There was once a time when remixes actually were remixes.  Songs were given totally different music.  They were slowed down, sped up, guitars were added, guitars were lost, choruses changed, and the artist was involved.  Those still exist.  A whole new generation of hip-hop producers are adding new music and completely altering existing songs through new programs.  These have actually picked up steam in the last few years or so, as remixes didn't just consist of asking Busta Rhymes or Twista to come drop a verse anymore.  But Ashanti's a few years behind and so is her new album of unreleased songs and remixes, Collectables by Ashanti.

Bright spots don't exist on this collection, just dim ones that somehow missed the black hole that has engulfed the rest of this record.  Plenty of ill-advised "remixes" show up, with such second-tier rappers as Caddilac Tah and Merce finding publicity on huge hits by the R&B singer for which this compilaion is named after, such as their endless rants about "murdah" on the "Only U (Remix)" and the awkwardly-placed verses on the remix for "Rain on Me".  The "Breakup 2 Makeup (Remix)" stands as the valley in an album full of holes; the original song ,surprisingly, was one of Ashanti's career highlights, but Black Child's appearance as the obligatory thug spitting mind-numbing tripe like "When you getting cake/ you know they gonna hate / But that pretty face'll brighten up any day" robs the song of any kind of listenability it once had.  Thankfully, sometimes of the remixes do feature new music and different choruses, but unfortunately, none of these things actually make the records any good.  The "Rock Wit U (Awww Baby) (Remix)" cribs the former Michael Jackson smash and makes Bad seem like something that I should be embarrassed to love.  After the awfulness of these retreads through her catalog, the blandness that comes along with the new material is more than welcome.  With cliched titles that define mundane, songs like "I Love You" and "I Found It In You" stand firmly in the trapping of modern R&B, sounding like some kind of Faith Evans record executive-produced by Satan.  The lone listenable points begin and end the disc, not coincidentally.  The Paul Wall and Method Man-assisted try at a club hit, "Still on It", features a bare-minimum beat consisting of Casio-like snaps and pops, but it doesn't completely fail at not being terrible. Finally, former "106 & Park" host Free makes a rare guest appearance on the "Focus (Remix)", where she helps on the only genuinely upbeat track of the album.  It's almost danceable, which is far and beyond the best thing that can be said about any track on this album.

Modern R&B is in bad shape.  It's scientific fact.  Still, albums as pointless as this one should wake up those within the genre as to their sad state.  While her labelmate and former duet partner Ja Rule gracefully goes out on a high note in 2005 with his strong greatest hits package Exodus, the self-titled "princess of R&B" releases an album of unreleased tracks that probably would have served better in Irv Gotti's vaults.

Go Hard: "Focus (Remix)", "Still on It"

Hardly: "Breakup 2 Makeup (Remix)", "I Found It In You", "Rock Wit U (Awww Baby) (Remix)", "Only U (Remix)"

Overall: 0.5 out of Six Shots