Now That's What I Call Music! 4

The fourth volume of the successful NOW THAT'S WHAT I CALL MUSIC series is, like its predecessors, a grab bag of various chart-oriented sounds. It covers the wide range of artists and their respective genres currently occupying the heights of pop preeminence. Smashmouth continues to combine '60s-style trashy organ, Peter Gunn-like guitar riffs, and Joe Jackson-in-California vocals on " Then the Morning Comes, " guaranteed to appeal to admirers of its previous hit " Walking on the Sun. " Macy Gray does wonders for the state of R & B circa 2000 by combining a contemporary edge with a decidedly old-school approach on the torch ballad " I Try. " The arch, angular riffs and rhythms of Train's slyly propulsive " Meet Virginia " prove that one can make convincing guitar-based pop-rock at the turn of the century without walking in the shadow of Counting Crows. Marc Anthony's " I Need to Know " fills the disc's Latin pop crossover quotient in style, with its air of romantic desperation and slinky, insinuating synth hooks. An...