R. Kelly

Black Panties

B-

Sounds like: Another piece of the R. Kelly Renaissance

No matter how the album turned out, “Black Panties” would always be remembered as “the one where R. Kelly played the topless woman like a violin.” Slightly degrading, overtly seductive and utterly ridiculous, the cover art succinctly encapsulates everything about R. Kelly’s last decade in music with one image. From the cover alone, one might expect a full-fledged return to “Trapped in the Closet” silliness. But “Black Panties” aimed to specialize in more than just the outrageous.

Following his two most recent ventures into a vintage soul sound (“Love Letter” and “Write Me Back”), “Black Panties” is a modest assault on the R&B mainstream with some of Kelly’s most accessible tunes in years. Given his recent high-profile love-making jam with Lady Gaga (“Do What U Want”) and bedroom tutorial with a pre-retirement Justin Bieber (“PYD”), “Black Panties” fits comfortably within R. Kelly’s triumphant 2013 return to prominence. Most of these songs aim for a similar radio-ready pleasure center, but still carry that trademark R. Kelly absurdity and vulgarity.

Unsurprisingly, much of “Black Panties” deals with the female anatomy. On the album highlight, “Marry the P*ssy,” Kelly romanticizes and personifies his favorite body part, saying the word a (likely) record-breaking 57 times in one track. It’s a startling, hilarious and overtly tongue-in-cheek song that abandons all sexual inhibitions in a way that only R. Kelly can achieve.  

Songs like “Marry the P*ssy” and “Cookie,” where Kelly not-so-subtly likens eating Oreo cookies to cunnilingus, should be debasing, yet he taps into a refreshingly frank sensuality that many of us — men and women, alike — often keep repressed. A line like “Girl, I’ve got a sweet tooth/ ain’t nothin’ sweeter than you,” reads like nothing more than “I Want Candy” for grown-ups — even if it precedes some far more vivid metaphors. When Panties strays from this formula, it turns in the occasional misfire.

Some tracks, such as “You Deserve Better,” find R. Kelly smothered in synths and autotune, evoking the emotional sensibility of Drake. Convincing a lover to leave her bad boyfriend should seem like a welcome change of pace on an album this sex-obsessed, but it instead comes across as too obvious and cliched for an artist who was proposing to genitalia on the previous track.

On “Genius,” Kelly balances frank sexuality and romance for one of the record’s blander and more conventional R&B ballads. Luckily, R. Kelly utilizes his friends for some of the album’s most potent pop numbers. 

Kelly ropes in an impressive lineup of guest performers — many of whom feel right at home in the sex-crazed world of Black Panties. On the opening track “Legs Shakin,” Ludacris passes the test with flying colors, vowing that his “tongue just like a Jacuzzi jet.” 

Lead single “My Story” pairs R. Kelly, arguably the best at tongue-in-cheek R&B punchlines, with one of the most consistently-satisfying rappers in that department: 2 Chainz. On paper, it reads like a match made in heaven, and “My Story” lives up to the promise, delivering the most infectious and sharpest cut off the album.

In addition to a Christmas album on the horizon in 2014, R. Kelly claims that his next release will be able to save the day from a “love-making album drought.” Which should lead one to wonder if R. Kelly even listened to Black Panties.