La Bella Mafia

“I’m a chameleon, I’ve got many styles and rhymes,” spits diminutive, bawdy badass Lil’ Kim on her latest album’s ultrasmoove “Can’t Fuck With Queen Bee.” As if to prove it, after opening the tune by decrying materialism (“I can’t take these diamonds with me when I die”), she does an about-face when defining her ideal man (“He gotta have security, power and wealth/’Cause I could do bad by my goddamn self”). But that’s Kim’s gift: Rather than undermining her, her schizophrenia only makes her more interesting. Musically, she’s all over the map, too. Timbaland’s bouncy, funky production is a perfect, energetic foil for “The Jump Off,” even if that repetitive guitar lick reverberating through its middle amounts to self-plagiarism. Fluttering woodwinds, herky-jerky beats, and Missy Elliott make the playful “Can You Hear Me Now?” irresistible, but then Kim flips the frivolity for the creepy, ominous “Heavenly Father.” Overall, it’s an uneven effort, but the highs are high enough to offset the lows.