Ne-Yo's year, yet again

Less than a handful of R&B artists can compete with Ne-Yo. Although he might not burn up the dance floor, he has released two commercially and critically successful albums and written an egregious number of singles for other big names. And his third album Year of the Gentleman keeps Ne-Yo out ahead still.

Much like his previous two releases, Gentleman is stuffed with unyielding love songs that Ne-Yo writes effortlessly.

It’s apparent that Ne-Yo simply loves women, and not in the “ladies man” type of way. When his Michael Jackson-esque croon kicks in with “She got her own thing / That’s why I love her” on “Miss Independent,” there’s no bravado or maneuvering present. The guy just respects women.

Even when his silky-smooth voice is partnered with the genre’s benchmark synth-beat sound on tracks like the opener “Closer,” Ne-Yo keeps it honest.

Whereas Usher wanted to make love in the club, Ne-Yo’s lyrics paint him as genuinely interested in his pursuit: “Turn the music up in here / I still hear her loud and clear.”

The collection’s closer, “Stop This World,” is one of the best songs that Ne-Yo included in the tracklist and sends the album out on the highest note possible. Ne-Yo’s strong and stirring vocal delivery powers the song and keeps it from sounding repetitive.

As previously mentioned, a major portion of Gentleman features tracks about the trials and tribulations of the heart, and an album full of material like that isn’t for everyone.

However, it’s not that any of tracks like “So You Can Cry” or “Back to What You Know” are bad in any way; it’s solely that the lack of diversity here can be boring.

With three albums released in as many years, Ne-Yo is clearly providing great music that’s still better than most of his peers. But if he took a year off and came back with some slightly different material, he’d supplant himself in the upper echelon of R&B.