<\/p>\n
Maroon 5 – Credit: Hugh Lippe*<\/p>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
After two decades of pop ubiquity, Maroon 5 are digging deeper into the crate than expected on their eighth album.\u00a0Love Is Like<\/em>\u00a0weaves a surprising number of Seventies funk, soul, and R&B samples into their sleek pop sound \u2014 Barbara Stant\u2019s 1972 obscurity \u201cYou Know I Love You,\u201d Loleatta Holloway\u2019s storming \u201cI Know Where You\u2019re Coming From,\u201d and the Festivals\u2019 forgotten B side \u201cTake Your Time,\u201d to name a few. The selections do more than nod to the group\u2019s blue-eyed-soul roots; they feel like earnest tributes. Yet in trying to smuggle these unruly sounds into a radio-ready Trojan horse, the record feels like searching for buried treasure with gloves on \u2014 ambitious, but careful not to get dirt under its fingernails.<\/p>\n The album sails in on the breezy piano hook of \u201cHideaway,\u201d as Adam Levine exudes his trademark ease. The sax-touched \u201cAll Night\u201d and the strutting \u201cYes I Did\u201d are similarly smooth. \u201cJealousy Problems\u201d leans on the sinewy funk of Black Heat\u2019s 1975 \u201cZimba Ku,\u201d with Levine clearly enjoying the role of summer scoundrel, singing \u201cI know this behavior is beneath us both.\u2026 I kinda like this dysfunction.\u201d And Lil Wayne rescues the title track with an endearingly dumb marriage proposal (\u201cYour love is like dope\/Got me twisted like a rope\/Let\u2019s elope\u201d) as he rides atop Valerie Simpson\u2019s classic \u201cSilly Wasn\u2019t I.\u201d<\/p>\n More from Rolling Stone<\/strong><\/p>\n The best moments are when the pop polish sounds like it\u2019s wearing off. Guitarist James Valentine slips in a few unshackled jags on the big single \u201cPriceless,\u201d which rides a catchy, scratchy guitar groove (supposedly based on a Levine iPhone voice memo) alongside Blackpink\u2019s Lisa. Historically, Maroon 5\u2019s pop-diva pairings (Rihanna, Christina Aguilera, Cardi B, Megan Thee Stallion) have yielded mutual wins that showcased the band\u2019s adaptability. Here, though, the guest spots underwhelm. Lisa should be a natural fit, but she\u2019s mixed too anonymously into the sonic wallpaper \u2014 a wasted opportunity. Sexyy Red fares better, barreling through \u201cI Like It\u201d with disco strings at her back and personality that can tilt the room. You half wish someone had just asked her and Lisa to cover \u201cSummer Breeze\u201d and call it a day.<\/p>\n There\u2019s nothing inherently wrong with a Maroon 5 yacht-rock era, but the impulse toward immaculate control can make the songs feel as if the band has dropped anchor five feet from the dock. Thankfully, Ryan Tedder and Marshmello are below deck to deliver the goods on a few straight-up pop bonus tracks. Tedder\u2019s \u201cCigarettes\u201d and Marshmello\u2019s buoyant romp \u201cCloser\u201d prove Maroon 5 can still pick the sure thing when the stars align.<\/p>\n The closer of the original album, \u201cCalifornia,\u201d remains the luminous standout. The band sets aside the winks and retro affectations for something unadorned and honest. \u201cI\u2019m paralyzed and weak here on my own,\u201d Levine sings. Maroon 5 have long been deft shape-shifters. But their musical soul has always been Levine\u2019s voice \u2014 that curious instrument, capable of sounding utterly detached one minute and heartbreakingly exposed the next. When it allows in vulnerability, it becomes the one thing you want to believe.<\/p>\n Best of Rolling Stone<\/strong><\/p>\n Sign up for RollingStone’s Newsletter<\/a>. For the latest news, follow us on Facebook<\/a>, Twitter<\/a>, and Instagram<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n \u2018 The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n \u2018 Some details of this article were extracted from the following source www.yahoo.com \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Maroon 5 – Credit: Hugh Lippe* After two decades of pop ubiquity, Maroon 5 are digging deeper into the crate than expected on their eighth album.\u00a0Love Is Like\u00a0weaves a surprising number of Seventies funk, soul, and R&B samples into their sleek pop sound \u2014 Barbara Stant\u2019s 1972 obscurity \u201cYou Know I Love You,\u201d Loleatta Holloway\u2019s […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1968932,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[25172],"tags":[345636,349526,345637],"class_list":["post-1968931","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-entertainment","tag-adam-levine","tag-loleatta-holloway","tag-maroon-5"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/Maroon-5-Go-Crate-Digging-With-Gloves-On.jpeg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1968931","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1968931"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1968931\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1968932"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1968931"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1968931"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1968931"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}