmas album it isn’t terrible, instead making for some easy listening to put on in the background.
That background listen might come to an end once you start listening to the lyrics of some of the tracks though. This isn’t an album of Christmas classics, all of the songs are original R. Kelly. One song in particular about unwrapping Mrs. Claus (wink wink) is a definite stand out. Why make snowmen, muses Mr. Kelly, when you can bump and grind all night.
All in all, this album is decent for what it is. The main issue is who is going to buy it. Your mum probably already loves Michael Bublé and R. Kelly fans probably won’t follow his venture into Christmas tunes. That niche market though who’ve been waiting for an R. Kelly Christmas album for years, boy are they excited.
By Nathan Quattrucci
