Search - Eddie Murphy :: Love's Alright

Eddie's minor classic!

Glenn Nippert | Alpharetta, Georgia United States | 01/28/2005

(4 out of 5 stars)

"This was Eddie Murphy's third attempt at a full fledged music album and apparrantly the third time was the charm. First off, he has a good, if undistinctive voice. He is never flat and never off key and puts a lot of feeling into his vocals. The opening track is called "Yeah" and features Garth Brooks, Barry White, Babyface, Bon Jovi, Paul McCartney, Stevie Wonder and quite a few others repeating the words yes and yeah over and over as some kind of dreamy chant to positivity. I know it sounds like a bad idea on paper, but it is really quite catchy and strangely effective.Lets face it, this was the era of grunge depression music and gangsta rap, so to me it was kind of nice to hear this once arrogant entertainer offer up such positive energy. Next up is "I Was A King" with reggae artist Shabba Ranks, a song about slavery, racism and black pride. This one is also catchy and was played on the radio a few times, but never quite caught on. Then comes the title track, "Love's Alright", definately the best song Eddie has ever written.This song will take you to heaven. It is a Prince-soundalike song, but a damn good one. The next one, "Desdemona" is Prince meets "I Am The Walrus" and is also good. Apparrantly, he was really into psychedelia at the time. He also does decent covers of Hendrix's "Hey Joe" and The Beatles "Good Day Sunshine" as well as a duet with Michael Jackson called "Whatsupwitu" which is little more than a repetetive novelty song. I remember the video had it's world premier after an episode of "Martin" and much attention was paid to Michael's participation in the song and video. Overall, Eddie created a cool little psychedelic soul album here and musically, was really starting to find his way. Unfortunately, he stopped recording music after the commercial failure of this album."