Natasha Bedingfield Pocketful Of Sunshine CD

Personnel: Natasha Bedingfield (background vocals); Natasha Bedingfield (vocals); Toby Gad (various instruments, programming); J.R. Rotem, Dernst "D.Mile" Emile, Greg Kurstin, Rodney Jerkins (various instruments); Mike Elizondo (guitar, guitars, keyboards, bass guitar, programming); John Shanks (guitar, guitars, keyboards, bass guitar, background vocals); Mads Hauge (guitar, guitars); Carla Campbell (violin); Hanoh (viola); Danja (keyboards); Michael Valerio (bass guitar); Wendy Melvoin, Nick Lashley (guitar); Mark Robertson , Julie Gigante, Natalie Leggett, Neel Hammond (violin); Keith Greene (viola); Vanessa Freebirn, Sebastian Toettcher, Victor Lawrence (cello); Richard Altenbach (strings); Wayne Wilkins (keyboards, programming, keyboard programming, drum programming, background vocals); Andrew Frampton (keyboards, programming, background vocals); Charles Judge (keyboards); Trevor Lawrence (drums, cymbals); Jeff Rothschild (drums, programming); Ravaughn Brown, Danielle Brisebois, Rico Love, Steve Kipner, Meleni Smith (background vocals).
Additional personnel: Sean Kingston.
Audio Mixers: Toby Gad; Marcella "Ms. Lago" Araica; Manny Marroquin; Phil Tan.
Recording information: 2nd Floor Studios, Atlantic City, NJ; Chalice Studios, Los Angeles, CA; Entourage Studios, Los Angeles, CA; Henson Recording Studios, Hollywood, CA; Miramar, Santa Monica, CA; Phantom Studios, Westlake Village, CA; Record Plant Recording Studios, Hollywood, CA; Sonora Recorders, Los Angeles, CA; Starstruck, Nashville, TN; The Phono Room, London, England; The Sweatbox, Los Angeles, CA.
Photographer: John Akehurst.
Arrangers: Richard Altenbach; J.R. Rotem; Toby Gad.
In 2008 popster Natasha Bedingfield dropped a finely constructed, hook-filled effort in POCKETFUL OF SUNSHINE. Rootsy and groove-oriented, but with plenty of contemporary R&B studio polish (a combo especially evident on the reggae-inflected standout "Love Like This," featuring Sean Kingston), POCKETFUL manages to be both laid-back and glamorous at once.
Bedingfield is equally adept at breezy, catchy dance-pop (the title track) as she is at heart-tugging love ballads ("Soulmate"). Sharp productions, head-nodding beats, singalong choruses, and Bedingfield's smooth, appealing vocals make POCKETFUL go down easy, and will keep fans coming back to these tracks again and again.
Natasha Bedingfield's Unwritten was a better than average slice of Top 40 ear candy buoyed by a pair of genuinely great pop singles, the self-empowerment title track, and the giddy "These Words," the most meta love song since Elton John's "Your Song." It seemed likely that the New Zealand-born, London-based singer/songwriter (the younger sister of dance-pop star Daniel Bedingfield) would be even more successful with her second album, but fate and record company politicking intervened. In early 2007, Bedingfield released a pre-album single called "I Wanna Have Your Babies," a fizzy, synthy tune that continued on the same self-conscious path as "These Words": at heart, it was a song about how the most shocking thing a woman could say (either to her boyfriend or in a pop song) was that she wanted to procreate. Although it was just a lighthearted jab at the hypersexualized nature of popular culture in the age of Paris Hilton sex tapes and paparazzi photos of Britney Spears sans culottes, the song was both generally misinterpreted and a complete commercial flop in the U.S. Bedingfield's second album, N.B., was released on schedule in the U.K. in May 2007, but Epic quietly scrubbed its American release. Later in the year, a new single, an agreeable but slightly faceless reggae-tinged collaboration with rising R&B star Sean Kingston called "Love Like This," made it into the Billboard Top 20 chart, and a slightly revised version of N.B. was announced for U.S. release, with the hit single and a new title track, "Pocketful of Sunshine," added to the album's lineup. The release was scrubbed yet again, and with eachRolling Stone (p.80) - 3 stars out of 5 -- "[With] some sad-eyed ballads and solid R&B -- 'Piece of Your Heart' is a dark, brassy thing..."
Blender (Magazine) (pp.96-97) - 3.5 out of 5 stars -- "[With] uniformly strong pop and R&B songcraft -- highlighted by the Sean Kingston collaboration 'Love Like This'..."