Powers refuses to write Kelly off as a freakish miscreant, and instead places him in a historical line that connects vaudeville performers, Sun Ra, the blues, Richard Pryor and Michael Jackson. But critic Ann Powers dissected the Kelly conundrum brilliantly in an essay in Monday's Los Angeles Times. It appears that Kelly has firmly entered Leni Riefenstahl territory: For some, if not most, critics, it's becoming impossible to separate the person from the art.Ĭan we? Should we? It's hard to say. Kelly's rampant delusions have seen off the last hints of the talent which once made him great.' The Guardian (2/5 stars) argues that 'the reaction 'Double Up' provokes makes you think of the scene from 'The Producers' when the opening night performance of 'Springtime for Hitler' ends and the camera pans on to the audience: open-mouthed, frozen, aghast.' Slant magazine (1/5 stars) singles out the Virginia Tech-inspired 'Rise Up' for particular abuse, writing, ''Double Up's' most egregious lyrical outrage is that, after 15 horny songs that were no doubt written with 14-year-old girls in mind, Kelly turns his attention to the grieving co-eds of Virginia Tech.' Even more damning, Yahoo's Launch music site concludes that on 'Double Up,' 'R.

If the critical reception given to his new album, 'Double Up' ( streamed here), is any indication, the answer is 'a lot.' Not much dirtier, weirder or worse to my ears than his previous albums, 'Double Up' has gotten a glut of reviews criticizing it as tasteless and gross.

How much does his reprehensible behavior cloud our perception of his music? He has also been indicted on charges of child pornography, and he recently compared himself to Martin Luther King Jr. Kelly has been successfully delivering catchy and lushly produced R&B for 15 years.

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