Consumer Guide Album

Iggy Azalea: The New Classic [Def Jam, 2014]
The hooks pop-rap lives off abound, and the cameos are essential because that's what they're here for, adding a measure of soul or power or fetching melody Iggy herself doesn't have in her. That's demonstrably true right now--line the seven bonus tracks that fill out the useless Reclassified repackage all in a row and you still won't have a decent EP--and might be true forever. Doesn't matter, because as a pop album this tops Ariana's, Sia's, dare I say it Taylor's, even Nicki's. What's more, it's Iggy herself whose striving Australian-Atlantan cadence puts every song across. Hooks you can hire easy these days. Originality you can't. And as Elvis Presley told Marion Keisker sixty years ago, she don't sound like nobody. A-