Michael McDonald was nervous for his Charlie Puth yacht rock collaboration: ‘Am I going to sound like Mrs. Miller or Robert Goulet on this thing?‘

Exactly how I feel. Check out the Beato interview. It's really good

personally as a casual listener of charlie puth, i'd say it's definitely because of his sense of harmony and keeping it simple while making it also interesting which is extremely on show in this album and less on his other ones i think most of his abilities shine in live performances as he lets his jazz part go a bit wilder, his quick reharmonizations (e.g. national anthem even though it was heavily influenced by whitney houston's version and i forgot who composed it for her), voice leading are really good and they're really present on voicenotes and this album as a lyricist? eh, he's alright, nothing too groundbreaking but musically he has an enormous amount of talent and i still think he's trying to find the right balance of easy enough to listen to while also being complex enough to use his extensive knowledge on which is a line a lot of pop jazz artists try to walk on but find it extremely difficult to stay constant and not go too much in either direction anyways for a really quick example check out his "how long" performance live at bbc i believe which has a few great reharm sections and listen to "boy" for a really amazing piano solo