Moby - 18

The problem with this album is that it's too closely related to its predecesor Play: it continues Moby's vocal sampling, his atmospheric grooves, has its own acoustic numbers, it's own reworked hip hop jam, a closing gospel tune, and even the same amount of tracks, not to mention a flood of associated singles. There really is nothing new that this album offers aside from being 'another Moby album'.

Also, while Play and Everything Is Wrong are both extremely eclectic pieces of work both in genre and instrumentation, a-sides and b-sides, the songs in 18 and 18: B-sides are way too similar, using a narrow range of instrumentation and even tempo (for the most part the album sounds like a drum machine, a few keyboards, some pre-recorded strings and vocal samples), and honestly, the vocals and vocalists Moby chose for this project just aren't as interesting as in Play. I won't say Gwen Stefani was the best choise either, but neither is Angie Stone.

But still, even if you chose to see it as 'another Moby album', it's pretty good overall, some good material, especially the few instrumentals (though the song 18 sounds suspiciously like the instrumental Everything Is Wrong). And besides, if you don't care for this album much, it's still way better than Last Night.