R. Kelly

Probably the most important R&B producer of the hip-hop era, R. Kelly's music has become the default mode of mainstream soul: a mix of syrup and sex, of church-trained vocals and simple keyboards employed in the service of a night out at the booty bar. Kelly isn't as intent on rooting through R&B history as neosoul archaeologists D'Angelo and Musiq, but he has a healthy respect for the past -- essentially, he updates the Isley Brothers' slick groove for hip-hop-trained ears. And his persona -- the tormented Lothario -- is indebted to the darker side of Motown. Like Marvin Gaye and Michael Jackson before him, Kelly plumbs the depths of his sexual neuroses. At his best, he expresses fears and worries that most lover-man R&B is too booty-fixated to bother itself with. At his worst, he sounds like he's feigning a divided soul to seem deeper than he is and wheedle some sympathy out of the ladies.

Kelly came up in the last wave of New Jack, and some of that style seeped into his debut. Though he always was a hell of a singer, nothing in the dozen songs of 12-Play (three times as good as foreplay, get it?) suggested he was in it for the long haul -- "Bump & Grind" was so direct that you can't really call it a come-on. Window-fogging was still his MO on the followup, but Kelly managed to keep it in his pants for stretches at a time. "You Remind Me" turned a string of dumb woman-as-car metaphors into a classic single. R. has its moments -- particularly the astounding cheater's plaint, "When a Woman's Fed Up" -- but Kelly can't keep it up for two full discs.

TP-2 is Kelly at his most wacked-out; at one point he assumes the voice of God to lecture himself. In 2002 a videotape surfaced of Kelly allegedly pissing on a teenage girl (he denies it's him), and Chocolate Factory was released as Kelly was ducking for cover. But he'd apparently learned from Michael Jackson's publicity mistakes, because the new Kelly was less haunted, if no less horny. The hit "Ignition (Remix)" was his warmest pick-up joint to date, and set the tone for the new record -- and maybe a new stage in his career. (KEITH HARRIS)