Well, by titling his sophomore set -- sophomore, that is, if you don't count his ill-advised 2004 sojourn into , which this winner clearly would like everyone to forget -- , doesn't shy away from the perception that his career hasn't quite lived up to the expectations his 2003 win set up for him. Not that his 2003 debut, , was a flop, exactly: it hit number one and its first single, the perplexing reached the Top Ten, but none of the other singles came close to the Top Ten -- in fact, there was only one other single, which didn't manage to crack the Top 40 just a few months after the album's release. All this almost-success had the cumulative effect of making seem a bit like an also-ran and he was certainly eclipsed in stardom not only by 2003 runner-up , but 2004 winner , a singer who actually was well suited for modern , which was not. As his easy performances showed on the show, was best suited for '60s and '70s -- which, of course, had very little commercial potential in the 2000s. So, despite his success on the show, turned out to be a hard one to peg as a recording artist: he was too old-fashioned for , yet his lazy, self-satisfied performances lacked the discipline for old-fashioned . So, it was hard to say where he should go, but in truth there was only road for him to follow: to try to be a modern spin on a classic loverman -- which of course meant being a new version of , the singer openly idolized and was often compared to on . There was a certain grain of truth to those comparisons -- like favored slow grooves, and he patterned his phrasing after , but there is a crucial difference between the two: effortlessly exuded sensuality and is devoid of it. And considering that the main -- nay, only -- thrust of is that is a master seducer, this presents a considerable problem. After all, his famous nickname, "the Velvet Teddy Bear," bears no sexual connotations whatsoever: it respectively refers to the silken tones of his voice and his considerable girth. Plus, it sounds cuddly, not sexy (when has a teddy bear ever been sexy?), but that's not how and his collaborators see it. No, they see as a seducer supreme, a loverman who has an utterly irresistible sexual charisma. This is a miscalculation. Not only has sex never been part of 's persona -- his size and smile give him the aura of a friend, not a lover -- he cannot convey sexiness no matter how hard he tries, and he tries very, very hard to sound sexy here, which only makes his voice, never the most robust instrument, seem thinner than ever on record. Since his thin, strained voice is paired with mechanical approximations of classic and grooves, given a hint of modern-day flavor, there's not much warmth to the sound of the music either. And is truly an album where sound is paramount: there are a few well-written tunes, such as the one slow jam that comes close to selling convincingly, but for the most part, the album is one long, monotonous groove -- which could have made for good if it was delivered by somebody who had the soul of a loverman, which simply does not. sounds self-satisfied, barely interested in the songs he's singing, so why would he be interested in the woman he's trying to bed? There's no sensuality, no warmth to his singing. Like before, exerts the minimum amount of energy on his performances; what once sounded like an effortless charm merely sounds lazy, particularly since he has few melodies to guide him. Without melodic hooks, he sounds like he's merely vocalizing, and since he doesn't have the energy or imagination to do soulful runs, he winds up merely sounding dull -- and when combined with the dull productions, the results are deadly boring. ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine