Once Again [Import]

John Legend | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (October 24, 2006)
• Original Release Date: 2006
• Number of Discs: 1
• Format: Import
• Label: G.O.O.D. MUSIC/ Sony Urban Music/ Columbia
• ASIN: B000HCPWZO
• Also Available in: Audio CD  |  MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (230 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,150 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)
  • #45 in Music > R&B > Contemporary R&B

Track Listings

1. Save Room

2. Heaven

3. Stereo

4. Show Me

5. Each Day Gets Better

6. P.D.A. (We Just Don't Care)

7. Slow Dance

8. Again

9. Maxine

10. Where Did My Baby Go

11. Maxine's Interlude

12. Another Again

13. Coming Home

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com

It takes guts, if not outright egomania, to abandon your given surname and adopt a loaded one like Legend, but the former John Stephens must have sensed that loftiness would one day be his calling card: Once Again, the follow-up to the Grammy-gobbling, platinum pile-on that was Get Lifted, surpasses expectations. Not that it bears much relation to its predecessor. Again again trots out a stable of talented, modern-minded producers--Raphael Saadiq, Legend comrade Kanye West, and the unsinkable will.i.am--but it's nowhere near as self-conscious about embracing the old-school as the knowing, R&B edge-skimming Lifted. Don't expect a derivative mash of smudgy, nostalgia-filching sounds, though, because despite its retro leanings, what's in store somehow crackles with currency. Call it neo-retro if you must, but never call it unimaginative: first single "Save Room" coasts, drifts, and floats along a ponderous path spiked by a cool keyboard-y crescendo; second single "Heaven" busts out a big, busy beat over a slow seduction; and a couple of selections--"Each Day Gets Better" and "PDA"--are so bright and twirly they seem custom-made for dizzy love scenes or jaunty, sunny-day skips through the park. Maybe the most unusual track is "Show Me," a rock song that pilfers elements of Hendrix and finds Legend climbing a few octaves to sound, weirdly, like Jeff Buckley, but it works: so slippery is its beat and so affecting are its hope-laced lyrics that, oddness aside, it's among the disc's best. Sandwiched as it is among 14 songs that all sound like future classics, that's saying something. --Tammy La Gorce

More Legendary Music

Get Lifted

Get Lifted/Live at the House of Blues (CD/DVD)

Live at the House of Blues (DVD)

Product Description

Other

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

31 of 34 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars RETRO-SOUL CHARM, October 29, 2006

By 

Y. Dharnidharka "D" (Middlebury, VT USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Once Again (Audio CD)

"Once Again", John's new album, is many things, chief among them, it's a pop/soul album fueled by intelligence, intuition, sensuality, spirit and a creativity made possible when which includes Raphael Saadiq, Kanye West, Craig Street and will.i.am, who brought the lead single, 'Save Room' to John.

Breezy and sexy, 'Save Room' is a joyful, cool love song, inspired by an old AM radio single, 'Stormy', by the Classics IV (a 60's Top 40 band best-known for 'Spooky').
Even more so than he did on 'Get Lifted', John went boldly in his own creative direction on 'Once Again', opting to write, not from a marketing standpoint, but from his heart and soul and personal experience.

Laced with a somewhat more dramatic flair is the mid-tempo 'Where Did My Baby Go'. John takes a somewhat political perspective on the stately 'Coming Home'.

Relationship ups and downs are the subject of the swaying Kanye West-produced 'Heaven Only Knows'.

'Show Me', which John cites as one of his favorites, is hushed, haunting and deliberately ambiguous (co-produced by Raphael Saadiq and Craig Street ).

Just as Kanye West tows hip-hop along a more cerebral path, so his protege (and fellow college boy) John Legend prefers master-crafted, soulful R&B to the bump, grind and glitter of his contemporaries.

Like his Grammy-winnning debut "Get Lifted", this impeccably produced follow-up runs a knowing gamut of styles and eras, taking in Motown, crooning, polished pop and even a hint of bossa nova.

You can forgive Legend's showtune and piano lounge moments for his gorgeous, lived-in voice. Whether whispering mournfully on 'Show Me' or giving it the come-hither purr on 'Slow Dance', it gently nudges the heart into submission.

16 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Save room for more Grammys, October 24, 2006

By 

Amanda Richards (Georgetown, Guyana) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Once Again (Audio CD)

Just when you thought it was safe to come back down to earth after you got lifted two years ago, back comes Legend like a breath of fresh air to send your spirits soaring once again.

Face it folks, this is as smooth and mellow as R&B/Soul is ever gonna get, and this is a perfect album to get for that workaholic friend or family member who really needs to take some time to sit back and experience some good music.

First single "Save Room" needs no further introduction, and is one of the best R&B songs this year so far, but don't underestimate the rest of the album. Second single "Heaven" takes up the pace a bit with a nice little jazzy groove, and then he goes a tad Hip Hop with "Stereo" (Note: turn yours up). "Show Me" is a smooth fusion of R&B and rock, and then it's retro time with "Each Day Gets Better" which reminds me of the Eagles' "Best of My Love".

A nice piano intro brings in the romantic "P.D.A. (We Just Don't Care)", and then it's way, way back in time to the days of Sam Cooke and company for "Slow Dance". After a quiet interlude with "Again", we get served a back-to-back pair of songs that can carry the album all by themselves. I'm talking about "Maxine" and my favorite track "Where Did My Baby Go", and I'll be very disappointed if the latter doesn't make it to hit single status. "Maxine's Interlude" gives a little breathing space before the album comes to an end in grand style with "Another Again" and the excellent "Coming Home".

Versatile, talented, and with a voice that gets way down and tugs your heart strings, Legend proves that he's no mere urban myth.



Amanda Richards, October 24, 2006

11 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Exceptional; As good, if not better, than the first, October 28, 2006

By 

Michael Brent Faulkner, Jr. "Brent Faulkner" (Kentucky) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Once Again (Audio CD)

John Legend is a rare breed of talent in the music business, more particularly the R&B industry today; he is unafraid to indulge into the soulful sound of R&B prominent in the 1960s and the 1970s. While GET LIFTED was an excellent portrait of anachronistic soul music in the twenty-first century, ONCE AGAIN just might be an even more soulful example than its predecessor. It is hard to say that ONCE AGAIN is better than the platinum, Grammy-winning debut, but it certainly is on equal footing if it isn't more daring than the exceptional debut.

The album opens up strong with haunting first single, the soul wrenching "Save Room" which features a very vintage sounding production coupled with sample "Stormy". The effect initially seemed a bit bland to me when I first heard "Save Room", but it has grown on me to a point that I really dig what Legend is doing as a musician.

Just as amazing is the second track "Heaven", which features a sample from soul classic "Heaven Knows". The Kanye West produced track features infectious, soulful repetition of the line "heaven only knows, heaven only knnows". Legend here sounds as soulful as he has ever sounds, especially coupled with West's great hip-hop drum programming giving this track both a retro and contemporary feel.

"Stereo", track three, features some of the most creative songwriting I've seen in a while. The drum programming is incredibly hard, for a soul track particularly making it have the "oomph" of classic soul music with a "dash" of "2006" as well. The organ adds a whole other dimension to the music and the bass line is incredibly deep and "bumping" for lack of better words. The chorus is incredibly catchy when Legend sings: "her favorite colors be platinum & gold, she only love in stereo, she only love in stereo...".

"Show Me" is an uncharacteristic sounding Legend track where Legend particularly sounds like a singer-songwriter. For another musician, this feat may have bombed horribly, but Legend sounds exceptional here and the production work by Raphael Saadiq works perfectly here helming perhaps one of Legend's best, most potent tracks ever. "Each Day Gets Better" features soul sample "In These Changing Times" and maintains the soulful nature of the grand 70s. Legend falsetto is particular strong here and the resonance of his voice is chilling and astounding! Again, it is the fifth straight consistent number in a row.

Who would've thought to write a song about "Public Display of Affection"? John Legend does and it makes for one of the most soulful tracks of the album with strong instrumental backgrounds and exceptionally strong vocals by Legend. On "P.D.A. (We Just Don't Care)", Legend sings so easily without straining his vocals or without using an overabundance of melisma and it is just a stunning effect. "Slow Dance" possesses one of the truest vintage feels of the album that screams 1960s soul specifically. The guitars sound great and Legends great pianistic skills here truly add the "cherry on top". Definitely one of my very favorites.

While every R&B artist somehow incorporates "sex" into their songs, Legend does it more tastefully, or maybe it is just more "credible" in a sense. Listening to "Again", Legend gives the situation of having sex over and over when he meant to stop after just one time. Sure, it's a track about sex, but it's not as ghetto or dirty as a number of other tracks in the same vein. It is just as soulful and as refined as all of Legend's other tracks on this very exceptional album. The minimalism here hearkens back to Legends "ace" "Ordinary People".

"Maxine" is another stellar track with percussion here given it a little bit of a different flavor than the other tracks. The production work is as strong as any on ONCE AGAIN. The last couple of tracks on ONCE AGAIN aren't as stellar per say as the rest, but none of them are bad and they are all worth listening to repeatedly. "Where Did My Baby Go" may not have the same punch as "Stereo", but it is definitely stronger than most of the other R&B tracks out from different artists. Skipping over "Maxine's Interlude", "Another Again" possesses a very nice sound overall that is lush and the soulful feel hearkens back to a vintage songwriting/production work by Gamble & Huff for say Teddy Pendergrass. "Coming Home" closes the album. It is a very nice closing track featuring Legend's piano skills coupled with some very beautiful string writing here; it is another beautifully, masterfully-done collaboration between Legend and Black Eyed Peas frontman/producer Will Adams aka Will.i.am.

Overall, Legend has brought the "heat" for the second time, and it just may be stronger than the first time. With the so proclaimed "curse" of winning Best New Artist, Legend doesn't seem to have any problems producing new material as strong and potent as his last nor does he seem to have a lack of fanbase. I personally think this album may be one of the strongest R&B albums of 2006, ranking up with the best of the best.
This one is close to perfect in my eyes.