Ke$ha

Animal

RCA Records

Rocks Like: An Auto-Tune-addicted Katy Perry who hasn’t… Ke$ha

Animal

RCA Records

Rocks Like: An Auto-Tune-addicted Katy Perry who hasn’t showered for a few days

Grade: B+

Whether or not you will appreciate Ke$ha’s debut album Animal depends on your ability to tolerate frighteningly vapid, party-minded lyrics paired with catchy yet overly auto-tuned electro-pop. Also, you will need a strong stomach. The music is unapolagetically filthy.

Try this on for size:

“And now we lookin’ like pimps / in my gold Trans Am / Got a water bottle full of whiskey in my handbag / Got my drunk text on / I’ll regret it in the morning,” she sings in “Take it Off,” a pulsating club banger that serves as a high point on the album.

Ke$ha certainly doesn’t come across as the classiest pop princess to hit the scene recently.

In fact, she makes Katy Perry and her girl-kissing seem like material fit for an episode of “Hannah Montana”.

But the fun part is, it doesn’t matter. Sure, you may feel the need to shower after listening to only a few tracks, but this is one guilty pleasure that merits the associated pop cultural guilt.

It’s refreshing to not only hear a pleasant new collection of cotton candy pop tracks, but to hear songs that are so straightforward in their paper-thin themes of superficiality and the rock-star lifestyle.

“Hungover,” “Boots & Boys” and “Blah Blah Blah” are all as flighty and devoid of intellect as they sound, but — gasp! — it’s surprisingly fun to turn your brain off in short, three-minute increments from time to time.

Of course, when Ke$ha does try to be serious, it’s hard to suppress giggles at the ridiculousness of her attempts. “Dancing With Tears in My Eyes” and “Stephen” are laughably bad missteps — trust me Ke$ha, stick to partying.

“I threw up in the closet / but I don’t care,” Ke$ha sings in “Party at a Rich Dude’s House”.

I may have just also thrown up a little bit imagining that, but I suppose I don’t really care either.

Ke$ha’s “Kiss N Tell”