Keep The Faith

By CHRISTOPHER JOHN FARLEY

If Sean ("Puffy") Combs makes music for Saturday nights, Faith Evans, a rising star on Combs' Bad Boy Records, sings songs for rainy Sunday afternoons. Evans, the widow of slain rapper the Notorious B.I.G., mostly steers clear of hip-hop on this album to focus on slow and mid-tempo R.-and-B. balladry. Some of Evans' sad-eyed love songs float away, like evaporated tears. But at her best, on such songs as No Way and Keep the Faith, she leaves us drained but curiously refreshed, as if we've had a good, well-deserved cry.

--By Christopher John Farley