Lopez Blogs

Christina, possibly more than any other recent pop star, has followed (to varying degrees of success) the Madonna route of pop reinvention. Her first album was an innocent enough straight up dance-pop affair. Stripped saw her getting all slutty and raunchy. The disappointing and waaaay too long Back To Basics saw her getting all jazzy and slightly boring on our asses. Or arses as le english (which i am) like to say. And now with her new single she has gone a bit dance and a bit Lady BlahBlah (apparently). But all that in due course. Whenever a greatest hits is announced, I'm always interested in the tracklisting. I like my greatest hits chronological and thorough. Which of course, is entirely possible now that the world is awash with mp3s and opportunities to create your own greatest hits. Now, I haven't seen an official track listing yet, but the ones i have seen are HUGELY disappointing. If that double disc releasing minx can't include the following selections, then me and her are going to have words...

1. Genie In A Bottle (near perfect cookie cutter pop)
2. What A Girl Wants (ditto but just slightly less charming)
3. Come On Over (bit meatier now but still poptastic stuff)
4. I Turn To You (who let Celine Dion in)
5. Reflection (it's from a Disney cartoon film so ergo I am preprogrammed to like it)
6. Nobody Wants To Be Lonely w/Ricky Martin (last mature effort before the pants dropped)
7. Lady Marmalade w/everyone (so glorious and so much better than All Saints)
8. Dirrty (A US flop I believe but still gets me shaking my booty in dad-dancing-at-disco undignfied way everytime I hear it)
9. Beautiful (amazing vocal lifts this above treacly status, plus boys kiss, skinny girls are celebrated and so are men who wear makeup set on whore. It's nirvana utopia camelot and eden all rolled into one)
10. Fighter (obligatory rock-pop song every dance artist must do - see EnVogue's Free Your Mind; Janet Jackson's If and Whitney's Queen Of The Night in your pop history books)
11. Can't Hold Us Down (ghetto trashtastic and ergo my fave Christina song ever. The women are allowed to be playas too lyrics! The rap! The knee high socks! Too much! Love it!)
12. The Voice Within (meh)
13. Car Wash w/Missy Elliott (it's no Lady Marmalade)
14. Ain't No Other Man (horns! Tight perms! catchy choruses! It hasn't aged particularly well for me)
15. Hurt (slightly sub par torch song ballad)
16. Candyman (Magnificence in a bottle - like any track from For The Boys with a 00s twist)
17. Slow Down Baby (sultry little kiss off number. Not brilliant)
18. Oh Mother (Oh Christina!)
19. Keep Getting Better
20. Dynamite

Some of my comments seem a little harsh, but i actually really like Christina a lot more than i thought i did, so am eager to see where she goes from here and if she keeps getting better (which is a bit audacious after her uber padded Back To Basics set, but oh well!) Back on sunday dudes...