Most people who follow the British television
series The X Factor would probably know
or heard of the 2006 winner Leona Lewis. If you do not know her, you should
probably know her most successful single “Bleeding Love” which reached number
one in over thirty countries. She is one of my favorite R&B/ Pop singers
not only because of her incredible vocal abilities, but also because of her soulful
singing that fully expresses the joys and agonies of love and life. Her debut
album Spirit included multiple songs
that touch the audiences emotionally with her voice and lyrics. Such as the
songs “A Moment like This”, “Better in Time”, “Footprints in the Sand” etc. This album is the very first album that she released
after winning on The X Factor. Leona
worked with a variety of producers to come up with this album to showcase her
voice and her journey to becoming a singer. Leona claimed that she named the
album “Spirit” because “it is my heart and soul and the voice within that says
everything is possible.” And that the album and lyrics “reflect things that I’m
really passionate about. I have to be able to put myself in the song for it to
ring true to me. If it doesn’t ring true to me, it’s not going to be believable
to anyone else.” Therefore, this album displays a lot of Leona’s personal emotions
and growth as well as her flexibility as a talented singer through using
various producers and alternating between heavy-beat ballads and traditional
adult contemporary style in her Spirit
album. It took Leona and her producers about a year to produce this album
because she wanted this album to exhibit high quality. Fans of hers also had
high expectations for her debut album because of her similar voice to Mariah
Carey and her champion status on the third series of The X Factor in 2006.
The Spirit
album had successfully produced seven singles after the worldwide release. One of my favorite
singles from her Spirit album is “A
Moment like this”. Even though this is another song cover originally by Kelly
Clarkson, I think this song truly connects with her audiences who have
witnessed her growth and success as a singer. People who have followed her
performances in The X Factor should
feel emotionally touched by this song and its music video the most; Leona sang
this song on the final stage on The X Factor,
and she burst into tears after her last note. Her most famous song and
her second single was the “Bleeding Love” in which she recorded in Los Angeles,
California working with One Republic’s Ryan Tedder and pop singer and song
writer Jesse McCartney. This song was originally written for Jesse McCartney’s
Departure album; however, the song was rejected by Jesse’s record label. Tedder rearranged
"Bleeding Love" for Leona and changed the key to suit her voice,
and Leona made it a major hit song in 2007. When I first heard this song, I thought
that this song lacked some kind of popular pop song elements, it sounded a
little old fashioned to me; however, the song was so catchy that it grew on me
and became my favorite song at one point. I realized that it was the mixture of
her soulful voice and the heavy modish drum beats in the background that made
the song so catchy and interesting. This song, like many other songs, talks
about the pain of loving somebody who does not love you anymore. It takes us to
Leona’s own interpretations of this song through her voice. She displayed the
sorrowful, painful, and helpless experience of a ‘dead-end’ relationship. Much like
many of her other songs, she does not write or sing about issues that are
controversial, such as artists like Pink, Lady Gaga, or Lily Allen. She goes on
the safer route of emphasizing on producing catchy songs that demonstrate her
vocal capabilities. Another example of her ballad type track would be her third
single from the album, “Better in Time”, written by J.R. Rotem and Andrea Martin, and was produced
by Rotem. This is a pop and R&B song that is in a moderate tempo which talks
about the heart-broken feeling of breaking up with someone, and the pain can
only subside as time passes by.
If we look at most of the songs from Leona’s
album Spirit, we see some covers and some
songs that were originally written for other people. I think it was because at
the time of her first album, she had just won the third series of The X Factor, a lot of people had the presumption
that she would not be famous for long. In addition, I think that even though The X Factor has guaranteed Leona a
steady group of audiences, her singing style was a little invariable, being
R&B and Soul. Most of her songs were ballads, even in her album. It seemed
like The X Factor has somehow shaped
Leona’s singing style and her presence with simple makeup and clothing. I think
that Leona needs a little more ‘personality’ in her songs and performances in
order to maintain her crowd of audiences and her status as a famous singer. I
believe her new album Glassheart will
show the audiences other sides of her and her singing since she has already
shown a more “Pop star” look in her newest single Collide, with heavier makeup and less clothing, which were
stereotypes of the Pop culture.
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