But what sealed the deal were the lyrics on the album, which seemed to spill the beans on a private life that had hit the headlines.
The first single from Confessions was the daringly minimal dancefloor hit Yeah!, a collaboration with fellow Atlantans Lil' Jon and Ludacris, which hit No 1 around the globe and briefly made the hip-hop sub-genre crunk look like it was going to change the world of pop forever. He did this with spectacular success in 2004, and is clearly trying to repeat the trick with the new album, Raymond v Raymond – another collection of sometimes ambitious, sometimes over-sentimental, state-of-the-art R&B.
Or does it? Somewhere in there, Usher created a paradox and hit commercial pay dirt by finding a way to appear to be baring his soul in his art without actually having to open up all of his life to widespread public scrutiny. Or, if people wondered if there were certain truths in certain things, my music basically sets the record straight." I try to live my life, and whatever is said in the press, I think my music will allow me to address certain things with people. Every other day something's written about you, but you can't get caught up in it. Privacy is something that just isn't there. "What R&B music is, and what it always has been, is taking an emotional experience and singing it passionately. "I don't have a private life – that's the catch," Usher says with a smile. There's no room for mystique, and if your private life is public property, what's left to put into your art? And what if you're a naturally private person who, despite having grown up in public and spending years making music that has to be sincere to succeed, doesn't really want to have to put all the details of your personal life on public view?
It's not just that the music has changed: the new paradigm for a successful musician demands constant interaction with fans and artfully choreographed press campaigns to produce saturation coverage around record releases and tours. These are tough times for soul singers who aspire to a place in the music's rich history (Usher's status among the greats is already assured: the late James Brown once called him "the Godson of Soul"). There's been birth and death, severed relationships, both personal and professional, and worries over a career that hasn't returned to the stratospheric heights his globe-conquering, 20m-selling Confessions album reached in 2004. He turns down more offers to appear in Hollywood movies than he accepts, he enjoyed good notices for a three-month stint on Broadway as Billy Flynn in Chicago, and even his male and female perfume ranges have been bestsellers.īut the last few years have been difficult for the man hailed as the best dancer in pop since Michael Jackson, and credited with inventing Justin Timberlake (the former 'N Sync star's debut album was built from Usher's blueprint). The basketball team he co-owns, the Cleveland Cavaliers, have just won their league. The first signee to his record label, Justin Bieber, is an international overnight star thanks to YouTube. You'd expect the multimillionaire R&B star who, according to the US music industry trade paper Billboard, stands second only to Eminem as the most successful artist of the 2000s, to have one or two things to smile about as he prepares to release his sixth album. "Energetically, my soul, my mind, my focus – I'm happy, I'm relaxed, and I'm ready to do it all over again." "I'm happy to be in this space and this place," he smiles, draped over a soft leather sofa in a recording studio in the basement of a Hollywood hotel – though he's speaking metaphorically, not literally. Usher Raymond IV is in a thoroughly good mood.
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