Flo Rida fails to deliver

Flo Rida

“Mail on Sunday” (Poe Boy/Atlantic)

**

In interviews, rapper Flo Rida has repeatedly articulated that his chief artistic goal is to approach things from the “left side,” even tattooing his left biceps with a massive picture of Jimi Hendrix to honor the late lefty guitarist’s iconoclasm. But rather than plumb uncharted creative terrain, “Mail on Sunday,” Flo Rida’s Atlantic Records debut, seems obsessed with familiarity.

Nearly every song has big-name help, with guest appearances from Lil Wayne, will.I.am, Sean Kingston, T-Pain and Rick Ross, displaying Atlantic’s high commercial hopes for the Miami MC, whose “Low” has had a virtual stranglehold atop the singles charts since emerging last fall. Sonically, an all-star team of Jazze Pha, the Runners, J.R. Rotem and Timbaland contributes beats that strive for a dizzied futurism but feel suspiciously boilerplate in their bombastic, synth-heavy, would-be club bangers.

As for Flo Rida, he’s capable and occasionally good, blessed with a nimble husky flow that wanders somewhere between Nelly and Bone Thugs-N-Harmony. Yet other than the album’s highlight, the resonant break-up song “Still Missin’,” “Mail on Sunday” rarely delivers, instead hawking the emergence of yet another major-label rapper with billion-dollar beats and an obsession with money, Patron, the club and, of course, girls in “apple bottom jeans and boots with the fur.”

-- Jeff Weiss

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Kevin Ayers

“The Unfairground” (Gigantic Music)

*** 1/2

“The Unfairground” is the world of a 62-year-old Canterbury rockster who, despite associations with and endorsements from Pink Floyd, Brian Eno, Elton John and David Bowie, remained a beloved if underachieving cult figure.

But it isn’t a bad place, and Ayers’ revealing account -- his first album in 15 years -- stands with his best ‘70s works of besotted, droll sophistication. He seems not just resigned to aging (“Only Heaven Knows”), loss and time passing him by (“Cold Shoulder” is “Girls in Their Summer Clothes” with bite), but jauntily amused.

Doesn’t hurt that he’s surrounded by fine friends both new (Teenage Fanclub) and old (his Soft Machine co-founder Robert Wyatt, Phil Manzanera). And for longtime fans, his baritone is an ageless comfort.

-- Steve Hochman

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Quick Spins

The Kills

“Midnight Boom” (Domino)

** 1/2

For its third full-length, this London duo commissioned sleek electro-rock beats from Alex Epton of the randy indie-rap crew Spank Rock. Funky as they are, though -- and despite one track titled “Cheap and Cheerful” -- Epton’s contributions hardly lighten the Kills’ black-as-night garage-blues. Alison Mosshart still fixates here on curdled romance, while her partner, Jamie Hince, continues to wield his guitar like a steel-wool scouring pad. PJ Harvey fans disappointed by last year’s meditative “White Chalk” should find “Midnight Boom” a sick little delight.

-- Mikael Wood

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Joseph Arthur

“Could We Survive” and “Crazy Rain and Boredom” (Lonely Astronaut)

***

Taking advantage of the new-model (or no-model) music business, former Peter Gabriel protege Arthur is releasing five EPs this year on his own label. The first two show the musician in an artistically restless vein -- not that he’s ever been predictable. “Could We Survive” offers relatively ruminative moods, he and his flexible band crafting semi-acoustic settings and clouds of harmonies for an affecting, generally gentle if unsettled set. Six songs get inside the heads of a soldier in Iraq (“Rages of Babylon”), a lover in bed (“Shadow of Lies”) and so on. “Crazy Rain” (due in April) gets edgier, sexier (the industrial-blues obsession mantra “I Want to Get You Alone”) and more electric. It’s all strong, if not as maverick as the format might allow. But there are still three more EPs to come, so plenty of time for adventure.

-- S.H.

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Be Your Own Pet

“Get Awkward” (Universal Motown)

***

Singer Jemina Pearl, 20, is young enough to be a daughter of the original riot grrrls, although the defiant, rapid-fire truculence that emerges from her convulsing mass of blond hair might shock her actual parents (she’s the daughter of Christian artist Jimmy Abegg). Her shrieking self-reliance rings powerful as ever on the Nashville garage-punk quartet’s sophomore album, whether on boyfriend-bashing anthems, paeans to juvenile delinquency, plaudits for the party life or 43-second rants punctuated by guitarist Jonas Stein’s angular riffage. The forebears who pioneered such rock ‘n’ roll whiplash have a worthy successor.

-- Kevin Bronson

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Albums are rated on a scale of four stars (excellent) to one star (poor). Albums have been released except as indicated.