jennifer lopez - "jenny from the block"

in winter the radio becomes less important to my listening - the feeling i get in spring and summer that its not only fun but genuinely important to hear what's going on isn't there with the same intensity. if i'm walking with headphones i keep choosing the j timberlake album over radio one; i still wake up to the radio but jesus christ, i swear it's always that shitty, tinkly u2 song playing at the exact moment i become conscious! i'm sure it is partly the drop in quality releases - the only songs i'm really enjoying are "sk8er boi"/"complicated", "dirrty", "heaven is a halfpipe" (which refuses to die a year or more since it's release, and thank god because now i love it so much!) and "jenny from the block".

i don't think any beat this year has been so pleasing and simple to digest - just straight up 'trackmasters do "south bronx" with flutes' executed perfectly to hit the pleasure zones ("south bronx" is still a great beat too). j-lo seems to have found a slinky voice which fits, one that can't be easily attributed to another singer's style, although no doubt its as real/fake as when she kind of sounds like milian or kind of sounds like ashanti or toni braxton etc etc. it probably should have been a monster summer jam, but i'm happy its around now without the baggage of distorted "man i was so happy in july" memories. i'm also thinking this is a more coherent and genuinely enjoyable old/nu face-off than anything on the missy album. i still don't understand why radio is playing the version without styles and jada though!