Ciara Taking Us on a Fantasy Ride

Looking for the goodies? Well, look no further because Ciara is back. As stated on Rap-Up.com, the First Lady of Crunk&B is working with Rodney "Darkchild" Jerkins, Lil Jon and T-Pain on her new album, entitled Fantasy Ride, which is slated for a November release.

According to Billboard.com, her third studio album will be a concept album that will contain three discs, rather than the traditional single disc, and each disc will contain 5 or 6 songs of a single theme. Disc one, called Groove City, will feature slow jams like her Evolution album single, "Promise." Disc two, called Crunktown, will feature crunk tracks in the vein of her number one debut hit, "Goodies." And finally, the third disc ,called Kingdom of Dance, will feature up-tempo house and freestyle tracks. Sounds like fun to me.

Ciara seems to be getting more conceptual, taking advantage of the freedom artists tend to receive when their debut album is a hit like Goodies was. Follow-up to Goodies, Ciara: The Evolution, had interludes titled "The Evolution of Music," "The Evolution of Dance," "The Evolution of Fashion," and "The Evolution of C," dividing the album thematically. But she's taking that one step further this time.

When She First Brought Us the Goodies

It all started when "Goodies" hit the airwaves Summer of 2004. By September of that year, it had crawled its way on top of the Hot 100, where it sat for several weeks. Riding on the wild success of the smash single, the album debuted at number 3 in the U.S. Proving she was anything but a one hit wonder, Ciara put out two more highly successful singles, "1, 2 Step" featuring Missy Elliott and "Oh" featuring Ludacris. The singles kept the album afloat on the chart for over an year and garnered Ciara two Grammy nominations.

Gracefully Avoiding the Sophomore Slump

Come December 2006, Ciara released the aforementioned Evolution album to great debut success in the U.S., fueled by singles "Get Up" featuring Chamillionaire and "Promise." The former sounds like a rehash of "1, 2 Step," while the latter is her first slow jam to gain widespread recognition. Even though the album did not match the success of Goodies, it contains some of her most unique, innovative songs, including the brilliant "Like A Boy," in which she explores the idea of switching gender roles amid ominous strings.

Now with Fantasy Ride slated for the end of this year, we have a lot to look forward to from the 22-year-old.