Photo by:

Fusion has appeared regularly in the music industry for some time now. For instance, Run DMC and Aerosmith once combined their’ efforts in order to create a new version of the latter’s song “Walk This Way.”  will.i.am collaborated with Sergio Mendes of the Brazil ’66 to fuse contemporary hip-hop with classic bossa nova, samba, neo soul and even a bit of reggaeton. 

With that in mind, the artist Priscilla Renea has her own brand of fusion to bring to any willing audiences, courtesy of her label, Capitol Records. 

This album, Jukebox, marks Priscilla’s first foray from her YouTube channel to the music recording industry. 

What ensues is a woven trifecta of pop music with R&B vocals and a hint of autotune to boot.  Yet, the very elements incorporated into the album helps this artist on many tracks, but hinders on others.

Many songs present on the album definitely lean closer to R&B aspects. 

The stylings of a consistent drum-machine, soulful lyrics, and mild hip-hop rhythms are on many of the tracks.  This part is still well done, so while this by no means is a bad thing, other tracks that borrowed from multiple genres seemed to have more staying power. 

One song entitled, “Lovesick” epitomizes this concept: the guitar and drums have a more pop-centric sound to them.  However, the vocals in their delivery have a definite R&B appeal to them.

As stated above, this approach has its pros and cons.  Priscilla Renea took a gamble in this approach, and it shows. 

Some of the songs seem to be better with more roots in one genre than the other (the genre it borrows from the most).  This album tackles many sorts of energies by doing this, but a little more consistency would be preferred.

Songs like “Mr. Workabee,” are not particularly bad, but given the elements combined seem like they would be better suited to heavier tones than the light cheerful tone that the instrumental contains.

This may, however, be exactly what this artist is looking to do with her freshman album, as a variety of emotions in her songs may cater to a wider variety of audiences and potential fans. 

It may not necessarily prove to be strong in one particular area consistently, but she does yield some versatility. 

Watch for her album when it is released Oct. 20.