Little Jesse McCartney is all grown up and he wants us all to know it. You may remember him as the teeny-bopper pin-up from the boy band Dream Street, solo artist of two pop albums, or for his roles in All My Children, Summerland and Disney Channel favourite Hannah Montana. Now 21 and already growing as an artist, having co-written Leona Lewis’ mega-hit ‘Bleeding Love’, fresh-faced Jesse has called on the help of such big name R&B producers as Tricky and The Dream (Rihanna), Sean Garrett (Beyonce, Gwen Stefani, Chris Brown), J.R. Rotem (Britney Spears) and The Clutch (Timbaland, Ciara) to give him a Justin Timberlake-style reinvention.

The result is Departure, an album of urban pop that is anything but clean-cut. “The album is called Departure for a number of reasons”, says Jesse. “There have been departures in my career, in my personal life…I wanted the record to have a little retro hint sonically but with my own contemporary feel – I listened to the music of Michael Jackson, Madonna and Prince a lot before we started the album. Departure has a more mature sound than what my fans previously heard from me but this is the road that I’m on right now and it’s the road that I believe they’ll join with me”.

Borrowing from the best of old-skool urban-pop music whilst drawing on the latest music trends, Departure is hardly original. But that is not the point. The real question is whether Jesse’s album successfully fits into this generic musical template of hip urban electro-pop that his old fans would have no doubt graduated to by now. With a voice that effortlessly flits in and out of falsetto and lyrics full of sexual innuendo, cock-sure arrogance and shameless self-references, Jesse certainly has all the ingredients that made JT (“It’s just Justin, feel good right?”) a sex symbol and put Beyonce (“It’s my girl B”) on the map.

He certainly gets off to a confident start with the catchy single ‘Leavin'’, a smooth electro-pop song with a great hook in which Jesse announces himself as “the one that’s so, so fly” and “can have you singing all night”. Yes, Jesse sounds like quite the ladies’ man, letting his fans know that they’ve “found somebody who can do it better”. He cranks up the raunch factor for ‘Into Ya’, a track with a sexy slow groove. But between his orgasmic grunts and lines such as, “if you let me put it inta ya, for so long I’ve been trying to put it inta ya”, “get up in my canopy…I’m gonna touch ya slowly” and “got me about to pop, genie in a bottle”, the song comes off a little more ridiculous than sexy.

“They call me Jesse, baby”, he announces in the even more ridiculous ‘Rock You’, a bombastic funky hip-hop anthem that shows just how eager the singer/songwriter is to shake off his clean, boyish image: “Hey mama, my car runnin’…gotta go at least two hundred so when the cops clock me they better bleep flow it”. It may be unfair to let my preconception of Jesse as the all-American good boy cloud my judgement of his new musical direction, considering the fact that the album is called Departure because of the very fact that it self-consciously signals a creative one from his previous music and style, but with some double-take lines, especially when he growls, “I’m rockier than the rocks in Montana”, he sometimes doesn’t make it easy. In spite of this, I nevertheless found myself wanting to grind my hips to this ultimately fun and cheeky track.

Jesse keeps it funky with ‘Make Up’, a track that builds up the beats, then slows them down to a sexy groove. “You’re sexy but you know it”, he drawls, while the sensual purr of a female voice can be heard somewhere in the background. ‘Freaky’ has some real oomph to it with its drum beats and dance floor appeal, while ‘How Do You Sleep?’ is melodious and catchy.

Amongst all this musical bravado are some occasional weak moments. The tinkering keyboard sounds in the ballad ‘Told You So’ come across a little like a flimsy ringtone as he sings about a girl who wants him back after leaving him for another man: “I don’t see you flippin’ or trippin’ over his moves”, he sings smoothly. However, in ‘Runnin’’, his lyrics seem to trip awkwardly over the music as he talks at lightning speed about how he’s been, once again, “trippin’”. The piano and violin driven ‘Not Your Enemy’ rounds off the album and shows off Jesse McCartney’s sensitive side: “I’ll take nothing less ‘til I hear happily ever after, the end”. Although slightly cheesy, this is the sexy-yet-sensitive-for-that-one-special-girl formula that works in mainstream pop, and it looks like Jesse is on his way to mastering it.

So should Justin be worried about losing his crown? Not quite. Overall, Departure sounds very much like one big cheesy pick up line from a cocky guy with all the moves, minus JT’s maturity and suaveness. However, the album’s show of funk and personality is nevertheless a promising start to the eventual trajectory Jesse McCartney is likely to make into the realms pop superstar and musical sex symbol. Admittedly, three stars might be being a little too kind to Jesse, but he’s a good looking boy and, like Jesse it seems, I’m always a sucker for a pretty face.

Departure, by Jesse McCartney
Label: EMI
Released: 16 June 2008
ASIN: B0019LZKJK

Buy Departure online and save some money to put towards Jesse McCartney's earlier albums Beautiful Soul and Right Where You Want Me. Plus, check out the video below to see Jesse in action for the clip to his latest single, 'Leavin''.