Lopez Blogs

The weekend is gently drifting to a climax and I've had a proper relax session which seems to have rebooted my system for the better I feel :) Hurrah. And now less than two weeks until holiday. How utterly pleasing. All this down time has meant I've finally had a proper chance to luxuriate in some of the new musical fruits of the week and my faves are discussed below. Hope everyone reading is all sorts of fabulousity :) See you in the week!!

Scissor Sisters ~ Any Which Way:

Since I first heard the mighty Night Work album (read review here), I was drawn to Any Which Way. Whether it be the Kylie backing vocals, the surprise Kylie guest vocal at Glastonbury or the utterly sordid middle 8 from Ana Matronic it worked as both a giddy album track and now, of course, as a gleefully naughty single choice. And hurrah! The video is here - and it's a doozy. You know the drill by now - here's what you need to know...

• The video starts with a nice static image of the Scissters logo - surely that is fairly iconic now. Like if they didn't put their names on an album, but just that image people would pick it up and know exactly what they were purchasing?
• Jake is running in very slow motion and kind of looks like Andy Bell 20 years ago. There is a shot of some fire extinguishers. And some blokes dancing with rubber animal heads on. I hope they can breathe ok in there!
• Pause at 19s for a brilliant piece of live action art work. It's just brilliant - it reminds me of a more disco-ified shot from Les Miserables; or more appropriately, that episode from Buffy/Angel where Spike, Dru, Angel and Daria are at the Chinese Boxer Revolution.
• Oh don't make me move on just yet - I could stare at that image all the live long day. Ana looks great with the flag, and Jake has quite the package going on in those tight little tennis shorts. Mazel tov!
• The vocals start and Jake is in some sort of fishnet stocking top. It shouldn't work, but this is Jake and it totally does. He is flanked by some dancers in primary colour leotards.
• None of that matters though because at about 25s Jake flashes his guns and they are freaking enormous. Everything else just disappears as you marvel at this moment...
• A bit more dancing goes on and some nuddy ladies get their groove on behind various household objects. I quite like the bit where Jake is all dressed in vinyl clothing and sings into multiple megaphones...
• Note: Vinyl clothing is very in line with the clubbing theme of the album. One assumes you can pop into a dark room, get your freak on and then just sponge anything off when you emerge. Sassy yet practical too...
• The scissters proceed to launch through various pyramids of cups which of course go flying everywhere. In terms of practicality, I hope they got that right first shot or some poor bugger was going to have to stack them all over again each time!
• The video continues to be filled with postcard stills - pause at 52s for a lovely shot of divine Del popping on some sort of helmet (oo-er) that could poke your eye out...
• Slow mo running AndyBellJake crashes through some vivid red sugar glass as the pieces splinter across the screen. Normally my health and safety side would kick in and worry that he got cut, but his body looks rock hard so it probably all just bounced off!
• You will no doubt want to pause at 1m19s and spend some time with that! I did :)
• Del's helmet (oo-er again) seems to be bunsenburner-rific. It is flaming all over the place. Much like this video :P
• Nude Ana and Jake alert at 1m45s! I really want to grab that Scissor Sister alarm c(l)ock with both hands and caress ;)
• There is lots more colourful dancing, more megaphones, a return of the fire extinguishers, more cup destruction and er, a table full of toys. Kids toys. Not Scissor Sisters at night toys (though who knows?!)
• Bondagey-lederhosen Jake does a rather graceful back fall into a pure white sheet juxtaposed with some colourful ornaments. It's quite stunning.
• Ooo! IT'S THE MIDDLE 8!!!
• Ana looks all sorts of dominant, but also a little bit like she is channelling Bette Midler from Hocus Pocus. This is a compliment. I love Bette and Hocus Pocus is a right good romp that you should whip out right now if you haven't already seen!
• Her facial expressions during her sexually liberating dialogue are amazing (postcard pause alert at 2m38s) - in fact, she is so on fire (with fire) that BabyDaddy is standing by with some sort of industrial Ghostbusters extinguisher to hose her down...
• It's not that at all - it's a sushi shooter. I don't know why I didn't think that straight away. Every home should have one ;)
• Ana does a bra flash (nice rack) and then pulls out her sword to cut those sushi down to platter size. Incredible.
• The band do their thing in various vivid primary colours, but I am too devastated by the destruction of the alarm clock :( That would have looked so good on my shelf next to, uh, my Lion King alarm clock...
• It appropriately ends with that brilliant shot of them running with the flag and a flash of final colour. All sorts of amazing really isn't it. I am so cosmic horny right now :P

Top 21 Songs of the Week (& Chart Chat):

• Eric Saade ~ it's been quite a week for Eric with his ace new video for Masquerade and some positively bonza performances on Swedish tv. Make sure you also check out Swedish Stereo for the rather good remix of his Break of Dawn ballad...
• Maroon 5 (above) ~ I think I really didn't bother to connect with California Girls (I can't bring myself to misspell it) this summer because I was too besotted with Misery. There is now a tamed down, cartoonified UK version of the video that I'm a bit iffy about - on the one hand, I love seeing more of the band in there but the cartoon erasing of the violence really tames it down too much for my liking. Bring on the album already! Great Bimbo Jones remix of this floating out there btw!
• Darin (below) ~ finally, it wouldn't be a new week on fizzypop if the pop machine that is Darin wasn't teasing us with mighty new music. There are snippets of his fifth (can you believe it's five already?!) album all week on his youtube page, but the real find is Microphone - a song he is using to help promote the new season of Swedish Idol. It's likely to be the most uptempo track on his ballad heavy album and the snippet of it is pure unadulterated pop that is sending me into a frenzy. Oh I cannot wait the 3 days til his album is finally released :)

21 ~ Le Kid, Mercy Mercy
20 ~ Dirty Disco, White Room
19 ~ Ola, All Over The World
18 ~ Eric Saade, It's Gonna Rain
17 ~ Alesha Dixon, Drummer Boy
16 ~ Ace of Base, All For You
15 ~ Kylie, All The Lovers
14 ~ Darin, Can't Stop Love
13 ~ Eric Saade, Masquerade
12 ~ Gabriella Cilmi, Love Me Cos You Want To
11 ~ McFly, Party Girl
10 ~ Same Difference, Shine On Forever
09 ~ Brandon Flowers, Crossfire
08 ~ Scissor Sisters, Any Which Way
07 ~ Bright Light x 2, Love Part II
06 ~ DeeDee, Balls (NE)
05 ~ Kylie, Get Outta My Way
04 ~ Maroon 5, Misery
03 ~ Kelly Rowland, Shake Them Haters Off
02 ~ Amy Meredith, Lying
01 ~ Darin, Lovekiller (2 weeks)

Coming soon: Darin album review; Darin & Eric acoustic; boyband round up; probably some other stuff too...