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Hot on the heels of his Super Bowl half-time TayTay show — a dizzying circus which saw the man rollerskating in the ring while ripping his shirt off to the strains of his 2010 hit OMG — comes Usher’s ninth studio album, Coming Home. It’s a sprawling sexpedition with observations on the theme of being the good guy, just out for love, but also the good guy who happens to be an incorrigible horndog. Usher’s muscularity over silken R&B defines him, and while this is the same sexed-up terrain he has always trodden, he finds ways to bank these tropes so they somehow still feel fresh. Take A-Town Girl: basically Billy Joel’s Up Town Girl, hijacked and driven, in the back seat of his car, to his hometown Atlanta. It’s a double take-inducing curveball for the ages, which is at once hilarious and flooring, and I can imagine no other artist alive being able to pull it off. Prince’s influence looms large, in the chronic shirtlessness and the bass-slapped funk of tracks I Love U and Please U (not to mention his love of the stand-alone capital letter). While maintaining quality control over 20 songs was always going to be a tall order, Coming Home throws out enough ideas to still feel impressive.
In the words of the man himself: “We ain’t good-good, but we still good.”