After the outstanding accolades of his 2007 quintuple-platinum Christmas outing Noël, Josh Groban did what any smart and successful artist would do — cut an album with Rick Rubin. Groban’s fifth studio album doesn’t play with the dire urgency of Johnny Cash’s final album, nor does it resonate with a raw and stripped-down production that’s synonymous with Rubin’s work. Instead, 2010’s Illuminations plays with a classic and timeless elegance that’s devoid of over-exaggerated vocal gymnastics. Following the opening instrumental “The Wandering Kind (Prelude),” Groban retains a slivered vestige from Noël with “Bells of New York City,” a beautifully melancholic piece that muses on Manhattan’s holiday church bells. He covers Declan O'Rourke’s “Galileo (Someone Like You)" with an otherworldly beauty similar to Jeff Buckley’s reinvention of Leonard Cohen’s “Hallelujah.” Throughout Illuminations Rubin keeps the tipping-point at the edge, pushing Groban to deliver some of his best vocal performances to date.