The Breakthrough

Mary J. Blige has done the nearly impossible in the R&B world, carving out a long, productive, compelling career in a genre that usually cycles through artists with alarming speed. It’s not just luck. Her seventh album shows off her assets: She’s got good taste in beats (check out the sublime, Motown-sampling “Can’t Hide From Luv “), unwavering confidence in the worldwide appeal of her personal dramas, and a gritty voice that she doesn’t use to run roughshod over her tunes. She even manages to inject fresh life into the umpteenth cover of U2’s “One,” a trick worth the price of admission by itself.