Album reviews

Professor Green

`Alive Till I’m Dead’

(Warner Music Korea)

This East Londoner has been making waves for the past several years, with references to Eminem and winning prizes worth 50,000 pounds ($78,000) from MySpace. But aside from the hype, Professor Green’s debut album promises a mix of dramatic rock, pop, dance and rap.

The convincingly entertaining release borrows tunes from INXS and combines vocals with the likes of Lily Allen, resulting in a familiar but edgy package. Green, from the land of grime, updates hits like ``Need You Tonight’’ to become a fully modern number. In fact, the entire record is a true product of the times (including a coverlet riddled with poor spelling and, is that Shereen Shabana’s name spelled wrong?), which falls flat at times but ultimately leaves you with a danced-out feeling of satisfaction and the epic ``Goodnight.’’

― Ines Min

3OH!3

`Streets of Gold’

Disclaimer: Bands with elementary punctuation in their name are automatically knocked down a point. That being said, the two behind this electro-hop group ― Sean Foreman and Nathaniel Motte ― manage to come up with popular beats that seem to call to the masses (note their two singles that hit number seven and nine on the Billboard Hot 100).

But their creativity for dance music and eclectic sound engineering takes a steep fall into the void with trite, obnoxious lyrics evident on nearly every track. Their naivete and stupidity come to a hit in the fratboy anthem ``House Party,’’ which includes such gems as ``I’m gonna have a house party in my house,’’ faux air horns and even a chorus of (probably real) ``brothers’’ shouting ``Paaarty!’’ I wish I were joking about this.