New music Tuesday: R. Kelly, Rihanna, and Blackroc

Baby, it’s cold outside, so maybe it’s best that we curl up and get comfortable. Oh, is this the new R. Kelly record? Let’s great really comfortable, baby. Okay, you’re probably as creeped out right now as we are by Kelly’s latest Untitled, which gets a C+ in Nathan Rabin’s review. “The more R. Kelly tries to portray himself as the lover of every woman’s dreams on his new album Untitled, the more he comes off as the creep of their nightmares,” Rabin writes. Yes, but at least he’s a creative creep. Unfortunately, Rihanna’s new post-Chris Brown break-up album Rated R isn’t as vibrant, says Michaelangelo Matos. “Like lots of works that are self-consciously intense, Rated R is also turgid: Much of its music is a dull wash, difficult to differentiate even across several plays, and not especially compelling outside of the real-life drama the singer examines and exploits,” he writes in his C+ review.

Faring better is the new Damon Dash/Black Keys collaboration Blackroc, which gets a solid A from Chris Martins, who says the project “defeats all odds by sounding both organic and cohesive.” Also coming out this week Chris Brown’s Graffiti, Jimmy Buffett’s Buffett Hotel, 30 Seconds To Mars’ This Is War, Snoop Dogg’s Malice N Wonderland, and Timbaland’s Shock Value 2.