Rebecca Black - "Let Her Burn"

A fiery official debut album; Is this Black's villain era?

Let’s be honest. We were a little too mean to Rebecca Black in 2011. It wasn’t her fault that “Friday” was that bad.

It is STILL laughably bad. But that’s more to do with the company her family paid…(talk about not getting your money’s worth)...for that music video.

THOUGH, to be fair, she wouldn’t be on anybody’s radar today without that atrocity. Which might explain why she seems very willing to own it as part of her legacy.

So what about her debut album, then? “Let Her Burn”, as a whole, is not what I was expecting, as it completely disregards mainline pop and leaps with both feet into this electro/hyperpop sound. And it’s good - right off the bat, it’s good! “Erase You” is one of the best album openers I’ve heard thus far this year. Several tracks are just *fun*, and Black’s vocals are solid, even when she lingers in falsetto for a bit too long.

This album is really held back by its length - at only 30 minutes, it feels incomplete. Add to that the fact that I found two tracks to be lackluster, reducing the total to 25 minutes…well, it’s good. Good enough to shed the “Friday” stink. And definitely better than that snobby snotrag Pitchfork says it is.

Rating: Green