Album Review: B.O.B - Strange Clouds

It starts strongly enough. Morgan Freeman, backed by strings, is as good a way to begin an album as ever. And when B.O.B starts throwing down his first verse, all seems fine. With venom he spits his rhymes with Eminem's fury, culminating in a catchy chorus that screams 'impressionable youths, I am your mouthpiece'. Digging deeper into the lyrics though, the realisation hits that there is actually very little there. “Whenever I wake up/I get this feeling/That I can't wait up/'Cause time is ticking/Bombs away” – awesome.

And from there, it's pretty much a case of wash, rinse, repeat. In the second track Ray Bands it's as though B.O.B is getting paid commission every time he drops a certain sunglasses brand, and the fact that Chris Brown features anywhere here, let alone singing the words “Damn, I'm killin' em”, is shameful.

In saying that, single Both Of Us featuring Taylor Swift is a guilty pleasure, and cameos by Nicki Minaj (Out Of My Mind) and Lil Wayne (Strange Clouds) are unsurprisingly a couple of other highlights. With an average song length of four-plus minutes, B.O.B's willingness to push past the straight-up, Black Eyed Peas-esque pop songs is worthy of a mention, although sometimes it leaves tracks such as Out Of My Mind finishing anti-climactically.

Strange Clouds is a little pithy. B.O.B aims for the clouds, and after his 2010 debut record peaked at number one in America it's fair enough that he does. It's just a little bit too saccharine sweet. You'll find it filling floors at your local Top 40/R&B night (and Big Day Out 2013 – WTF?), just maybe not in your headphones.