"I'm a fan of my butt. I totally have no chest, I'm all butt. Guys are usually like, 'Oh my gosh, look at that butt!' In a good way!"

- Kelly Clarkson says she's just fine with her weight.

• Love vs. Money, the new album by R&B singer, songwriter and producer The-Dream, is "genuinely odd," according to Rolling Stone, which describes it as "avant-garde dance music and radio-friendly pop." Vibe thinks the man behind "Umbrella" and "Single Ladies" is "not doing anything new, per se—he’s just sampled the best parts of the old." The Boston Globe can't stop raving about it: "Unlike his spotty debut, this is a seamless, brilliantly produced affair featuring his unmatched contemporary pop technique and songwriting craftsmanship."
• American Idol alum Kelly Clarkson "makes nice with the pop machine and takes back the mall while keeping her integrity" on her fourth album, All I Ever Wanted, according to Blender magazine. The follow-up to Clarkson's disappointing My December gets a "B+" from Entertainment Weekly: "Does ['My Life Would Suck Without You'] mean our queen is back? In a word, yes." The Los Angeles Times agrees, calling the album a "generous helping of the Kelly so many love – yes, Photoshopped and slicked up, but with her big, brilliantly accessible heart and voice intact."
• Mexican dancer rockers Kinky flirt with pop on their sixth release, Barracuda. "This is the sweatiest, most accessible record that the band has yet released, which makes its middle third all the more disappointing given the great songs that surround it," laments Popmatters. "How you feel about Kinky’s fourth effort will likely be determined by how you view their overall progression toward more gloss, increased pop, bigger beats and added sonic trendiness (hey, ‘80s British New Wave!)," writes Metromix.
• R&B singer-producer and Timbaland protégé Keri Hilson releases her debut album, In A Perfect World. Slant magazine slams it, calling it "merely passable," before adding: "Hilson needs to do much more than pick fights with Beyoncé to justify her transition from hook girl to solo star." Allmusic echoes the opinion: "If [Hilson] didn't… fill the songs with her beaming personality and casually fluid voice, and didn't have top-level producers providing mostly excellent beats, it would be a mess."
• Masked underground rapper Daniel Dumile (MF DOOM, Madvillain) returns as DOOM with his latest, Born Like This. "After a period of workaholism that threatened overkill, followed by a period of hibernation, Born Like This finds DOOM back to his scalpel-tongued, scatter-mouthed best," observes The Guardian. "While he hasn’t had the breakthrough success many of his contemporaries have had, he is still one of the best around," proclaims Clashmusic.

Like Avril Lavigne and Kelly Clarkson, Alejandra Ruiz, aka Pambo, excels at carefree anthems for pre-teens and anyone in the mood for puppy love. Along with fellow Mexicans Nikki Clan and Belinda, Pambo's brand of rock is unashamedly light and glossy which may belie both her musical potential and artistic intentions.

Recruited by Sony BMG while still a student at Mexico City's prestigious Fermatta Academy (the alma mater of Natalia Lafourcade and Joselo of Cafe Tacvba), Ruiz took her stage name from a slang term for tomboys. On her new debut, Poprocks, there's traces of both her pedigree and tough pose. Mostly, however, it's a collection of friendly melodies and gently played rock numbers.

Produced by the very successful Aureo Baqueiro, the album's full range is on display in the current single, Tras Nubes (Behind Clouds) where an acoustic guitar intro sets the stage for Ruiz' confident, casual singing – a sometimes raspy but always full-bodied pop voice. After an appropriately cheesy electric guitar solo over an organ bed, the track teases with a cascading drum and vocal break. But just when things get interesting it's back to basics for the big finish. Good times. (Fans of Motel's Dime Ven will recognize the structure – if not Baqueiro's fingerprints.)

On the remaining tracks, Pambo's similarities to Spanish superstars La 5a Estacion will likely help this first outing make the rounds while mature compositions like "Mejor Que Tú Mintiendo" and "Perdón" should put her on solid footing for the next round. Perhaps, by then, she'll be more than just another rocker who pops.