Review Summary: Tell Me You Love Me: How Demi grows musically out of a warm pop to a strong R&B where she expresses her highest feelings.
When Demi Lovato released the first single from her new album a few months ago - the vengeful "Sorry Not Sorry" - she made it clear that her next job would invest in pinpricks everywhere. The song was well accepted, entering the TOP 10 of the Hot 100, but the question remained whether the rest of Tell Me You Love Me would follow the same path.
And the answer is yes. Lovato came with both feet on the chest of ex-boyfriends, haters, fake friends and all sorts of disaffection that makes the life of a pop star so unpleasant - as it has become standard in the niche of pop singers in the musical showbiz. If in "Sorry Not Sorry" she made it clear that "I'm fine now and I'm not sorry that you do not like your life", the rest of the album continues the journey of this mixture of revenge and empowerment with impeccable production - wait - and full of effects to pack the acidic letters she's prepared.
Aretha Franklin and Christina Aguilera were, according to Lovato herself, the biggest influences for this new work, which comes with weight in R & B and soul music, but always with many electronic signatures tempering everything. The mix works most of the time and, in songs like the title track, it surprises with powerful vocals in an intense ballad with the right metal and the sounds of palms.
Ironically, it is one of the few moments of the album where the singer lowers her guard and admits she needs someone, but soon after she already pours her acidity in "You Do not Do It For Me Anymore", where mercilessly ends without giving motives and making a point of saying that that person simply does not serve anymore. The arrangement with violins favors his vocal acrobatics and is one of the songs with more potential of the whole disc.
"Sexy Dirty Love" is more spicy. Almost explicit, Lovato cries out for an intense, uncompromising night aided by a loud crash and an explosive chorus. "Daddy Issues" brings a nervous metallica and exposes a difficult relationship between Lovato and his father, while "Ruin the Friendship" is yet another daring provocation to the most inconsequential. Again the metals appear at full steam, complementing with taste the base pop.
"Cry Baby" and "Lonely" follow the same line and are full of acid messages and swearing all over the place, and in the latter she has the help of rapper Lil 'Wayne, to reinforce the pinfall and receive that gangsta Lovato's generation has also searched more often.
Tell Me You Love Me is a surgically crafted product to please fans and make their headsets explode with strong beats and ripped brass. The songs remain provocative and now have gained a greater weight in acidity, reflecting a new confident posture of Lovato's life.
- Sources and Credits: Omelete; GabrielSantos
