photo: Vince Alongi

First up I heard Alexandra Burke’s new song the other day. The song, “Bad Boys” is the first song off of Burke’s debut album and features Flo Rida and personally, I don’t think it’s as good as Lewis’ “Bleeding Love.” The critics are loving it at the moment and I personally quite enjoyed listening to it. I didn’t really enjoy the production at the beginning of the song though. The synth just doesn’t sound right to me and the constant left to right switching got annoying after a while. The song does get better as it goes on though and I especially liked the areas where there was more of a piano involved. The chorus does work very well and her voice isn’t overly processed – something to Alexandra’s credit. Flo Rida is obviously on the record for commercial purposes but he fits the quick beat quite well to his credit. You can preview the song on DailyMotion below.

Alexandra Burke – Bad Boys (Feat. Flo Rida)

Bad Boys is released 9th October. Alexandra’s album (TBC) will be released 26th October. Pre-Order it here.

Right onto some newer stuff. One artist who’s set to have a huge 2010 is Drake. Blik has previously gone on about Drake a lot, but I’ve only recently come round to liking him after being a bit unsure of him at first. It was probably his performance on that Young Money song “Every Girl” which brought me round to him – he stood out against the rest of the artists featured by a long way. Anyway a new song  has been leaked which is due to be off the soundtrack to LeBron James’s upcoming documentary. The song features the best of the rap world though – Kanye, Wayne and Eminem. I at first thought it had to be a mash-up as getting these 4 together on a track must have been hard work, although I understand LeBron James is quite popular in the US so they were all probably happy to feature. The song is called “Forever” and is extremely good. No autotune from Wayne either which gives it more brownie points. I really enjoy all the rapper’s verses and the hook from Drake is good as well. Can’t wait for his album, which is sadly expected in February 2010.

Drake – Forever (Feat. Kanye West, Lil Wayne & Eminem)

Forever will be released tomorrow. Make sure you get it.

The last track today is a remix of Shakira’s “She Wolf.” When i first heard this song nearly a month ago, I didn’t really enjoy it and thought it didn’t come close to “Hips Don’t Lie” – which I really liked when it came out. The song has grown on me a lot recently though and in particular, I lke the retro video which was shot to accompany the song. I’ll leave you with the official video along with the Villains & Calvin Harris remixes of the song which I enjoyed listening to.

Shakira – She Wolf

Shakira – She Wolf (Villains Remix)

Shakira – She Wolf (Calvin Harris Remix)

She Wolf is out now in the US. Get it here. It is released on September 14th in the UK.

And that’s it. In other news Dizzee Rascal’s “Holiday” looks set to get the #1 spot at the weekend after finally being released. Only the radio edit is available at the moment, but if you want to help Dizzee you can get the song here.