Review Roundup: Katy Perry Teenage Dream

Watch out, it’s the day you’ve all been waiting for — Katy Perry’s Teenage Dream album is about to be released! As a singer she personally does nothing for me but I’m sure a lot of you out there are fans and have been waiting for her latest album. We’ve scoured the web to find the best and worst reviews for Teenage Dream to give you a full idea of what it is you’re in for. Sit back, relax, and find out whether Perry is a dream or a complete nightmare…

Her Vocals:

Too often she sounds robotic, like a wind-up toy incapable of singing with any elegance or nuance. She either stutters for effect (“E.T.”) or lands on the beats so emphatically (You! Make! Me! Feel-like-I’m-livin’-a! Teen! Age! Dream!) that it’s almost comical. The production does her no favors, giving her lines a pasted-together artificiality. Singing ability is not a prerequisite for making great pop music, but original ideas and inventive presentation are — and both are lacking. [Chicago Tribune]

The Tone

She tends to connect best in ’80s leotard-lady mode, as showcased on the deliciously glitchy throwback ”E.T.” — imagine Lita Ford crawling through Trent Reznor’s night terrors, Inception-style — and the aerobic, synth-spangled title track. Her Ke$ha-esque party-till-my-parole-officer-calls shtick on ”Last Friday Night (T.G.I.F.),” however, just feels hollow. Beneath the fruity outfits and fart jokes, Perry is clearly serious about the business of hit songcraft; that doesn’t make Dream nearly cohesive as an album, but it does provide, intermittently, exactly the kind of high-fructose rush she’s aiming for. [EW]

The Lyrics:

“Circle the Drain” is aimed at her ex, Gym Class Heroes’ frontman Travis McCoy, condemning his excessive use of drugs and the role he wanted her to play in their relationship, “Wanna be your lover, not your fucking mother… Had the world in the palm of your hands but you fucking choked.” The only difference is that Katy Perry’s trying to justify her language based on context: “fuck” is OK if it’s used under the pretense of raw emotion, but not OK if it’s mixed in with sexual innuendo. But with songs like “Peacock” that innuendo is embarrassingly masked under a crass shroud of wordplay, “Are you brave enough to let me see your peacock? Don’t be a chicken, boy, stop acting like a bi-atch.” Context here doesn’t mean a thing; it would be less offensive if she refrained from such grade-school nonsense and simply said she wanted to check out this dude’s dick. Then again, doing so doesn’t rhyme as well as peacock and bi-atch, does it…? [Culture Bully]

The Songwriting:

However, to this day what continues to separate Perry from her contemporaries isn’t her sound as much as it is her hands-on approach to the actual songwriting behind her albums—with Teenage Dream there isn’t a single track where she doesn’t receive a songwriting credit. No matter where you stand on any other aspect of the album, Perry should definitely be praised for that, especially when she could have easily relaxed on that front and gone with whatever was put on her plate. The only issue is that the end product, regardless of who’s behind it, is so predictable that Teenage Dream only goes to further suppress the idea that she was much of a singer/songwriter to begin with (not that “Ur So Gay” was all that dynamic a song). [Culture Bully]

Overall:

Lady Gaga has all but cornered the market on Madonna comparisons lately, but Teenage Dream (* * * out of four) makes a strong case that Katy Perry could be a truer creative descendant. Lest we forget, what made Ms. Ciccone a pop icon in the first place wasn’t her considerable gifts as a provocateuse — it was her affinity for singles that combined sumptuous hooks with lyrics that addressed the joys and challenges of love from a distinctly candid, distinctly female perspective. [USA Today]

Teenage Dream hits shelves Tuesday, August 24th.

What do you think? Does it sound like the album is worth your time or money?