She's extremely talented and has her own distinct musical "voice". Plus, she has a devoted and borderline fanatical cult following (I consider myself a member).

But I think the pressure to come up with something as tight as Complex Simplicity might have gotten to her, a bit. The Anthony Hamilton featured song is the only thing close to a single on this album. The rest is stuff that devoted fans will largely enjoy, but won't win any new fans. I doubt any of her old fans are ranking this new album above CS.

This new album seems to have the mark of Beyonce's last album all over it, to me. I realized that yesterday, listening to it in the car. Alot of the melodies have that Beyonce-esque wandering, with no definitive direction or aim. Almost sort of freestyled melodies. Well, I would say that of the least enjoyable, most skippable songs on the album, of which I'd there are about 5. That's a step down for Teedra (and one of the reasons Beyonce only has 3 or 4 all-time classic solo songs, despite such a high-profile for such a long time.)

Teedra can easily bounce back from this, but she probably needs someone challenging her songwriting, not so much her actual voice (not the figurative "voice" I mentioned earlier) - the voice is still superb and distinct.

What worked so well on the first album was that the melodies always felt like they were headed somewhere, and when they got there, there was a payoff. That's something she should get back to.