Adam Lambert NewNowNext Awards Arrivals - H 2012
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After the glam rocker skyrocketed to fame as a runner-up on American Idol in 2009, Adam Lambert quickly released his hugely successful debut album, For Your Entertainment. The release debuted at No. 3 on the Billboard charts, and Lambert has continued on to earn a slew nominations and awards.
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On Tuesday, Lambert will release his highly-anticipated sophomore album, Trespassing, on which he served as executive producer and co-wrote many of the songs.
Reviews for Trespassing have been mostly positive, with many claiming a vast improvement over his first effort.
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Billboard: While it is rare for an artist to executive-produce his or her own release, Lambert, the flamboyant season eight American Idol runner-up, insisted on having full creative control of what he admits could be the decisive album of his career, his moment to prove himself as more than a TV-fueled seasonal sensation. (Billboard also hosted a live Q & A session with Lambert on May 14.)
L.A. Times: Lambert moves away from the guitar-heavy ‘For Your Entertainment’ (which he called “my version of glam rock”) toward a sleeker electro-disco sound in keeping with dance music’s takeover of mainstream pop.
Associated Press: Trespassing is evenly divided between club-ready rhythmic pop tracks and a collection of moody melodic showcases for the vocal acrobatics that made Lambert a front-runner on the eighth season of Idol.
USA Today: Trespassing (*** out of four) is the album that fans of the former American Idol runner-up have been wanting from him. More cohesive and personal than 2010’s For Your Entertainment, it finds Lambert drawn to the beats and sounds of EDM, combining over-the-top dance grooves with multi-tracked vocal marvels.
NY Daily News: As serviceably catchy as most of the songs may be, it’s only Lambert’s performance that raises them above radio fodder. His vocal attack remains a dizzying mix of the awesome and the absurd. For “Kickin’ In,” — whose lyrics provide Lambert’s only semi-gay allusion, involving a proposed three-way — he shrieks like someone just dropped a TV set on his toe. In “Underneath,” the album’s sole ballad, Lambert belts the notes with a rock-operatic flourish, like some demented mix of Freddie Mercury, Ian Gillan and Ethel Merman.
HitFix: Every so often an artist makes an album that brims over with not so much confidence as the feeling that he has left absolutely nothing on the studio floor. Trespassing is one of those efforts. It feels like every bit of Lambert’s heart, soul, ambition and sweat went into its creation. Such efforts can be a mess of too much of everything, and restraint has never been Lambert’s strong suit, but his tendency toward excess serves him well here.
STORY: Adam Lambert to Perform on ‘American Idol’ May 17
Lambert seems to think his album will surprise.
“I do feel that sonically, lyrically and emotionally, this album is a surprise for people – and myself,” he told AP in an interview.
The singer is scheduled to perform on American Idol May 17. Then play five shows with Queen in July. It is even rumored that Freddie Mercury will appear on stage similar to the Tupac hollogram at the Coachella music festival.
For more from THR’s Adam Lambert Week, click over to the Idol Worship blog.
