Ameriie “Outside Your Body”
As lame as adding an extra “i” to your name in an attempt to give your stagnant career some sort of re-boot might seem, it’s quite understandable why the artist formerly known as Amerie would want to start anew: despite being the voice behind some of the past decade’s most exciting R&B singles (the critically acclaimed 2001 jam “1 Thing” being at the top of the pile), girl has struggled to catch a break commercially, her last effort, 2009′s In Love And War, failing to get anywhere close to the 100,000-units sold mark.
Still, she should know that whether her name has one “i”, two “i”‘s, three “e”‘s or is switched to some unpronounceable symbol, it matters none if folks don’t find the new tunes worthwhile enough to help get her one of those shiny gold or platinum plaques.
In line with nearly every major pop and R&B star in the past couple years, Ameriie’s newest single “Outside Your Body” finds the leggy beauty getting bit by the international pop bug, her feverish, sirenic wails making a new home in an upbeat merging of 80′s robo-funk (it recycles bits from Midnight Star’s lone crossover success “Operator”) and modern-pop’s current (over-)leniency on European club tastes, with a slight Prince-produced girl group twist.
Sounding like some space-age travel agent, Ameriie endorses a magical land far away from social ills like “hate”, “pain” and “jealousy” where “you can live like it’s your last” and “get outside your body”. That place ends up being a bunch of predictable idealistic go-to’s (“Let’s go to London town and Tokyo and Paris yeah/ Tokyo and so”), but Ameriie is convincing of their euphoric pleasures, the track’s big, fist-pumping hook (and new wave-y swirl of a bridge) delivering the addicting type of dance floor ecstasy charge one could lose their body in.
Where “Outside” falters, though, is in thinking it’s far more revolutionary than it actually is.
Ameriie may deserve some kudos for actually sounding like a real person and not the Auto-Tuned-to-Hell half-cyborg persona electro-leaning things like these usually inspire artists to adopt, but in her quest to be the “new Jody Watley” here, the singer really only ends up becoming “yet another Rihanna knock-off”.
Such a ploy could easily lead to the career re-ignition Ameriie yearns for as the song feels like a Top 40 smash in the making, but if “Body”‘s purpose was to keep Ameriie standing out from the crowd in the same way she did when she was working those killer Rich Harrison (and Rich Harrison-like) grooves, we say she needs to turn the radio on more.
From her forthcoming fifth LP, Cymatika, Vol. 1.
As a bonus, peep this lovely, dreamily soothing cover of “1 Thing” (re-dubbed “Vietnamerie”) by London-based singer-songwriter Mara Carlyle (via):
Mara Carlyle – Vietnamerie (1 Thing) (Amerie Cover)
