Album Review: Keith Urban – Graffiti U
2 min readGraffiti U is the tenth studio album by Keith Urban. Defined as country singer, Keith Urban has always been flexible and eclectic about the music he creates and the people he works with, and Graffiti U is no exception. In fact, in his latest album Keith Urban features many different musicians as Shy Carter, Kassi Ashton, Lindsay Ell and co-writes most of his songs with artists as Ed Sheeran or Julia Michaels.
Even before Graffiti U came out, Keith Urban made people talk about himself when he released his first single Female. Written with the idea to support the #metoo movement and to celebrate women, this song has been categorised as a mansplaining episode. Though there are many conflicting opinions on this, everyone one (including me) is shocked and irritated by the “She’s a maniac in the bed / But a brainiac in her head” in Gemini.
Moving on, Graffiti U doesn’t feel as a uniform project. Although I appreciate Keith Urban adaptability to many genres, I still believe that he delivers his best tracks when he remembers what he is good at: country music. In fact, one of Graffiti U strongest song is Parallel Line (co-written with Ed Sheeran). Other positive notes go to Texas Time and Steal My Thunder.
Overall, Graffiti U feels like a confused compilation featuring many different genres as country, rap, dance rock, pop and even EDM. Given Keith Urban’s attitude to experiment, this is not a surprise at all, but this time Keith Urban was not able to create a cohesive album.