Brooke Hogan Albums (2)
What The Critics Say
No doubt about it: the Hogan family had a rough time after the fall 2006 release of Brooke Hogan's first album Undiscovered. Within one year, her parents' marriage dissolved and her mom ran off with a boyfriend younger than the 21-year-old Brooke, sparking a very ugly public divorce not helped at all by her brother's arrest for reckless driving. It was a heaping dose of TMZ-fueled gossip that feeds the part of her second album, Redemption, that isn't devoted to songs of love, sex, and nightclubs, songs that suggest Brooke Hogan is a pretty simple, sweet girl who only wants love and understanding. In another era, she'd be Sandra Dee singing about holding hands, but in 2009, she's a Britney wannabe singing about "BeDDable" boyfriends and rough sex, laying bare the explicit thoughts BritBrit only hints at. Britney's Blackout is a clear sonic template for Redemption, with Brooke happily embracing whatever role is handed her, only taking control on her vitriolic attack on her mother, delivered completely with an actual argument pasted over the bridge, and the ominous self-empowerment of the title track. Apart from this, Brooke is singing with gusto through layers of Auto-Tune, letting her producers fit her into tracks that provide the throbbing soundtrack to a very late Saturday night. ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine, All Music Guide
What The Critics Say
Another unlikely pop singer to hop aboard the indiscriminate good ship Storchaveli, Brooke Hogan -- it's just "Brooke" henceforth, or at least for the time being -- is stuck in a phase where she's too young to be convincing as a vixen and too old to relate to younger teenagers. Lead single "About Us" tells you more than you need to know. "I'm just tryin' to live, but you're all up in my grill/How's a girl to breathe with the media staring down my mouth with a four-inch lens/I just wanna hit the mall with some of my friends." This is delivered with a Beyoncé-aping flow in a voice that resembles an exaggerated (or piercing) version of Gwen Stefani. Produced mostly by Scott Storch (everybody), the comparisons to Paris Hilton's album are inevitable, even though the two celebrities-turned-singers are at different stages in their lives. Hilton's album effectively rides on the entitled heiress persona that dozens of middle-class singers have attempted before, whereas Undiscovered sounds exactly like the kind of album made by the teenaged Floridian daughter of a professional wrestler. Brooke tries hard to be authentic and taken seriously, and though some of the material is mildly enjoyable, the batch of productions she is given is noticeably weak when they're stacked up against the tracks on Paris. Brooke does drop the seriousness on the throwaway finale, but it doesn't fare any better. Anyone who knows War's "Low Rider" will likely flinch at the sight of the track's title; sure enough, "Low Rider Jeans" adopts some of the words and all of the notes of its chorus: "Low rider jeans hug a little tighter." ~ Andy Kellman, All Music Guide
