Unbroken Reviews - Portrait Reviews

Katharine McPhee: Unbroken
Review by: Amanda
Proofread by: Elizabeth


With her new physical makeover (and platinum blond hair), Katharine McPhee seems to have wanted to change her image to give off a more rock and roll vibe, so I anticipated her album to be more rock infused than her last one. And, to an extent, it is. She goes for the pop-y rock songs, though, and quite honestly, not a whole lot of them sound that great with her voice. She has a big voice, one suited to live performances and difficult ballads. And it isn't showcased here at all.

I don't recommend buying the album, but there are a couple tracks that stand out and are worth getting on their own, while there are a few more that are just so-so, and I'd suggest listening to them completely before you decide to buy them or not.

The Standouts:

Had It All was the first single from the album, and it's one of the best tracks on it, so I completely understand why it was chosen. It really isn't anything special, just a typical pop song about lost love, but, unlike most of the album, it's fun to listen to and I don't want to skip it while I'm listening to it. There are also a few bright spots during the song where Katharine really lets her voice go, and she sounds the way she should sound.

Faultline is the most emotional-sounding track on the entire album, and the one where you can actually hear what her voice could have sounded like if it was used properly. I wish more of her album had sounded like this. It's a gorgeous song.

The So-So:

Terrified is far from being something I can listen to over and over again, but it sounds so much better than the rest of the album. Katharine sounds like she's only paying half attention to the work she does on some of the other songs, but here she sounds like she's really present, which makes it a little better to listen to. (Also, the new version of the song, not on the album, with Zachary Levi, is even better.)

How is a good song — not a great song, but again, she actually sounds good on this one. She gets to use her big voice, and though it is a little too repetitive for me, it's much better than more than half of the other songs..

Lifetime makes my so-so list only because I still can't decide how I feel about it. It has a cool sound, but I'm not really liking the overly breathy vocals at some parts of the song. The message of embracing each moment because this one right here could start a lifetime is a good one, though.

The rest of the tracks, unfortunately, don't sound like anything more than something a wannabe popstar would sing. And I wish that wasn't true because the world already knows how great Katharine's voice really is. Even “Unbroken,” the title track, just isn't that good. Her vocals are all over the place for a large chunk of the song, and the lyrics are incredibly repetitive, which might work well for a dance track, but not on a slow one like this. (As a side note, I encourage you to skip “Last Letter.” While the lyrics are good, the singing is pretty awful. Katharine sings some of her lines flatly, shouts others, and none of it comes together. It kind of hurts to listen to.) I just don't think she's been able to capture the same magic that her live performance of “Somewhere Over the Rainbow” showed when she was on American Idol. At least, not since she was on the show. I sincerely hope her next studio album is as amazing as it could be, but since she's given herself a complete style makeover, both in her music and in her appearance, I'm not going to hold too tightly to that hope.