I Get Around - K'jon

Aug 11, 2009 12:08 pm

Long-hustling Detroit native K'Jon makes no attempt to conceal the considerable legwork he's put into his major-label debut.

When K'Jon languorously croons "I'm finally gettin' around" on the title track of his 2009 debut slab I Get Around, he's putting it lightly. The Detroit native worked the streets and radio stations of his hometown for over a decade before getting his major-label national stage. And, like Anthony Hamilton and so many others before him, the years of hustle pour out in the singer's impassioned voice. When he intones "I just want you so bad/it just seems so real" in the intro to the torch song "On the Ocean," it should be a cliché, but there's a hunger behind his words of desire giving them power. An otherworldly '70s vibe pours out of K'Jon on the first half of I Get Around, a late-night AM radio tenor of passion and seduction and sex and discarded liquor bottles; the molasses-slow "Fa Sho" even references Marvin Gaye's "I Want You" with its background scat. The title track, with its smooth soul, carefree vocals, and jazzy backdrop, conjures up domino players in front of a stone stoop on any summer's day. Any hints of aughts brand neo-soul are slight; even the subtle apparent Auto-Tune on trouble-man song "Fly Away" could easily be a Zapp-style vocoder, and the robotic synths are straight out of the pop-funk playbooks of Rufus or Shalamar. Unfortunately, there's a block of songs starting with "After the Club" where K'Jon tries his hand at more modern street jams (although he's still mostly laid-back), and he sounds, at best, drab and uninspired, at worst, wholly out of his element. Luckily, he brings the past and present on "On Everything," a spare track which mixes a sinister, slightly chopped, and a bit screwed beat with a beautiful piano hook, and the perfect bedroom-eyed vocals, buoyed by the requisite guest rap (this time by Seven the General). I Get Around is by no means original, and often gets lost, but K'Jon at his best combines the sensual prowess of Barry White with the sadness-in-struggle of Bill Withers, dropping a dash of deep soul into the heart of the Auto-Tune generation. ~ Jason Thurston, All Music Guide