Albums of the week

POP/R&B

Nelly Furtado: The Ride (Nelstar)

Seventeen years after her worldwide hit I’m Like A Bird, Nelly Furtado is still soaring and her sixth album swoops between genres and stylistic angles with idiosyncratic zeal. The Ride is a scientific clash of Furtado’s melodic R&B sensibility with the unpredictable otherness of producer and co-writer John Congleton. At its best, the experiment is spellbinding: Cold Hard Truth is all confrontational stomping beats and vocal ...