Today, Joe Jonas unleashed his debut solo single upon the world: “See No More.” So, how is it?

It’s good! It’s very, very good.

Produced by Brian Kennedy and co-penned by Chris Brown, “See No More” is a modern, aching Ryan Tedder-esque power-pop/R&B ballad: “All I keep seeing is your picture / But I don’t want to see no more,” Jonas cries above the slow stomping beat. The song is very much born of the typical boy band-gone-solo tradition a la Nick Lachey or Nick Carter, albeit with a far more modern electronica undercurrent.

While “See No More” certainly pulls no surprise punches as far as production, it’s still an incredibly solid pop song, growing catchier with each replay. I’d truly be shocked if we don’t see this one immediately climbing the radio playlists worldwide this summer.

Go Joe, go!

Stream courtesy of Ali’s Blog.

“See No More” will be released on June 13.

Joe Jonas–perhaps better known ’round these parts as my future husband (TO THE LEFT, JOE MCELDERRY*)–will be releasing “See No More,” the first single from his upcoming solo campaign, on June 3.

From the press release:

San Diego, CA — Joe Jonas will release his debut single as a solo artist, “See No More,” on June 3rd. The highly anticipated debut solo album on Hollywood Records will be in stores on September 6, 2011 and will feature production by Danja, Brian Kennedy and Rob Knox. “See No More” was co-written by Joe Jonas and Chris Brown and produced by Brian Kennedy. The song will be available digitally for sale on June 13th.

“Working on this album has been a rewarding but intense experience. ‘See No More’ especially carries a lot of personal emotions with it and I am hoping people listening to it will get a sense of where I’m coming from with this new sound,” says Joe Jonas. “I’ve had an awesome team working with me on the music and I am excited, anxious, but more importantly… ready… to share it all with my fans. It’s as much for them as it is for me.”

Brian Kennedy is responsible for producing some majorly MuuMuse Approved favorites, including Rihanna‘s “Disturbia” and “Fire Bomb,” Chris Brown‘s “Forever,” BoA‘s “Obsessed” and Jessica Mauboy’s “Saturday Night.”

“See No More” will premiere to radio on June 3, followed by a digital release on June 13. His debut solo album will be released on September 6.

After his album’s launch, Jonas will reportedly whisk me away to a castle in the countryside where we will eat Oreos together and pour boiling water on tweenage Jonas fan-girls attempting to breach the manor with pitchforks fashioned out of old issues of J-14.**

MY BODY IS READY.

*You can still watch if you want, though.
**MuuMuse Excluusive.

AMAZING SINGLE SELECTION ALERT!

Keri Hilson is set to shoot a video for “Lose Control (feat. Nelly),” one of the smoothest cuts off of her sophomore record, No Boys Allowed.

The video will be helmed by Colin Tilley, the same director responsible for such clips as Hilson’s “One Night Stand (feat. Chris Brown),” Shontelle‘s “Perfect Nightmare” and Ciara‘s “Speechless.”

Get it, Miss Keri Baby!

For an album called No Boys Allowed, there sure are a lot of boys that came to play inside Miss Keri Baby‘s clubhouse.

Though she’s tried at length to explain her new album’s title–that No Boys Allowed a “no bitch ass-ness” kind of empowerment collection about ditching the little boys and uplifting women, it’s hard to drive that point home when the album’s guest-list is exclusively filled with men–especially when one of them is Chris Brown.

But putting the album title-content conflict aside, Miss Keri Baby has produced a worthy follow-up to her excellent and underrated 2009 debut, In A Perfect World… with No Boys Allowed, released on December 21.

Read More…

FORWARD…MARCH!

Here at MuuMuse, we’ve got our guns, got our guns, we got our guns in the mothafuckin’ ayuh. Why? Because it’s time for the premiere of Rihannoir‘s “Hard.”

There are explosions. There are spikes. There is a surplus in sass-talking, shoulder pads, and duct-taped nipples…and that’s just the first two minutes!

There is also mud-rolling, and a flash of army men playing cards and betting chips (WHICH IS A LOT LIKE A CONTINUATION OF RUSSIAN ROULETTE WHEN YOU THINK ABOUT IT.)

At the delicious 2:12 mark, Riri takes aim where it hurts: Making the hand gesture that means ‘You have a tiny penis.’ Because as we now well know, Rihanna is a size queen…so it probably has something to do with C. Brown‘s penis. I’m literally just guessing at this point.

And I haven’t even BEGUN to analyze the multi-layered gender studies-ready reading of the straddling-a-pink-turret-while-wearing-Mickey-Mouse-combat-helmet moment at the 2:40 mark. Sacrefreud!

But THEN , just when you think it could not get any better, she defies ALL of my expectations at the 3:30 mark and, during the “Where dem’ bloggas at?” section, PRETENDS TO BE TYPING ON A KEYBOARD. IT IS LIKE SHE IS TALKING DIRECTLY TO ME.

This video is literally too good to be true. I need to lie down.

Forget the military’s “Army of One” recruiting campaigns…this is all they’ll ever need.

Viva la Rihannoir!

In the aftermath of the Chris Brown incident, Rated R could have gone one of three ways for Rihanna: A schlocky, inspirational ballad-filled account of her experience, an ignorance-is-bliss continuation of her winning 2008 dancefloor formula, or something much, much more daring than anything she’s ever done before. Lucky enough for us, she’s gone ahead with the latter.

Rated R finds the singer in a dark place. One needs look no further than the moody, high contrast Ellen von Unwerth-shot promotional photos for the album that feature the singer in a variety of S&M-lite poses, pointing her fingers like a gun and taking aim toward the camera in a skin-tight corset and standing bare-breasted within a lasso of barbed wire. In her video for “Russian Roulette,” the camera flashes between scenes of her partaking in the deadly game of chance to inside a padded cell, awaiting execution in the aftermath of the game.

She’s in a murderous mood for sure, which is why at a certain point I began referencing the artist by a new, more fitting nickname: “Rihannoir.”

Trading in her umbrella for a few gats and a razor sharp tongue, Rihanna’s weapons of choice have evolved significantly over the past year as she goes on the offensive for a large part of Rated R. Lyrically, Rihanna has all but rejected the meaningless dancefloor romps like “Don’t Stop the Music” and “S.O.S.,” instead greeting us with an in-your-face attitude, ballsy statements and sarcastic quips: “I’m such a fucking lady,” she taunts on top the repetitive, winding thuds of buzz single, “Wait Your Turn.”

On the roughest of cuts, including the menacingly paced “G4L,” Rihanna let’s loose a deluge of blood-chilling statements: “I lick the gun when I’m done, ’cause I know that revenge is sweet,” she purrs before the song begins before later announcing “We got our guns, got our guns / We got our guns in the motherfucking air.”

“Hard” finds Rihanna at her most defiant, pulling out all the stops to prove just why she’s so…well, hard: “I’ma rock this shit like fashion, as in goin’ til they say stop / And my runway never looked so clear / But the hottest bitch in heels right here,” she proudly proclaims over a grinding series of industrial beats, horns, and piano chords. Regardless of whether one is inclined to accept Riri’s new-found street cred, it’s all but impossible not to want to play along in the meantime.

Photo courtesy of Ultimate-Rihanna.com.

The album isn’t completely icy however, as the artist breaks down her defenses more than a few times for a series of introspective, though somewhat uneven jams. “Stupid in Love” is both the album’s only traditional ballad and also the most skippable part of Rated R, as the singer plods through a somewhat embarrassing chorus: “This is stupid / I’m not stupid / Don’t talk to me like I’m stupid.” Other slow numbers, including the masterful, six-minute “Cold Case Love” and the guitar-heavy “Fire Bomb” all offer subtle clues as to how she’s feeling: “Your love was breaking the law, but I needed a witness / So wake me up when it’s over, it don’t make any difference,” she coos through “Cold Case Love.”

But if anything’s meant for Brown, it’s the soaring, gut-wrenching “The Last Song,” the album’s outro which may also go down as Rihanna’s most overlooked, artistic piece of work yet.

This album is not, however, the confessional many thought it might have been. In fact, Rihanna delves into a host of other topics and issues including the triple-take worthy “Te Amo,” which follows a female suitor’s unsuccessful attempts for the singer’s affections atop a swaying, Latin beat. “I’m all for feeling the love, but I don’t feel that way,” Rihanna pleads as the song’s bridge fades. Be it the young singer’s first foray into lyrically exploring her sexuality or simply a not-so-subtle round of homophobia, “Te Amo” proves about as earnest in its replay value as Rihanna’s unrequited love.

Whatever Rated R lacks in synthesizers and dancefloor vagueries is more than made up for in “Rude Boy,” the only dance-oriented number of the album. Grinding, grooving and downright filthy, “Rude Boy” is destined to be the album’s best kept secret, meshing the island sway from her Music of the Sun days with the naughtiest come-ons that Rihanna has ever brought into the recording booth: “I like when you tell me kiss it there, I like when you tell me move it there /So giddy up, Time to get it up / You say you’re a rude boy, show me what you got now.”

From an artist who already has enough trouble making “Disturbia” seem thrilling in front of a live audience, the moody, at times beatless contents of Rated R have made for quite possibly the worst concert experience of all time.

Yet as a body of work in its own right, Rihanna’s fourth studio album provides the Barbados-born songstress her transition from fleeting radio obsession to legitimate pop icon in the making. The album is immensely listenable from start to finish; one of the most delightfully unexpected major label releases of the year and certainly her best record to date.

Though Rated R is not nearly as commercially viable or even as accessible as her past three records, the album offers a taste of what Madonna‘s Bedtime Stories and Kylie Minogue‘s Impossible Princess provided in their under appreciated, experimental production value–a distinction that may not make itself apparent until years down the line.

Congratulations Rihanna, you’ve assembled the first few pieces of your new throne.

Purchase Rated R on iTunes | MySpace | Official Website

Everyone loves an underdog. Everyone loves a superstar. But almost no one’s got love for an underdog superstar.

That’s about how I’d describe Ciara, the 23-year-old R&B sensation responsible for eight top ten singles and roughly ten million albums sold in just five years. Still, despite an impressive chart record and a lasting presence in the industry, the songstress continues to face the crippling blow of the shadow–that dreaded, overbearing presence brought upon by enough comparisons to her contemporaries to recall the bubble-gum blonde diva duels of the ’90′s (Willa Ford, you will be missed). And while her latest outing, Fantasy Ride, will likely provide no help in separating CiCi from RiRi (and I dare say, from Beysus), it’s worthy enough to merit attention in its own right.

On paper alone, the album already reads like a smash: From Missy Elliot to Darkchild, Dr. Luke to Danja, Ludacris to T-Pain, The Clutch and Chris Brown (gasp, boo, hiss, etc.), the girl’s simply got it written in the stars (well, by the stars, for that matter). But as you might have expected from such an expansive guest list, the music gets a bit messy sometimes. In fact, the only thing keeping this Ride from complete lift-off is the noisy overproduction on almost every track.

Still, much of the album’s got the grit to inspire more than just a little sweat: The Missy Misdemeanor-fueled “Work” and the super swagged “Pucker Up” are the purest definitions of club bangers, while “G Is For Girl (A-Z)” promises to be C’s best attempt at ‘tude yet: “N is for nothing, boy I do this in my sleep / O is for original, cause I’mma O.G.” She’s not nearly “gangsta” enough for me to buy the act, but with that crunchy clang-a-lang beat, I don’t really care if she’s as hood as Asher Roth.

As we’ve gathered from the excellence that was “The Promise” off her last album, C knows how to command a ballad. Well. With an Aaliyah-like disjointedness, she tip-toes along “Like A Surgeon,” floats all over the lush mid-tempo chill of “Keep Dancin’ On Me,” and swoons atop the fluttery “Lover’s Thing”–all while making sure to obey the restrictions of her vocal capacity.

The momentum doesn’t entirely hold: Though the general public may disagree, the insipidity of current smash “Love, Sex, & Magic” fails to inspire any joy on my end, while the sleepy “Never Ever” (which samples 1972 Harold Melvin & the Blue Notes hit “If You Don’t Know Me By Now”) quickly stalls after the chorus fades for the first time.

Fantasy Ride isn’t quite the stuff of fantasies, nor is smooth sailing throughout. But with a hot string of floor burners and some truly killer baby makin’ grinders, it’s probably one of the better trips I’ve taken this year.

PS: Make sure you’re getting the deluxe editions when you order–”Echo” and “I’m On” are highlights, and leaving them off of the original tracklisting was a criminal decision!

Ciara’s Fantasy Ride was released on Jive Records on May 5. Click below to preview and purchase NOW!

A few days ago, NME reported that Rihanna and Chris Brown had teamed up in the studio for an upcoming duet, a story I initially declared too good to be true.

Well, I was right. The publicist for Polow Da Don got tangled up in a big ol’ lie thanks to TMZ. Here’s what was first reported:

Three people from TMZ then contacted Polow Da Don’s publicist, who not only said the E! story was true but gave us details — that Chris and Rihanna were engaged in “playful touching” and the session was packed with “emotion.”

But now, the publicist’s story changed:

We’ve now learned it was B.S. — Brown was in the studio last weekend, but he was not with Rihanna, and the producer is not Polow Da Don. Now Wright says she was really referring to a song Rihanna recorded in the past — but that ain’t what she said before.

THANK GOODNESS.

Rihanna was spotted in New York City last night, miles away from Brown’s location. Perhaps she really does have an in-group dedicated to well-being, rather than her position on the charts.

Respect granted.