J.Lo (album) - Critical Response

Critical Response

Upon its release, J.Lo received generally mixed reviews from music critics. According to Metacritic, which assigns a normalized rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream critics, it received an average score of 52 based on 11 reviews. Stephen Thomas Erlewine of Allmusic stated, "Essentially, this is the same album as On the Six, only a little longer with a little less focus and not as many memorable songs. This lack of winning singles becomes a drag, since at over an hour, the record meanders much longer than it should. meander isn't really the right word, because the album sets its tone from the start". Tom Sinclair of Entertainment Weekly gave J.Lo a C- and commented on Lopez's vocals saying that "There's no way to know if Jennifer Lopez's voice is mechanically altered or not, but on the recorded evidence of her sophomore album, J.Lo, her singing seems to be in key". Sinclair also added, "Our gal consistently aims for the lowest common denominator, shamelessly spouting disco era banalities ... on several dance tracks, and cooing about L U V and S E X everywhere else."

Jon Pareles of Rolling Stone felt "that most of the music sounds like jigsaw puzzles: showers of tiny bits and pieces that interlock as complex, coherent songs." Pareles also stated that "Lopez tries to coo and whisper" on the ballads while comparing her vocals to that of Janet Jackson. He disapproved of latin pop songs like "Ain't It Funny" and "Si Ya Se Acabó" commenting, "She piles on Hispanic signifiers ... only to sound like she's repeatedly remaking Madonna's "Isla Bonita." Christian Ward of NME gave the album negative reviews, giving it a 3/10 rating while describing Lopez to a market between, like, Janet Jackson and Gloria Estefan. Slant Magazine's Sal Cinquemani felt "that so many of the tracks on her sophomore effort, J. Lo, sound like they're straight out of 1986" and compared the album to Janet Jackson's Control era. Jake Barnes of Yahoo! Music UK gave the album 5 out of 10 stars and said that "The number one hit 'Love Don't Cost a Thing' kicks off this 15 track album and from then on it's kind of ... OK-Lo."