I continue to be endlessly impressed with Rihanna’s last album, Good Girl Gone Bad. To put it in terms of Michael Jackson, which seems to be required these days, it’s as chock full of hits as Thriller.

I just picked up Rihanna’s previous album, A Girl Like Me, and though I haven’t had a chance to listen to it all the way through yet, the first single ‘SOS’ is as groovily infectious as the new stuff. I don’t know how she has managed to float to the top of all the similar singers out there. She doesn’t write any of her songs so it’s probably a matter of her (or her management, or both) recognizing top songwriting and producing talent and lining her up with the right people. She also has a great presence and is a strong performer, so maybe it’s the writers and producers who want to be in business with her.

One thing Rihanna does well is effectively incorporate samples into her songs while avoiding the stench of recycling. Puff Daddy, or P Diddy, or whatever his name is, strikes me as a prime example of how not to sample songs. His regurgitation of The Police’s ‘Every Breath You Take’ for the Notorious B.I.G. tribute song ‘I’ll Be Missing You’ is exhibit A. It’s not a new song… it’s a guy rapping over ‘Every Breath You Take.’

Rihanna’s ‘Shut Up and Drive,’ on the other hand, borrows a wicked groove from New Order’s ‘Blue Monday’ and turns it into a grunge-rock funk-fest that might evoke fond memories of the original but is very much a brand-new thing. I’ve embedded the New Order song below so you can check them both out. That’s a great song, too, and a reminder that I should get me some New Order.

Two more comments. First, I sure do love this line, and Rihanna’s delivery thereof: “You look like you can handle what’s under my hood / You keeping saying that you will, boy I wish you would.” And second, if I had access to the mechanics’ shop depicted in this video, my car would be the best-maintained vehicle in history.

New Order – Blue Monday