Brandy: Full Moon : Music Reviews : Rolling Stone

Album Reviews

In which Brandy Norwood leaves behind her girlhood as a teenage sitcom star, self-conscious cover girl and vocalist of mediocre but very successful R&B records. Full Moon is supposed to be the twenty-three-year-old multimedia starlet's statement of autonomy now that she's a married woman and mother-to-be. With Rodney "Darkchild" Jerkins at the helm, Brandy shows off her much-worked-on voice: a soaring falsetto, solid tremolo and suave breath control that relaxes her phrasing. Jerkins fills up every available nanosecond with electronic blipping and the staccato beats that are the modern diva's lifeblood; for all her hard work, poor Brandy's new-and-improved vocals could be anyone's. The bright spot is the already released single "What About Us?," with its awkward, chopping pace and snarky sound effects mugging in the background. The rest of this interminable (seventeen-track) product is frantic, faceless, fake-sexy R&B. It'll probably go quadruple platinum.

ARION BERGER
(RS 894 - April 25, 2002)