N.E.R.D.
In Search Of ...
Virgin Records

Don't even bother picking up N.E.R.D.'s In Search Of. . . because within six months, you'll be hearing it everywhere. Much like Moby's Play, this record will be impossible to ignore. It will appear in commercials, movies, malls, airports and bathrooms. You will catch your mother shimmying to it. Your friend who doesn't care much for music will ask you about the band. Which doesn't mean the music is bad; on the contrary In Search Of. . . is quite good, but consider staying ignorant of this disc to keep the inevitable media saturation from getting you down.

Of course N.E.R.D.'s bleak, ubiquitous future can't be held against them. They have made a funky, breezy album with undeniable hooks and surprising rhythms. But it's also a very thin record, without much substance. Everything is perfectly in place — sugary melodies, restrained backing vocals, instrumental flourishes — except for the heart. It's a soul record with no soul. All making up and no breaking up.

That the album was slated for release last year but was completely re-recorded with real instruments (the original was primarily ProTools and synthesizers) hints that N.E.R.D. was nervous about their slick sound. The new version does a lot to beef it up — adding just a hint of grit to the super-slick melodies — but there still isn't much to grab onto.

It seems only natural to be suspicious of a record from a duo responsible for some of pop's catchiest hits. Among those behind the N.E.R.D. moniker are Pharrell Williams and Chad Hugh, better known as the Neptunes, the premiere hip-pop producers of the moment. The many cuts the Neptunes are responsible for include Britney Spears' "I'm a Slave 4 U" (which they actually bite from on In Search Of. . .'s "Brain"), Ol' Dirty Bastard's drunken anthem "Got My Money" and Jay-Z's hypnotic "I Just Wanna Love U (Give It 2 Me)." The Neptunes know better than anyone how to construct tones, pitches and rhythms that will appeal to the hips, minds and wallets of listeners.

In Search Of. . .'s twelve cuts do exactly that. "Lapdance," the album's first single, builds around a simple, burping guitar riff that's easily better than any riffage that has appeared on modern-rock radio in ages. The sparse arrangement of "Provider" lets the song breath, even if the clichéd, mock-chauvinistic lyrics are suffocating. Strangely, "Truth or Dare" employs a strikingly similar stuttering riff to "Lapdance," but the raspy guest vocal by Kelis saves it. Another stand-out track, "Baby Doll," contains a reverb-drenched guitar line, giving it, surprisingly, a '50s feel that's only solidified with the lyric:

Roses are red, yellow and white
Where have you been all my life?
Violets are blue and I'll be too
If you leave because I just met you

Ultimately, the album disappoints for the same reason it will be a huge commercial success: familiarity. If the Neptunes' ingenious production style had not dominated pop and hip-hop radio over the last three years then this album would be revolutionary. As things currently stand, In Search Of. . . could be a compilation of the best recent pop singles minus the personalities that fronted them. It's a great album, but it suffers from their success. After putting their signature on so many other artists' records, The Neptunes sound like they're jumping their own bandwagon.

— Yancey Strickler (ystrickler@yahoo.com)