Saturday, 31 October 2009

Oops ... Shakira Did It Again

If Britney is happy to look like a fit Courtney Love circa 1998, then great, but she really needs to start making an effort - there is not even much to parody beyond her now trademark arm-raise/face-smirk, which originally featured in the British cut of the Peice of Me video.



Shakira on the other thigh, recycles Madonna's sloppy-seconds with the male dancer Cloud (who I am now bored of after his shoulder-jigging on Miss Rowland's When Love Takes Over clip), with the best artistic choreography since Dannii Minogue collapsed at the end of Douche Me Like That. But why is she in the steam room with a bunch of Charlottes*?

*You know, the epidose titled The Attack of The 5 Foot 10 Woman where Char feels insecure about de-robing in the steam room because of her thighs.

Thursday, 29 October 2009

Crush On You

Roxette Challenge Dannii To A Re-Release Off!
As a confused gay I have had a few phases of hetro-crushes in my younger years - obviously I just wanted to be these women ('obviously'), but my infatuation with peroxide punkstress Marie Fredrikkson was love at first sight. Her bleeding outpour of soulfully damaged ballads and punchy appetite for rock deliveries established a visceral attraction that remains undiminished. And so Roxette have re-released their studio albums with bonus tracks for good measure - obviously Dannii Minogue was making them feel bad with her recent deluxe edition release schedule.

The career-best Joyride album's first bonus track is the shy and mellow ballad The Sweet Hello, The Sad Goodbye, wherein joyful strumming verses spiral into melancholic heaven. If you can't picture yourself skipping to this in a field, then you clearly have a knack for not getting carried away for tossed off ballads. 'You know you're not the only one who knows how to cry' and 'we're very much the same' and tender offerings we all crave to hear, and Marie's aching voice is the perfect instrument for such wistfully tear-blurred sentimental vulnerability.

Love Spins operates a similar feel to other tracklisted Per vocal led tracks, particularly the awesome Knockin' On Every Door, and so it is little wonder they slammed the shutters on this one. A faultlessly perfunctory track. Violins provide massaging comfort on the Marie-drenched ballad Seduce Me with the finger-snapping sass I love them for and has the singer on fine form, grunting 'hey you' with remarkable bravery for self-introduction as ever.

Look Sharp's sought-after scintilating glamour makes it my favourite Roxette album: Marie's wind-defying quiff survives the bullet-firing 'na-na-na-na-na-na' chorus she unforgettably delivers. Cry is bizarrely their best song - it could have been sung by any of the greats and yet criminally is an album track! The shimmering champagne-fizzing dance-ballad I Could Never Give You Up is the set's other lost single and should have been another American number 1. And so the first bonus track is The Voice, which utilizes I Could Never's thunderstorm drums and glistening synths. Picking up the pace is the demo One Is Such A Lonely Number, which sounds like a generic Gloria Estefan album track - no life can be injected to such lyrics as 'make the world go around' but Roxette fans are under no illusion. The next 1987 demo, Don't Believe In Accidents, is quite a harsh anti-abortion stance, but I am sure there is a reason they aborted this mistake (the music sounds like the theme to UK TV show Casualty at one point).

I am not too familiar with their debut album Pearls of Passion (great title as it is!), but Soul Deep has always been one of their best stompers, with the most usurping whooooaaah yeah's I have ever heard - it makes Duffy and her cronies look a bit desperate, demonstrating vividly that whatever direction they take seems effortless, as here they channel 60s doo-wop into gurning prowling. The dramatic So Far Away is stark and agonising, which might be too theatrical for its own good, but I happen to love it. And so bonus track 1 is the Tits And Ass Demo 1986 of Neverending Love - the single has never left much of an imprint on me, but their dynamic is being put in place, yet it is a tad twee for my thirst for their raddled-faced, earthquaking ballads and rock numbers. Equally polite, the TAAD of Secrets That She Keeps is an acoustic turn for Per's stubble-bristling vocals to rub you down like a nail file.

Room Service is a worth all their previous triumphs, it really is a solid and surprising album: the high voltage of You Make My Head Go Pop would make Shania Twain blush with envy, Marie's self-penned Little Girl is a standout amongst their best work, and the ballads are par excellence for their unassuming beauty. The rippling electro and thorny guitars on the bruised Entering Your Heart are divine, it's a majestic ballad and Marie sings so sweetly it is impossible not to feel as if you are about to melt into ice cream at the mercy of Michelle McManus. The piano-led love song The Weight of The World showcases another gristling Per lead, and, well there you go. Bla Bla Bla Bla Bla (You Broke My Heart) is on the money for its aliterated repition as it's such a b-b-b-b-b-side if ever I heard one, it plods with distinctly Roxette-the-Beatles-were-a-huge-inspiration-you-know-piano-thuds.

When I was 8 years old I had lost my first set of friends and so beyond school had no idea I should really have found replacements, and so at school I went away on camp without realizing I would need to share a dorm with some mates. Well fancy that, after an embarassing crying fit, behind the scenes figures of authority obviously arranged classmates to ask me. I'm drifting, but basically when away I wanted the intriguing Tourism album as it was my chosen 'reward' for going. I still remember getting a letter from my Mother whilst on location at this camp, reading that she had bought it for me. I still remember kneeling by the CD player in the livingroom like listening to Roxette was the only thing that I cared about. Who needs social development when you have music to absorb yourself in? I was always disappointed and confused by their arrangement of It Must Have Been love, by hey-ho - Fingertips was amazing, Marie's rise-and-fall 2nd verse, The Rain's stunning celtic cheese-fest was to die for ('I was raised the Northern way' always raises a smile) with it's chugging sense of drama and quivering kiss-clenching, and Silver Blue remains one of their finest ever ballads. Okay, so bonus-wise we have the single edit of Fingertips and a vocal-switch of Cinammon.

Have A Nice Day came out of nowhere in 1999 and it was remarkably up to the challenge of shifting units amongst Britney, Cher and Destiny's Child, but after the sultry orchestra of I Wish I Could Fly settled itself on the UK charts at #11, the record company rudely gave up. The startling head-spinning rush of Stars, with Marie's frostbite vocals going hell for leather in dancefloor pursuit, was simply head and shoulders their craziest track since Joyride - the chart climate was ripe for this track to impact itself, but whatever. Special mention goes to Marie's gunpoint vocals on the ceaselessly amazing Crush On You. It Hurts is the tear-dripping ballad bonus track, widely available for some time, with great 'come down' poise that Massive Attack would be proud to reel in Tracy Thorn for. Myth has a guitar riff that sounds like the sitcom Friends theme tune, a bar-rocker track with a tough vocal from Marie - 'I love your myth' is great fun, especially when you are listening to your idol singing it. Makin' Love Tou You isn't fully committed - they aren't about to go wrong, but it's too gentle to fully penetrate (unless they don't mind you drifting off whilst they 'perform'), and Marie's vocals are thin like how she sung most of the next album....

1994's Crash! Boom! Bang! album slightly disloged my obsession for the band. I loved Marie's cackling delivery on lead single Sleeping In My Car, but it was crammed full of atmospheric songs that ran short of fuel in my opinion. Some fantastic ghostly vocals were in place, but it was lacking something overall. The lush soundtrack single Almost Unreal is included - a UK top 10 and one of the few videos to feature some proper beauty shots of Marie (those black eyebrows always set her cheekbones off like no one's business). The wilting verses are so inviting before we are bitch-slapped by their trademark sensitivity - 'I love how you do the hocus pocus to me' is adorably clumsy and of course was meant for the song to feature on the Bette Midler starring film Hocus Pocus. The twee verses to Crazy About You are their stock-and-trade and we have another 'hello' quaking chorus - maybe Per goes speed-dating far too often as these welcoming greetings are starting to grate. The floaty ballad See Me drifts away nicely, much like Go To Sleep did on the original sequence (Enya eat your heart out).


Roxette are eternally poignant and never fail to charm with their obsession for personal hand-shaking lyrics. If they return for one last hurrah I for one cannot wait.

Wednesday, 28 October 2009

Very Promising Start

Fiercely independent Britney is looking marv for the first time in ages. I mean properly grown up and on her way - I mean that in a non-patronising tone, to allude to the chances of Britters finally fulfilling her promise of becoming a pop queen and not just a flakey over-sexed media phenomenon. I actually like 3 for its melody, lazor-beam synths and the singer's auto-tuned and sensual vocals, which are effortlessly horizontal. The photograph above more than reminds me of one of the shots of Kate Bush for her Hounds of Love album. With her second singles collection due for release, will Ms. Spears ever create a truly spellbinding work of art (her own Hounds of Love, Like A Prayer, Girl or World Clique) or forever scatter her greatness through 2-3 great tracks per album?

Tuesday, 27 October 2009

Sweet Revenge: Keisha Blows Her Final Wad

With her petrol-curdling ad libs, like singing with her mouth full of melted liquorice, Keisha can communicate her powers even underwater to dolphins, whales and penguins - with Get Sexy alone she has helped the migration of endangered blue whales in order for them to mate properly whilst being coached by Buchanan's squeeling tenderness.

Above: Heidi's hips have never told a fib yet - 'help, cannot breathe' was their most recent tweet update.

The culled project Sweet 7's Keisha-included originals have leaked in the form of the album sampler now doing the rounds like Amelle deepthroating a stag party or using the local bus route ro make up the numbers (something she is good at). Forget baby seals, Keisha's ow-ow-barking vocals are killer and challenge her ostrich-face nemisis to a brutal fierce-off, with poor hapless Heidi blowing her nails dry until her middle-eights to sing about being a ladeee (she really never got over that Victoria Beckham line from the Wannabe rap did she?).

The shuddering About A Girl is already less compelling with Lady K's replacement Jade (of whom I actually don't mind and can forgive her Coco Pop's monkey with a wig 'beauty' for the sight of her chopstick legs alone), and Lady Much Amelle's belching 'party y'all' is like someone who has just been sick breathing right onto your face when you're not asking them to. The usually useless Heidi sounds good chirping away like an Topshop cashier who's finishing their shift in 5 minutes.

The air tight Get Sexy's cum-sharing vocals aren't likely to be effected since Mutya was able to stop her singles being re-recorded and the Keisha delivery of ehoing 'now-now-now' has been a tatoo for everyone's ears from day 1 of it's first play. Sorry Jade.

Jade takes another violin bow to the face on Wear My Kiss as once again Keish-Keish just keeps on bringing it and floors the skittles with her bowling-ball vocal destruction. With obvious similarities to Bananarama's terrace chant Na Na Hey Hey Goodbye, Buchanan is hidden in the mix until her verses express some much-needed ejaculating attitude (there ain't no one who spurts their vocals like Keisha-Babe). Heidi is once again a prop, and foil for the main show of K&A's ongoing alpha scrap.

Below: 'I might be fat, but my vocals are phatter!'
Amelle might think she is Miss Everything to the Suga's, but even on 4.0 she feels like the rubbish tranny out of America's Next Top Model cycle 11 and her dry-purging vocal talent makes RuPaul sound like Aretha. Miss Everything is date raped a bit by rnb fatso Sean Kingston, but Keisha nails her vocoder tricks perfectly fine all by herself, and Amelle sounds miles better this way without her fag-ash-lil' rasp pissing the hell out of me.

Below: just gorgeous.
Sadly not a Lisa Scott-Lee cover, Wait For You begins like a Basshunter track before flexing the Sweet 7 electric muscle. It is my second favourite.

Below: just yuck!
The Cascada-meets-Whitney Thank You For The Heartbreak has a lead vocal from bad smell Amelle that is fed from saturated tampons, decayed fish and dried up KY. K's own bubble-popping chorus can't even save it, but it's like cherishing the last breath of the class bully before she's dragged out the room by lesbian janitors, one wonders what there is left to fear and admire. The umbilical chord to the Sugababes 1.0 has just been severed, and I hope those bland and butch bitches (yes, bitches) are happy with themselves - how very track 2 off 3.

Monday, 26 October 2009

More Dannii Drivel


Dannii obviously woke up naked in her local Chinese takeaway joint again and quickly ripped off some wallpaper for an off-the-shoulder quick fix before her grilling with polished-turd face Piers Morgan (I have seen mashed potatoe with more structure than his face).

Sunday, 25 October 2009

Belinda Carlisle - Mad About You

With vocals like pouring icicles, ex-druggy Belinda Carlisle's solo pursuits have often snorted the same formula of shoulder-pad rock ballads, but her debut album was a likeable showcase for her prickly vocals.

Add VideoHer unassuming start-off point was the sparkly bubble-gum Mad About You - in America it was a sensational top 30 smash. The syngeing 80s free-moving synths glisten like excessively-worn bangles one can imagine her then-fans wearing at the time.

The boldly titled Belinda album chugged 80s kangaroo drums on the Kelly/Steinberg/Hoffs affair I Need A Disguise, driving with the wrong petrol as the remaining material often fell short of engineering the singer as the crimson world-conquering belter she would soon become.

The hallway pre-Clarkson Lindsey 'Fleetwood Mac' Buckingham written promo song Since You've Gone is an unexpected sincere love song, but soon descends into Cher levels of cowardly seeking loud drums to do the work for her, but those quietly theatrical moments are gorgeous, stark and revealing, though less so than her Playboy spreads.

The hip-bouncing tamborine summer pop of I Feel The Magic is appealing with retro girl-band woo-ing vocals and giddy Blue Angle style saxophone enthusiasm, and a wonderfully thudding, stair-falling drum loop announcing a near acapella chorus middle-8. Jaunty piano keys are sweet blossoms of Belinda's quirky pop attitude not always fully realised by her subsequenthairspray ballads. The track poked the American Billboard charts at #82.

Her nasal-bleeding cover of Band of Gold does not work beyond decent kareoke, sung as if holding her breath under water through a snorkle.

The cocktail bar balladry of From The Heart betrays her from the nose vocals, it's definately a wet one with less convincing heartache than Mary Kiani whingeing through the Motiv8 I Imagine remix with 2 gay escorts by her side on one of her high profile 7am Australian Mardi Gras slots.

Shot In The Dark doesn't care who she blows - with Carribean music playing, she is obviously a racist not being able to identify her lovers with the lights off (now we know the real story behind Leave A Light On, and her racist cravings for black cock would obviously continue to haunt her throughout the 80s and 90s with In Too Deep and My Little Black Book soundtracking her lifetime addiction).

The misleadingly-titled Stuff & Nonesense is an endearing nose-snot ballad with vocals having the silent grace of a winter frost. It's not long before we get a rhythm section rescuing her away from genuine emotion and the salty schmaltz drizzles the album to a close. Her split-ends vocals bristle with tickling pathos, but the world was soon ready for her fist-clenched power ballads.

Friday, 23 October 2009

Dannii's Shell-Shock Round 2

Dannii Minogue is set to shock ITV viewers in an interview scheduled to air soon as part of the sadly-vile Piers Morgan's Life Stories series. Personally, I would rather she remained silent and waited for the release of a non-rarities-compilation studio album to shoot her confessional load. The singer reportedly welcomes the teardrops, which already has me cringeing - this is the sort of programme best avoided as far as I am concerned, as it presents a one-off shot at creating a very good or extremely bad impression of yourself. One can only hope she gets good camera angles and stuns Piers with her oozing eyes as she says nothing about Sharon, nothing about Chery, nothing about Kylie, nothing about botox, nothing about not selling many records, nothing about lezza-gate and nothing about playboy. Oh wait...

Above: the naturally stunning Sharon Osbourne will be rubbing her clit red raw with excited fury as Dannii flatly confirms the 'Mum In A Million' is an inspiration to all parents whose kids have survived rehab and booked reality show appearances to tell the tale.

Tag-Team MILFs Volume 3 - Bananarama Have Their Knockers

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Thursday, 22 October 2009

Dannii Stuns The World - The 1995 Sessions

1. Free Your Love
2. Skin Deep
3. Love And Affection
4. I Got This Feeling
5. Let Love Into Your Life
6. Everlasting Night
7. Crazy For Your Love
8. Love In Me
9. Exclusively
10. Love Will Find A Way
11. Don't Wanna Leave You Now.
12. Free Your Love (Bonus Track)

Her shelved album finally due for release on 23/11/2009 - I am actually quite emotional about this!