KEY POINTS:
JANET JACKSON
Discipline
(Island)
Herald Rating: * * *
Verdict: The aural version of sado-masochism, in all senses
Janet "Nipplegate" Jackson has never shied away from revealing her dirty side. Her 10th album sounds as though it was named for her recent weight loss but one listen to the title track, complete with calls for "daddy" to punish her, will either reinforce your suspicions about the Jackson family or ignite an interest in bondage. Try not to cringe when she sings about fruit and the Kama Sutra in the same sentence on the bonus track or attempts to get intellectual about sex on The Meaning.
Much of Discipline is more creepy than sexy as Jackson splits her time between the dancefloor and the bedroom, with help from (among others) boyfriend Jermaine Dupri, the Dream and Ne-Yo. The dance hits come on hard and fast - Feedback, Luv and the album's most infectious track, Rock With U where she sings, "strobe lights make everything sexy" over synth-stacked beats.
Jackson spends far too much time interacting with a empathetic computer called Kyoko, and she's no wordsmith - "love, fate, hope, destiny" she coos on one of many vacuous interludes. But it's hard not to get caught up in her deeply groovy bump 'n' grind. She gets jiggy on the Daft Punk-sampling So Much Betta and successfully shares the limelight with Missy Elliott on The 1. She also contributes a couple of ballads in the luscious Can't B Good and Never Letchu Go, a song that should've never been allowed out of the 80s. Occasionally Jackson feels as though she's hanging desperately on to her kudos but there's enough here to keep the charts happy for a while.
