In a rather alarming trend, more and more R&B singers seem to be abandoning the genre to make straight ahead pop tunes.
Akon was one of the first to probably totally whitewash (see what I did there?) his sound to make it more palatable to pop audiences, going from the gritty “Locked Up” to the David Guetta produced fist-pump anthem “Sexy B***h.” Then you have Usher, whose latest single “OMG” is about as far away from R&B as the singer has ever gone.
Ne-Yo’s always walked a fine line between R&B and Pop, thanks to his collaborations with Norwegian production team Stargate. But on his latest single, “Beautiful Monster,” (which, from the title, seems like it should’ve been a Lady Gaga/Beyonce mash-up) Ne-Yo foregoes any attempt at being an R&B singer and is catering solely to Snooki and crew.
