Whitney Houston delivered
One Wish: The Holiday Album, her first Christmas record, a year after her 2002 comeback, Just Whitney. If it seemed like that record played it safe, that's nothing compared to
One Wish, which is the straightest adult contemporary record
Houston had released in years. Of course, holiday records are the last place anybody would want to take a risk, since they're designed to be nice, pleasant mood music and this suits the bill nicely. The clean, pristine production, heavy on synths, sounds as if it was cut in the late '80s, yet it's also strangely spare, often being no more than a synth and a drum machine. Still, it's a sound that's well suited for
Whitney and her thoroughly predictable set of material (the title track is the only new song, then the final two songs are recycled from the soundtrack of
The Preacher's Wife). Ultimately,
One Wish is the kind of album that may only appeal to a fan of
Whitney who has already yearned for her holiday album, but for those fans, it will be satisfactory. ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine