Diva in Training  | CD Review | Advocate.com

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Diva in Training
Leona Lewis has the pipes -- but not the bravado -- to play in Mariah's league.
By Louis Virtel
An Advocate.com exclusive posted April 16, 2008
Diva in Training

The meek diva -- a rare thing in any case, but a rarer gay phenomenon in 2008 against the undulations of pussycat quintets and 20-year-olds with albums titled Good Girl Gone Bad.

But the stunningly shy Leona Lewis, the 23-year-old who won season 3 of Simon Cowell’s British singing competition X-Factor, could’ve only cannoned to prominence this year. First she floored her homeland on reality TV, rejuvenating jukebox fog like “Sorry Seems to be the Hardest Word” and “Lady Marmalade.” Then Perez Hilton latched on and planted Lewis’s image stateside, updating his blog almost constantly with Lewis’s latest performances and igniting a cult following for her.

A superstar is born thanks to reality TV and blogger mania? Has such a feat even been invented yet?

Nonetheless, Lewis’s voice swells with the technique and tenderness of a bona fide superstar. Her debut album, Spirit, which finally saw U.S. release last week with a couple new tracks, squarely compacts the bronze belle’s penchant for (what else?) ballads and heartache, sufficing as the first full-length effort that captures her poignant bleat. But contrary to the glitzy fame machines that built Lewis, Spirit is dunked in dredge of yesteryear, like vanilla ballad formulas and slow-jam soups of nearly decades gone by. Much like Lewis foremother Mariah Carey’s uneven '90s albums, the lead single (in this case, the gooey but ingratiating torch-pop hit “Bleeding Love,” produced by OneRepublic front man Ryan Tedder) stands out like the climax of a pop-up book next to the vast tundra of whimpering tracks.

Virtel is a frequent contributor to Advocate.com.

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