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Black Eyed Peas
Monkey Business
(A&M/Universal)
Sure, they're named after a vegetable. But the truth is Black Eyed Peas are junk food.
On the musical menu, these hip-hoppers are the aural equivalent of chocolate-covered potato chips or deep-fried Mars bars -- something that's really, really bad for you but completely irresistible. And if you thought their 2003 breakthrough disc was seductive, you ain't heard nothing yet.
Monkey Business, their second album since they added hoochie-mama singer Fergie and sold their social consciousness for a penthouse suite at the Four Seasons, is so dangerously addictive it should come with a warning label.
Let's check the ingredients. There's the can't-miss opening party-starter Pump It, a turbocharged upgrade of the Dick Dale Pulp Fiction theme Misirlou with new vocals. There are hook-laden superstar guest spots by Justin Timberlake, Jack Johnson, Sting and James Brown, who brings in tha funk on They Don't Want Music. Between them, there's a seemingly endless supply of whomping hip-hop grooves, bumptious bass lines, derivatively poppy melodies and blatantly commercial ear-candy production.
Sure, there are also a couple of massive clunkers like Fergie's cringe-inducing My Humps, an ode to her "lovely lady lumps." (And they say rock lyrics aren't poetry.) But never mind; honestly, by the time you get that far into this 66-minute disc, you won't care. You'll just be sitting there like one of those lab monkeys who can stimulate their brain's pleasure centre by pressing a button. In your case, it'll be the rewind button on your Walkman or iPod. And like that monkey, you'll sit there going eep! eep! and pushing that button and listening to Pump It over and over again instead of eating, sleeping or doing anything productive.
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That can't be good for you. But damned if it don't feel good.
Eep! Eep!
Track Listing:
1. Pump It
2. Don't Phunk With my Heart
3. My Style
4. Don't Lie
5. My Humps
6. Like That
7. Dum Diddly
8. Feel It
9. Gone Going
10. They Don't Want Music
11. Disco Club
12. Bebot
13. Ba Bump
14. Audio Delite At Low Fidelity
15. Union