Album: R Kelly, Love Letter (Jive)

"I wanna bring love songs back to the radio," oozes R Kelly at one point here, making you wonder which station he's tuned to, so rarely does radio's gaze stray from that subject.

He's true to his word, though, with the feverishly tumescent sensual testimonies of tracks like "Music Must Be a Lady", "Taxi Cab", "Love Letter" and its festive segue "A Love Letter Christmas" strongly redolent of the Marvin Gaye of "Let's Get It On". There's nothing here quite as absurdly overblown as his legendary five-part soap-opera sex odyssey "Trapped in ihe Closet", though Kelly's superheated, melodramatic delivery on the slow-burning, symphonic R&B of "When a Woman Loves" and "How Do I Tell Her?" harks back to the classic deep soul era of James Carr, Percy Sledge and Solomon Burke, and is not found wanting in the comparison.

DOWNLOAD THIS How Do I Tell Her?; When a Woman Loves; Love Letter