No Regrets

iTunes Review

No Regrets feels like the first opportunity this long-working vocalist has had to simply be herself on a record. Her focus and self-assured demeanor come through immediately on the title track, a song fueled by inner strength and based around a cyclical, hypnotizing hook. While the album still shows traces of her stage training there is something more relaxed and human about her delivery here. Withers is drawn to club music (“Rock & Rain”) and melodramatic showstoppers (“I Remember”), but her personality comes trough strongest on unadorned soul songs like “Take Me Back,” “Need Love,” “Alright” and “Because I Love You.” Songs like “Why” distinguish Withers from the competing ladies of modern R&B, but she doesn’t need to change her style to stand apart. She displays a dignity and strength that can only come from years of paying dues — a feeling that can’t be expressed in the kind of manufactured R&B songs we often hear on the radio. A song like “Say It Now” is a reflection of the expression Withers wears on the album cover — open but resolute, and with enough confidence to know she has nothing to hide.