Keith Sweat - Keep It Comin' CDs • Vinyl Records • LPs • Music Albums

It Comin', largely produced by Sweat himself, fails in the areas that had sustained his limited vocals: beat-laden tracks and hook-heavy composition. The title track (and first single) is accessible as usual, but gone is the big beat that once anchored his pleading groans; as a substitute, Sweat offers a more polite rhythm track and overpowering background vocals that drown out his trademark vocal ad-libs. The dance tunes "Spend a Little Time" and "I Really Love You" are uneventful, rhythmically and harmonically.

Sweat employs neo-Seventies soul tricks on a few of the ballads on Comin'. His gimmicky resurrections of Barry White's bass-register monologues on two grinding slow numbers, "Why Me Baby?" and "I'm Going for Mine," come off more as farces than tribute. And the vocal group Silk, which provides spirited vocals on Sweat's "Ten Commandments of Love," recalls the stellar sound of the Dells and the Chi-Lites but still doesn't manage to bring this banal ballad to life. On the plush slow jam "(There You Go) Tellin' Me No Again," however, Sweat's plaintive moans work well in his favor.

The irony of Keep It Comin' is that, just as Michael Jackson appropriates New Jack Swing to harden his sound, Keith Sweat, one of the music's pioneers, surrenders his usual gritty production for a smoother, anachronistic approach. After hearing the often saccharine Keep It Comin', one wonders whether James Brown has any plans to record with the London Philharmonic orchestra. I hope not. (RS 621)

GORDON CHAMBERS