Frank Kogan

My P&J ballot is due in less than a week, and while I'm struggling to keep my singles shortlist under 100, I'm also struggling to come up with a really good albums list (though it's already way better than last year's). ( Dishwasher ) Anyhow, here are my four certainties, plus some prime candidates, a few of which I've listened to more than once.

Top Four:
1. Ke$ha Animal (RCA)
2. E.via Must Have EP (Dline Art Media)
3. The-Dream Love King (Radio Killa/Def Jam)
4. Various Artists Ayobaness! (The Sound Of South African House) (Out Here)

( Candidates )

( Pending )

( Reissues )

The-Dream is a brilliantly galling combination of Mick Jagger and Michael Jackson, and if his voice were more than one-fifth as good as either of theirs he'd be the best thing in history. As it is, he gets to me anyway, basically all the time now. I don't feel a drop-off from his last album at all. Makes his lush lovers' tracks edgy and rambunctious, just like his edgy and rambunctious tracks. When he goes, "I'll never be the hot actor, I'm too cold," he probably only means he's not topping anyone's name-recognition list, but I like to think he's also referring to the piercing icicles of his mind.

Rihanna's Loud and Robyn's Body Talk turned out better than their singles had made me fear, and Ne-Yo's Libra Scale turned out worse than the singles had caused me to hope. As I said when "Only Girl (In The World)" came out, Rihanna sings the sweet seductive parts with beautiful precision. She's got a basic command in her delivery even when she's being as anonymous as can be, and none of the other tracks on the album ruin themselves with the dance pulverization that wrecked "Only Girl"'s chorus. Is good-to-great bubblegum, the old roughness and sorrow that spill into her voice just making for stronger bubbles. Best tracks: "Man Down," "S&M," "Love The Way You Lie," "Skin."

I'm only on my first impression of Body Talk. Its weakness relative to Robyn 2005 is that back then she and Åhlund had cleared out the arrangements so as to allow her cute and grating voice to make its own rules. Whereas now she's got more full-and-balanced tracks, and the voice feels like an element that doesn't necessarily belong. The Röyksopp tracks work best 'cause they provide severe electronic cliffs for her to scratch her way up.

Ne-Yo's album simply doesn't have enough good tunes, and his delicate connoisseurs' voice isn't sufficient to carry the rest. (One hearing only, however.)

Robyn, Paula, Enrique, Beyoncé, Heidi Montag, Mira Craig, Beth Ditto, Yung Berg, Ashley Tisdale, and lots about Aly & A.J.

The Rules Of The Game #20: Fleshy Women, Slimy Men, Smart Teens

Two questions: (1) Of all the songs I've been championing, why is "Potential Breakup Song" the one that's struck the biggest chord with you folks, that's become our miniature cause célèbre? (2) Why do some of us care so much that it gets airplay and breaks through to the general pop audience? What does it represent? What's at stake?

I read this column to the people in my writers group last night, some of whom got excited when I quoted the line from "Potential Breakup Song," and thought the song was terrific when I played it for them (at least the women did). My friend Ken said that it's got elements that remind him of Del Shannon. (When I think about it I can hear a family resemblance between its opening riff and the opening to Runaway. And PBUS's bass line does have something of a rockabilly boogie in it.)

( Links to my other Rules Of The Game columns )