Taio Cruz – The Rokstarr Collection
4 min read
London’s Taio Cruz has been busy making quite the name for himself over the past couple of years and with the release of his latest record, The Rokstarr Collection, he is about to become a household name. is Taio Cruz’s first greatest hits release and is brimming over with a plethora of chart featured singles and future hits in a record which shows a diverse scope to one of the UK’s most profitable songwriters.
Combining large volumes of dance with deep pounding RnB and pop infusions, The Rokstarr Collection is one hell of a record.
Taio is no newbie on the music scene. He enjoyed a moderately successful lead up to this latest offering with his debut record Departure. The record was hailed as a weighty breakthrough for Cruz however lacked the uptempo beefiness that is heard with this collection. Come On Girl however saw Cruz’s profile raised and a sound that the singer could no longer avoid. The dance beats were exactly what his fans wanted and so that was the direction that Cruz targeted. There are still ballads on the new record but they are laced perfectly with mild electro-pop flavorings to keep them interesting.
I Just Wanna Know is the perfect example of this. Sounding very similar to the uptempo pennings of Lemar, the track is a gentle ballad with a sweet synth filling laid throughout a tribal beat with Cruz crooning smoothly through the number and a complimenting and introduced string section that rounds the track off flawlessly.
Love comes gushing at full speed with the three ballads additions being situated closely together at the heart of the collection. I’ll Never Love Again and Falling In Love (the latter being the more optimistic of the two) take the reigns of the record and prove to be sweet numbers that excude vulnerability and an emotive depth that adds versatility to not only the record but also Cruz’s abilities as a musician. With I Just Wanna Know, I’ll Never Love Again and Falling In Love, Cruz really showcases himself as not only an incredible musician who is able to write sensitive and touching ballads as well as the immense uptempo pop hits that are surrounding this gentle centre but also a musician with an exquisite set of vocal chords. He is capable of letting his voice shake the walls of a nightclub as much as he is able to pen an incredible tearjerker easily adaptable for a Saturday veg out rom-com.
The ballads are great numbers on The Rokstarr Collection but what really pulls you in and holds you tightly when listening to this record is the number of infectiously upbeat additions. Almost every track on this record sounds like a chart topping single and that’s what makes a perfect greatest hits collection. Each song has a life of its own that never dips to dullness or has any feeling of growing old on you anytime soon. With electro-pop being tapped into so heavily over these past couple of years, Taio’s merging of RnB and the blood rushing electro genre couldn’t work better if Lady Gaga herself penned the tracks.
Dynamite is a killer of a track with it pulsating and dirty beat that gave Cruz his second number one single achievement. I Can Be, one of Cruz’s most recognizable hits, earns its spot within the collection as does Take Me Back.
Break Your Heart, Taio’s more recent mammoth chart smash is an almost perfect way to describe the album in its entirety. If you are a fan of this club-floor filler with its infectious and grinding melody and pulsating dance infused rhythm then chances are that you will be bouncing along to the majority of what is contained within the collection of hits that the London hip hop prince has put together for us. Break Your Heart gets a second injection on the record as the track features as the albums closing number after being taken through the technopop remix machine with the help of Ludacris proving to be an even better version than its earlier plugging.
Dirty Picture combines Cruz’s rap spitting, alluring female vocal swapping courtesy of US pop princess Ke$ha and some bass heavy, techno seduction often reserved for the likes of hardcore ravers in a field letting loose on acid. The lyrics are very telling with lines such as ‘I’ll take a dirty picture for you’ leaving very little to the imagination as Cruz shows he is as much a kinky lover as he is a gentle heart tamer.
Higher is a late inclusion to the record and is a perfect weekend warm up track.
I’ve never found time to listen to Taio in the past but after listening to The Rokstarr Collection I have a slight feeling of deprivation. Though I may not be fronting a Taio Cruz t-shirt or be throwing my underwear to the rapper from the front row at his next gig anytime soon, what I can say is that this is one album that will be getting numerous repeats on my iPod from now on.
A fantastic collection of dance heavy club fillers and moving ballads with memorable and high quality laden hooks and well written lyrics.
Buy ‘Taio Cruz – The Rokstarr Collection’ from Amazon
::: RenownedForSound.com’s Editor and Founder –
Interviewing and reviewing the best in new music and globally recognized artists is his passion.
Over the years he has been lucky enough to review thousands of music releases and concerts and interview artists ranging from top selling superstars like 27-time Grammy Award winner Alison Krauss, Boyz II Men, Roxette, Cyndi Lauper, Lisa Loeb and iconic Eagles front man/songwriter, Glenn Frey through to more recent successes including Newton Faulkner, Janelle Monae and Caro Emerald.
Brendon manages and coordinates the amazing team of writers on RenownedForSound.com who are based in the UK, the U.S and Australia.
