Lady Saw – Passion

Lady Saw's passion appears to by country & western music.

After striking Gold with last year's country tinged "Give Me A Reason," Saw goes into full redneck mode with not one, but two full blown Nashville numbers. "I Don't Need to Know" and "Lover Boy" are tolerable, even enjoyable in single doses. Two on one album is too much.

If you've been out of the Dancehall for the last year, Passion is an excellent release. If you've been keeping up with the latest releases, however, you'll notice that most of the good stuff on Passion is just plain old. "Long Til it Bend," "Sycamore Tree," "Woman We Name," "Wuk With You" and "Healing" have already risen and fallen on the charts. What's left is "Na Nurse," an excellent new slice of slackness, an unexceptional 'positive' song called "Let Peace Reign" and five crossover songs with country, pop or hip-hop biases.

Things start of well with "Gal No Worry" and "Na Nurse," two new songs delivering the pseudo-feminism and explicit slackness that we know and love in Lady Saw. "Na Nurse," in particular, seems destined to join the Saw classics that tell the macho men that women can give as good as they get.

After these first two songs, and excluding the songs that we already know, the pickings are slim. "I Don't Need to Know," is better than "Lover Boy," but not as good as "Give Me A Reason." "Passion" might be funny if it wasn't saddled with a ridiculous beat and silly harmony, but it just sounds stupid.

"Love is Strange (featuring Shaggy)" and "Call Me" are Lady Saw's two attempts at singing. The former is undermined by the simplicity of Shaggy's lyrics and the latter is mangled by Saw's limited vocal ability. Her voice isn't bad in certain situations, but "Call Me" demands more range than Saw can provide.

After the torrent of mediocrity, the surprise is that Passion's obligatory hip-hop cut, "Raw," is actually pretty good -- if you like that sort of thing. "Raw" is reminiscent of Shabba's heyday as a hip-hop/dancehall pioneer. Maybe it's the blandness of the surrounding material, but "Raw" stands out among the newer tracks.

THE VERDICT: Passion is rescued by it's older tracks, which were all well-deserved hits. The new music, with the exception of "Na Nurse," is all throwaway filler. We hold Lady Saw to the same standards as Dancehall's elite, and this time, she falls short.