Josh Groban's new album nearly finished!

(Picture: Josh Groban waving hello from Glen Ballard's studio in one of his recent video messages. Screencap by Rachel)

Yesterday afternoon this message was posted on Josh Groban's fanclub forum:

We are close to finishing the album. News coming soon.
Hope everyone is well.
Brian

("Brian" being Brian Avnet, Josh's manager.)
So the release of a new studio album is only a few months away! His last studio album was released 3 years ago - time flies - and judging by his own "updates-from-the-studio" video messages, it will be very different from "Closer" and probably miles away from his self titled debut album. All 3 of the song titles that have been announced so far are in English - "Weeping" feauturing Ladysmith Black Mambazo, "Lullaby", with music by Josh and lyrics by Dave Matthews, and "I'll wait for you", also written by Josh. He worked on these songs with Glen Ballard, who produced "Believe" from the Polar Express Soundtrack. In addition to that we know that he's been in the studio with Deep Forest in France (confirmed by Deep Forest's web site), and he was possibly going to collaborate with Joshua Bell on a track - since it worked so well on the last album... however I don't know if that really happened or if it was just a rumour or wishful thinking...;)

Grobanites on both of Josh's boards have witnessed me going crazy about this upcoming release - both in a negative and positive sense. Positive because it's been 3 years since Josh's last release and it will be interesting to hear what direction he's taking now. Negative because it's been 3 years since Josh's last release and it will be interesting to hear what direction he's taking now.

Let me explain...

It's always fun when your favourite artist releases a new CD, with the promo craziness that goes along with it; articles and reviews in every newspaper, talkshow appearances, radio play, posters in every music store.. then a new tour to follow.
But lately I've started to be insecure about what direction Josh is taking musically. When I first heard him I fell in love with his soft, operatic voice - however I was mostly into pop music at the time and didn't like the songs on his album that were, in my opinion, too "classical". It's been 4 years and 6 months since I bought his CD - I was 17 years old - and a lot has changed since then. I'm sure Josh has too.

"Closer" was different from the debut album both in the sense of his voice, which he pushed higher to sound like a tenor and at the same time adjusted to singing pop songs, and the music itself which was more pop-sounding and less operatic. Some fans found this disturbing, other again found it refreshing. I liked most of the songs but was not particularly pleased about the direction I felt his voice was heading in. That's what I'm concerned about with this next album.

And in the meantime I've grown increasingly interested in classical artists, not only in instrumental music like Joshua Bell but also vocally with singers like Rolando Villazon, Kiri Te Kanawa, etc. I'm afraid I've turned into a self-proclaimed culture snob; I'd rather see Swan Lake at the Opera house instead of going to a pop/rock concert at Rockefeller music hall.

The big question for me is.. will I like Josh's new album at all? Will I hate it? Will I be disappointed? Will I be indifferent? According to Josh I'll have to wait until October to find out.