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- <text id=94TT1787>
- <title>
- Dec. 19, 1994: Music:Triple Jump
- </title>
- <history>
- TIME--The Weekly Newsmagazine--1994
- Dec. 19, 1994 Uncle Scrooge
- </history>
- <article>
- <source>Time Magazine</source>
- <hdr>
- ARTS & MEDIA/MUSIC, Page 77
- Triple Jump
- </hdr>
- <body>
- <p> TLC follows up its platinum debut with a fine, slinky CD
- </p>
- <p>By Christopher John Farley
- </p>
- <p> One of the hottest groups in R. and B. right now is the
- vocal trio TLC. The letters stand for the members' nicknames
- Tionne "T-Boz" Watkins, Lisa "Left Eye" Lopes and Rozonda
- "Chilli" Thomas but there are a lot of other things the name
- could refer to. Tender Loving Care, of course, is one
- possibility, and the group's enormously charming new CD,
- CrazySexyCool, is full of songs about women in search of love,
- caring and tenderness. Given the well-publicized travails of the
- group, however Lopes is facing charges that she burned down her
- boyfriend's house, and Thomas is searching for her biological
- father TLC could also be the initials for Tabloids Lotsa Copy!
- </p>
- <p> Happily, Watkins, Lopes and Thomas have been doing more
- than getting in the gossip columns lately; they've also been
- getting better. Their 1992 debut album, Ooooooohhh...on the TLC
- Tip, sold almost 3 million copies, but it was instantly
- forgettable. CrazySexyCool features slinky singing, bouncy beats
- and grabby rap interludes, and the vocals are stronger and the
- melodies more piquant than those on the first album. Several
- songs stand out, including Creep, a funky, slightly jazzy dance
- number, and the delicately saucy Red Light Special, a love song
- written by the ubiquitous Babyface (who has composed recent hits
- for Boyz II Men and Madonna too).
- </p>
- <p> The trio also laments inner-city despair on the ballad
- Waterfalls ("My only bleedin' hope/ Is for the folk who can't
- cope"). But the secret of TLC's success isn't social commentary.
- It may not fit the initials, but what TLC really stands for is
- pure, funky fun. And CrazySexyCool delivers.
- </p>
- </body>
- </article>
- </text>
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