Not enough ooh-ooh-ooh in the world

If anyone can confirm whether Ne-Yo composes music as well as lyrics, I'd appreciate it. His thin, high tenor is serviceable; the lyrics find clever Smokey Robinson-esque variations on wolfish vulnerability (he wonders whether "the little wrinkle on your nose when you make your angry face" in "When You're Mad" excites him in a way that his girlfriend's laugh doesn't) and love-man narcissism (pleading his lover to fuck in front of the mirror "so that I can watch you enjoying me" is worthy of Bryan Ferry). The melodies, however, are indelible, which is higher praise than Ne-Yo himself (judging from the album sleeve photos of lyrics jotted on yellow pads) has accepted.

If there's a better hook I've heard all year than the one sweetening "Sexy Love" then I don't have ears. Never let it be said that Ne-Yo hasn't studied his Motown collection: the plucked harp hook comes quick and unembellished, there's call-and-response vocals, a bridge, a chorus, and then the bridge and chorus trade places. Its ooh-ooh-ooh's recall Jeffrey Osborne's last pop Top 40 hit, "You Should Be Mine (The Woo Woo Song)" but sung by a serviceable tenor whose anonymity mitigates the rather gross post-coital admission (Ne-Yo covered her in jizz and she liked it); a better singer might have massaged his ego all over this*. He's like a teenager who's become infatuated with his girlfriend after they make love for the first time -- a rare breed as we all know, since our first instinct is to head for the hills. If nothing else on In My Own Words is at "Sexy Love"'s level, give Ne-Yo credit for fulfilling the promise he made to his audience on "So Sick" -- he wrote his own classic and (almost) made his own album as irrelevant as the insincere chart fodder he's quick to dismiss ("So Sick" is Ne-Yo's "Panic," except he's peeved while Morrisey's pissy).

* El Debarge an exception, maybe?