POPSCREEN: R. Kelly

A word of advice for the gentlemen: don’t bring your girlfriends within a country mile of R. Kelly.

As his shameless new video, “I’m a Flirt (Remix),” makes abundantly clear, he’s a flirt. He can’t help it, of course. It’s not his fault if “She checkin’ for a platinum type of guy.” All he has to do is glance in her direction, although it’s a wonder he can see anything, much less your girlfriend’s cheating heart, through his diamond-encrusted sunglasses.

Wait a second. Let’s talk about those sunglasses. Literally smothered with ice, they take bling to another level. We see the shades a lot, because the choice of visuals is either that or cleavage. While it’s not the most groundbreaking premise for a music video, recent history has shown that the combination of scantily-clad women and R. Kelly leads to chart success (and occasionally court dates). Suffice it to say that eye candy is in plentiful supply.

Yet the visuals tire quickly, with amusing cameos from T.I. and T-Pain providing the only counterpoints to an endless succession of quick cuts featuring R. Kelly, people’s (now ex-) girlfriends, and still more R. Kelly.

What redeems and almost legitimizes this video is the song itself. It’s tacky, tongue-in-cheek, and irresistibly catchy. Clocking in at five-and-a-half minutes, it long overstays its welcome, but the piano-driven chorus (“Please believe it / unless your game is tight and you trust her / Then don’t bring her ’round me / because I’m a flirt”) never seems to lose its sugar-coated luster.

If R. Kelly can use his incontestable vocal chops to forever change how you look at closets, then you better believe that “freakin’ wit honeys like I supposed to” is a walk in the park.