Her debut album Whoa, Nelly! set her up as a possible female Beck, full of bright melodies, intelligent songs, and killer production. Her sophomore slumped, going for an acoustic-based folk feel – musically strong, it failed to connect with, well, pretty much anyone. Now Nelly Furtado is back as a pop tart.

There’s essentially no difference between the songs on Loose and those produced by any other middling modern r ‘n b pop star, such as Rihanna or Ciara. Furtado’s voice was never her strength – instead it was the way she phrased her words, and the strong melodies particularly on Whoa, Nelly that made her stand out.

Loose still has a couple of killer songs – the singles “Maneater” and “Promiscuous” are strong, with the production from Timbaland punchy and crisp throughout. Indeed, much of this album seems to have been cut from the same cloth as Gwen Stefani’s Love Angel Music Baby, or perhaps J. Lo or a touch of Janet Jackson – it’s all sex and sinews, groove and taut guts.

As such, it’s almost devoid of what personality Nelly Furtado displayed on her first two albums. Sure, the singles are killer, but the two Spanish-language tracks stuck in the middle acts as the break weight point – tracks like “Glow” are killer pop tunes made for the radio, but the second half of Loose is comparatively insipid after such a punchy beginning. So whilst it could have been a really great pop release, Loose instead plumps for the middle-ground.