No matter If you are a big fan of mainstream music or not, you probably appreciate when your favorite musician makes an effort to step out of his comfort zone and creates something that sounds at least a little bit different than anything else on the radio. Lovers of mainstream pop have appreciated the previous album by John Legend titled Love in the Future. It. The album turned out to be clairvoyant as Legend started a family after his wife gave birth. On the professional side, Love in the Future didn’t turn out to be crystal gazer as its successor Darkness and Light a significantly weaker effort.
There are not many words to write about Darkness and Light. Still, John Legend is playing on his court. These pop-soul songs witness the domination of his authentic vocal, but melodies are not on the same level as those from his discography. In my opinion, they are very banal and irritating. Besides the single Love Me Now and gigantic hit All Of Me, the whole albums sound hackneyed, obsolete and tedious. Legend was supported by Matt Sweeny and Bonnie Prince Billy, but that support did not always result in success. I Know Better is torturing itself with silky arrangement, while the title sound evokes memories of another Prince.
Arrangements and production are familiar. No big surprises here. Even though it is obvious that Legend have tried to refresh things up with the bunch of new collaborators, the final product offers visible absence of inspiration. John sipped anger in every glass, but the glass ended up being empty.
Bonus tracks on extended version of the album leave better impression that the regular album. Drawing Lines and What You Do To Me in demo version offer more than most of the official songs. How Can I Blame You might be victorious in reaching someone’s sentive soul, but I am pretty sure that the rest will leave everyone sighing in boredom. My biggest problem with this album that is comes off as not personal. Considering that this is an artist who had emotion and quality of someone like Adele. Meanwhile, Adele released non-impressive 25, so John Legend is not alone. I wish him better luck next time.
