Lopez Blogs

Janet Jackson - Miss You Much (from my no. 6 album)

Jason Donovan - Too Many Broken Hearts (from my no.4 album)

Bless my barnacles, i've had "a week" I have... busy busy busy with lots of things work and friends related, and not really felt inspired to blog. I did learn essential things like not to walk home from work bopping along to Lily Allen and mouthing the words to F*** You at everyone I pass. Also Spectacular the Movie is a whole lot of fun - i finally saw it and will write about it soon! Still 3 days isn't exactly a massive break is it, and now I've once again got loads of ideas for things to bore you with :) I was going to start with a post about the melodifestivalen singles, but realised I'd included a few thoughts on the key tracks i adore from that in the most recent Fizzypop Chronicles (needless to say, I am obsessed with Mans and BWO tracks - the latter particularly in it's many remixes, which are bloody bonza ripper; Alcazar is blooming great, and Marie and Jonathan have really grown on me). Anyway, I've had one of those weeks where i have felt the need to dig out key albums I have adored in the past, no matter how craptacular they may have been. This is the first in probably an ongoing series...

Sheena Easton ~ What Comes Naturally (1991):

Thanks to Whitney's ace I'm Your Baby Tonight album, I was all about New Jill Swing in 1991. I was definitely a rhythm nation boy who was forever your girl. Er, or something. With my boy yearnings blossoming, i wanted to kick off my mormon shoes, and dance like Kevin Bacon in Footloose. Only wearing glasses so thick you could rebottom beer bottles with them :( (Style eluded me until i was 20, fashion fans!) I became interested in Sheena after her quite bonza Lover in Me album, and her syrupy but delicious duet with Prince on the Batman OST (Arms of Orion - utterly delicious, like a slightly edgier version of Linda Rondstadts Don't Know Much!!). So I spent all my money from my weekend job and got myself the What Comes Naturally import. A-may-zing. I think the first thing that hooked me in was the delightfully dance oriented title track, complete with whispery, not quite rap Middle 8, the style of which would become a fave of mine over the years (see also En Vogue's Strange; Madonna's American Life)...

"ooo crazy crazy, it's getting kinda wild. Is that a yes I'm seeing in your smile? I don't know you but I feel we're connected. One look from you and baby we're affected. I can tell that you're reading my thoughts, but let me tell you now I'm not afraid of getting caught. The risk is worth any chance that we're taking. Cos this could turn out to be lurve we're making"

The single rather obviously mixes r'n'b and pop stylings in much the same way Paula Abdul/Janet Jackson did on their recent aforementioned releases. It had a great beat and catchy chorus - it's almost like something Vitamin C would sing, if she were still recording. Dance was the mission statement of this album and quite evident on tracks like First Touch Of Love (an urgent rhythmic track with shades of electronica), You Can Swing It (elements of hip hop, though to be fair, hip hop lite) and Somebody (like a Blackout era Britney demo). And rather brilliantly, to satisfy my power ballad needs there was the lushly produced To Anyone - a gorgeous tune that threw any hint of subtlety out of the window and went for grandiose, dramatic feel. Which, to be honest was fine with me as a teenager - everything was a drama back then. It was indeed just one psychological drama after another. I loved - and still love (it's great for a nice aerobic workout) - this album. It wasn't particularly cool, it's not aged amazingly well, but it made me dance, and reminds me of my carefree last year of school days.

To evidence how much this album soundtracked my A-level revision in 1991, it was on the stereo in the sixth form common room and I was singing along to the "crazy crazy" bit. My friends were teasing me that I never did anything "crazy crazy" and when i went to have pee, one of them dared me to pee out the window (oh the things kids do at school - it's not a bit like Skins). So i knelt on the cistern, opened the window, hoisted my little todger up and got ready to spray for England (which incidentally would have been all over the teachers parking lot). Then there was this sickening crack. Apparently toilet cisterns aren't built to hold the weight of 17 year old boys. It broke - i had absolutely nothing to grab onto, such was my weird willie in the window position and fell backwards so hard that I knocked the locked door of the hinges, and knocked myself out temporarily - all while the toilet water from the cistern flooded over me, and to the sounds of Sheena's Manic Panic. Oh. And you do still pee while you are unconscious. Marvelous. I came too in the nurses office with a headache, borrowed sports kit on my bottom half and in a lot of trouble from the headmaster :( Still, i finally did one legendary if immensely stupid thing at school to the subtle beats of Sheena Easton. Ace.

Coming next week: Spectacular review; Little Boots n Pixie; best one album only acts ever; more albums i've loved; some new music including the AMAZING PPG/Popjustice approved Erik Hassle!

Good gravy. (And last Sunday it was. Darren mixes up a lovely batter!). After the last slightly fact orientated Erasure post of just two days ago, I was trying to recall why I stuck with Erasure after the giddy highs of ISISIS and Erasure through the lows of Loveboat and Other People's Songs (more on that below). One reason is that I am generally quite loyal to artists who i've supported for a long time (i'm still kinda rooting for a decent Whitney comeback, and god knows Deborah Gibson must have a brilliant album in her, 8 years after her last set of original music) and especially loyal to those who injected a little colour and excitement into my youth. After all, growing up a gay Mormon could've been fraught with challenges. However, as the picture above shows (guess which one i am - clue, i have a hideous flick of hair and detestable trousers on, but at least no flash of white socks. Even then i knew white socks with formal attire was a neddy no no), I had a pretty balanced childhood. I wasn't itching to run away to the big smoke or anything cliched like that, in fact church was one of the few places i didn't get teased about being a big homo. Church dances were a pretty regular occurence, and though Darren mocks me for it now, it was there that I first heard Erasure's Sometimes and A Little Respect and fell in love with the band. It was also with a friend from church and school that at age 17, we skipped class and drove down to London for our second row Erasure tickets concert. I was absolutely surrounded by hedonistic, colourful gays and drag queens, opening my eyes to a world I hadn't seen before. I even kept some of the feathers from Andy Bell's boa that made it into the crowd, and naively fought off a lot of attention from the older guys round me. Boy, could I have been a human pin cushion that night :P And even though the bright lights of London couldn't lure me (I've always had the need to be quite close to my family), I swore there and then that I would love Erasure forever for showing me how to be comfortable with myself. And thus it was so. Even during the Other People's Songs years...:P

Other People's Songs - Erasure have done some quite decent cover versions in the past. Their Abba-esque EP remains a classic. Magic Moments is lovely. Even their blondie covers (Heart of Glass and Rapture) are palatable. For some reason though, the majority of this 2003 set of cover versions didn't click with me. Sure they erasure'd up the songs so they do actually sound like Vince/Andy tunes but at best this is a bit of a vanity project that is top-end karoke. I think at the time, I was just eager for some self penned Erasure tunes and this didn't really scratch my itch. Fair do's though, the way Come Up And See Me is sung, is positively filthy.
Singles: Solsbury Hill (#10); Come Up And See Me (#14); True Love Ways (NR)

Nightbird - Mercifully there was a great return to form with this next album. The lead off single, the gracefully mature Breathe (even more magnificent in acoustic format) managed to become one of my top ten Erasure songs of all time. The tune (and ultimately album as a whole) bear more than a passing resemblence to the great tunes they put out in the late 80s and early 90s. Once again, the songs are about the good and bad sides of love and are presented in an intimate personal way - perhaps more so because the album was solely produced by Erasure. Thanks to a seemingly renewed confidence in their abilities, and an endearing sense of optimism, the lyrical beauty and melodic dancing throughout this set could've easily spawned five-six singles. All This Time manages to be both inspiring and heartbreaking at the same time, while shades of the mighty OMD run throughout Here I Go Impossible Again. Abba influences are apparent on the mighty Don't Say You Love Me while it's a trip back to ISISIS with the epic Let's Take One More Rocket To The Moon. But for a sad, autumnal sounding affair you can't go far wrong with I Bet You're Mad At Me. All quite, quite lovely indeed.
Singles: Breathe (#4); Don't Say You Love Me (#15); Here I Go (#25); All This Time (#25)

Electric Blue (Andy Bell solo) - Barely 10 months after the excellent Nightbird was shockingly rejected by the British public (though was their most successful album for a while), Andy went solo on the mixed bag club-orientated album Electric Blue. And for sure, the album is more Sylvester than Erasure - and more celebratory than the sombre Nightbird. Despite the fact that Andy Bell looks like Grace Jones on the cover, it's a decent set of songs designed to get you on your feet. For me, it does lack Vince's synths, though of course if they had been there it wouldn't really have been a solo project would it?! Dogged by bad singles choices (Crazy instead of the gorgeous ballad Rest of Our Lives; I'll Never Fall In Love Again instead of dancefloor stomper Delicious), there are still gems to be found. I'm not a massive fan of the Jake Shears duet I Thought It Was You (though that could easily have been a club hit), but Caught In A Spin and Shaking My Soul are proper good slices of electronic dance. A woeful lack of promotion meant that only hardcore Erasure fans checked this out...
Singles: Crazy (#35); I'll Never Fall In Love Again (NR); Rest of Our Lives (NR); Delicious (NR)

Union Street - the third Erasure/Erasure linked album in less than 18 months was an acoustic rendering of some of their smaller hits and album tracks. As I have always loved a more reflective melancholy Erasure, this set of tunes was custom made for me. The track above is their gorgeous Nightbird track I Bet You're Mad At Me, which wasn't on the album, but on the lovely Boy EP which fleshed out the Union Street tracklisting even further. Stay With Me is by far a highlight for me, but as it is one of my favourite Erasure songs ever, that is hardly surprising. Home and Tenderest Moments are also beautifully presented here. Yes it's true that often Andy Bell's voice benefits from a more vast production scale, this set of lesser known tunes stripped down to their purest form show that Erasure really do know how to write a decent tune and can sometimes pull off a more restrained performance. Their acoustic tour accompanying this album was quite lovely.
Singles: Boy (NR)

Light At The End Of The World - (check out my original review here) It stands true that Erasure (and probably pet shop boys/depeche mode) are past the point of winning over masses of new fans with each release. That certainly doesn't mean they should give up making new albums, especially when they are as peppy and upbeat as this one. It's almost like taking Wild and Chorus, putting them on the same stage they were many years ago but giving them different lighting - it's certainly a more *pop* album than anything since Chorus. I Could Fall In Love With You has Vince's traditional synth wizardry running through it, while the lovely Sunday Girl is epic electro-pop heaven. An EP of alternate mixes and remixes (Storm Chaser) was released which enhances the album and gives the listener the opportunity to put together their ultimate version tracklisting. The extended mix of Sucker For Love brings out the beauty of the song, while When A Lover Leaves You really should have been a single - it's as lovely as Happy Ending by Mika (particularly with the lovely strings intro from the EP). It wasn't particularly revolutionary or cutting edge, but it was a consistent set of well composed emotive love songs, and really after 25 years that is what Erasure does best.
Singles: I Could Fall In Love With You (#25); Sunday Girl (#32); Sucker for Love (NR); Storm In A Teacup (NR); When A Lover Leaves You (NR)

Seeing as Pop - The First 20 Hits had a perfect chronological tracklisting, I can only wish that Erasure had been given more singles success from their latter albums. My own personal Pop 40 tracklisting would be as follows...

DISC ONE - Enough Is Enough (With KD Lang)/Rage (with Lene Lovich)/Always/Run To The Sun/I Love Saturday/So The Story Goes/Stay With Me/Fingers and Thumbs/Rock Me Gently/Sono Luminous/In Your Arms/Don't Say Your Love Is Killing Me/Rain/Worlds On Fire/Freedom/Alien/Here In My Heart/Perchance To Dream/Always (2009 mix)/Fingers and Thumbs (Soundfactory Edit)

DISC TWO - Solsbury Hill/Come Up And See Me/True Love Ways/Magic Moments/Breathe/Don't Say You Love Me/Here I Go Impossible Again/All This Time Still Falling Out Of Love/Crazy/I'll Never Fall In Love Again/Rest of Our Lives/Delicious/Boy/I Could Fall In Love With You/Sunday Girl/Sucker For Love/Storm In A Teacup/When A Lover Leaves You/A Little Respect (Avantara Remix Edit)/Always (Manhatten Clique remix edit)

All the quite correct talk around the amazing return of the Pet Shop Boys has quite correctly made me yearn for all things pet shop boysey from the past. However, it has also made me long for all things Erasure-ish. Back when I was a "youngster" it was a world of easy choices - debbie gibson or tiffany, bros or brother beyond, pet shop boys or erasure. I always kinda loved Erasure the most (though adored the Pet Shop Boys too) - they were the pop group it was almost cool for me to like. They were also the first pop group to give me the perfect format of a greatest hits album (pretty much the same time Kylie did that perfect first hits collection) - a format which i stuck to to this day. And as the release of their Pop - 40 hits collection nears (another near perfect format, especially the boxset which would be perfect for Kylie or Madonna now), I've had a fun week or so going through their back catalogue post Pop - The First 20 Hits... (check out Chartriggers take on the new boxset!)

I Say I Say I Say - ISISIS as it is often referred to marked a bit of a departure for Erasure (or Erase Sure as someone has listed them on youtube :P) From the haunting woodland cover, to the poignant melancholy songs, it's a step away from the Hi-NRG, hi-theatrical sound I adored on Innocents, Wild and Chorus. However, as my favourite pre-PopFirst20Hits songs were the downbeat Am I Right and You Surround Me that was more than ok with me and until their next album came out, this was very quickly my fave Erasure set of tunes. Often dreamily romantic, sometimes devastatingly sad, Andy Bell's lyrics are razor sharp and matched perfectly by Vince Clarke's gorgeous melodies. First single Always (now rereleased as a barely perceptible 2009 remix) is and was a graceful demonstration of how electro-ballads can often be so beautiful they are almost painful. A completely gorgeous song and a masterclass in song construction. I Love Saturday and Run To The Sun were both upbeat singles that nevertheless had nostalgic, bitter-sweet lyrics (thanks to Abba, I am enamoured with upbeat tunes with downbeat lyrics). Take Me Back was actually a pretty decent album opener, with distorted synths and almost otherworldly production values - great hint of what was to come on the epic Erasure album. And in crime-not-be-a-single, the excellent So The Story Goes has gothic choirs, a 6/4 time signature and a stunning vocal performance from Mr Bell. Classic, gorgeously produced pop that stands perfectly the test of time...
Singles: Always (#4); Run To The Sun (#6); I Love Saturday (#20); So The Story Goes (NR)

Erasure - the epononymous seventh album is by far the duo's most divisive among fans. I find it to be their most elegant piece of work to date, and the one I go back to most often to lift my spirits. Only Vince Clark could make his Oberheim Xpander synth sound so sad, emotive and beautiful all at the same time. Gone were the three point five minute pop wonders. In their places were ambient, electronic tracks that often ran longer than 6-7 minutes. Not gone however were the insightful lyrics and devastating melodies. The songs are incredibly complex and multiple listens reveal different layers each time you listen to them. Stay With Me is one of the most heartbreaking pleadings I have ever heard, and retained it's beauty when rendered in a more acoustic setting for Union Street a few years ago. Gently rhythmic, the occassionally histrionic voice of Andy Bell is tempered by the power of the melody. Rock Me Gently delivers the listener into a more trance type state of pop, while perhaps the most "traditional" song on the set Fingers and Thumbs layers synth tones and melodies on top of each other for maximum, upbeat pop pleasure (A soundfactory 2009 remix on the Pop-40 collection is by far the best remix of the bunch too!). Highly recommended if you like your Erasure melancholy, or are just a fan of beautiful electronica compositions.
Singles: Stay With Me (#15); Fingers and Thumbs (#20); Rock Me Gently (NR); Sono Luminous (NR)

Cowboy - Though not quite as powerful as ISISIS and Erasure, Cowboy marks yet another strong set of dance tracks. In My Arms was a bold choice of first single that bridged the gap between the melancholic mature erasure of the past two albums and the fun, theatrical erasure that this album hinted they still sometimes wanted to be, notably on the 80s tastic single 2, Don't Say Your Love Is Killing Me. Airplay for the group was slipping, but this album deserved far more than two singles - Save Me Darling was another nod of the hat to the old Erasure, with a peppy production and toe tapping chorus, while their cover of Magic Moments was as decent as anything they produced for Abba-esque. The gorgeous Worlds On Fire should have definitely been another single and is another delightful ballad from the lads. Boy would eventually become an acoustic single as part of the Union Street project...
Singles: In Your Arms (#13); Don't Say Your Love Is Killing Me (#23); Rain (NR); Worlds On Fire (NR)

Loveboat - By the turn of the millenium, it seemed like the world needed a decent disco pop album and along came... Kylie with Light Years. As fantastic as that was, this throwback to the early Erasure sound was somewhat lost on the British public and although I didn't particularly like it when it first came out (it was the first album since The Innocents in 1988 that I didn't buy on the day - or even week - of release), I've come to appreciate it over the years. It's not a bad album, it just pales a bit compared to their previous output. Lead single Freedom stiffed at 27 in the UK charts, and both Andy and Vince have gone on record stating their unhappiness with the vocals and use of guitar loops respectively. There are some standout moments on the opus though - Aliens, Perchance To Dream and Here in My Heart all have great synthy moments in there, with lyrics of love - but a love that brings pain rather than joy. Still the shoddy moments (Freedom, Moon and Sky) make this album more filler than killer :(
Singles: Freedom (#27); Alien (NR); Here In My Heart (NR)

Coming tomorrow - part two (Other People's Songs - Light At The End Of The World, via Electric Blue)

Click here for Part One ~ May 2001 :)

Remember September 2003? I was less young and hunky than I was in May 2001. Darren and I were moving into our second home together - a gorgeous little cottage surrounded by green grass and parklands. Buffy was finishing a stellar 7 year stretch of amazing television and The OC was about to grip the world before it got crap and the superior Gossip Girl would replace it 5 years later. And yes, it was another stunning month for great pop music. S Club had finished, but the juniors were carrying the torch forward, while Rachel Stevens went the solo route and Bouncy Beyonce launched her solo album. There was great pop - a - plenty to be had for everyone. Here again, in no particular order, are 8 songs that had me humming all month and many years into the future...

Rachel Stevens ~ Sweet Dreams My LA Ex: Who knew Rachel would come back with something so entirely amazing as this debut single? Written by Cathedral Dennis and produced by Bloodshy and Avant, this was a percolating frothy groove of a tune that was tastily produced and delivered with enough sass and verve to give it real personality. The video (top of the page) saw Rachel prancing around with ribbons and giving hope to the world that a new pop princess was about to launch. Sadly it was not to be, and frankly it's quite criminal that her second album didn't set the pop world alight. Don't get me started, because i'm still proper miffed :(
Gareth Gates ~ Sunshine: Sigh. It should have all been going so well. He had the second best selling single of the year (the camp as christmas Spirit In The Sky) and was launching his second album with much improved hair, a buffed up body and a sleek, flawless midtempo pop tune that dripped like a melting ice lolly with hooks and beats that should have netted him another number one. Damn those Black Eyed Peas. Like Rachel, it never really happened for Gareth after this single but there were plenty of ignored hits in his ace of base Go Your Own Way...
Mark Owen ~ Four Minute Warning: Ok ok, technically this was released in August 2003, but it lingered like the last gasps of Robbie Williams sanity into September, and still remains the best pop song ever with Four Minutes in the title :P Mark's first release since Celebrity Big Brother, it was a quirky guitar driven pop tune that counted down the last four minutes before the big explosion takes us all out, and gave us some stories of folks last moments. Totally riveting pop music and proof that Gary B wasn't the only talented songwriter in the soon to be reformed TT...
A*Teens ~ One Night In Bangkok: Ok, this technically wasn't a single at all, but I was so obsessed with it at the time that I think I put it on every compilation cd I made for friends at the time. Always a favourite of mine from the musical Chess, combine it with the last vestige of early 00s pop (The A*Teens) and it became an instant classic for me. I'm not really sure why this works for me, because i played it for a friend today and they were absolutely repulsed by it, haha! Oh well, different strokes for different folks. I think actually that September 2003 may be cursed because soon after this song, the teens released a greatest hits and split :( Good gravy!
Mis-Teeq ~ Can't Get It Back: I was a little late on the Mis-Teeq train so didn't catch on to this super Salt'N'Pepa for the noughties track til a couple of months after it had charted, and then I couldn't stop playing it for weeks on end. As it turned out, this song would prove to be sadly prophetic as it is about a philandering no good dude who ends up tied and taped in his undies. Great court room video and excellent rap in the middle 8 (that tragically I still know all the words to today), the poor bloke ends up molested by a tranny cleaner at the end, which is almost worse than ending up riddled by sleeping with evil Javine. Team Alesha!!
Kym Marsh ~ Sentimental: Ooo she ditched Hear'say before they went crap and released a solo album that was ridiculously underrated and classed as sub Natalie Imbruglia nonsense. Well screw that. Cry and Come On Over were ace enough, but this gorgeous third single is an ideal showcase for Kym's warm vocal style and has rather understated verses before she lets soar with the lovely chorus (and listen closely to the euphoric piano tinkling in the background of the chorus. It just makes it so delish). Surely she is re-famous enough now that she can finally release a second album?
Dashboard Confessional ~ Hands Down: Oh my gosh I almost forgot about how amazing I thought this song was! Just freaking loved it when i first heard it and then couldn't get it out of my head for weeks and weeks afterwards. It was perky emo at it's very best, and helped me develop a rather unhealthy crush on lead singer Chris Carraba. Great vocal performance, frenetic energetic chorus into emotive middle eight that actually becomes the end of the song. Love it or hate it, this totally worked for me and I still listen to it fairly regularly today, though nothing they have done since has bettered this...
Play ~ I Must Not Chase The Boys: I was a bit late on Play as well, but i thought these saucy swedish sirens were utterly captivating. This was my favourite track of 2003 with it's down and dirty beats, thrashy pop chorus and a refrain that even good boys like myself must remember once in a while. Nothing more needs to be said :) (Video at top of this list!)

The big gay icon:

And then came Switch It On, the leadoff single for the third album. It was most unexpected and most un William, yet very William. It seemed to hover around the internet for about 3 months before it's official release. And it was the most out and out pop-dance addictive tune that William had ever released. Starts off with this seductive drum beat - dum da dum da dum dadumdum - and builds into a frenzied chorus while William apes every homoerotic bit of Top Gun ever in the video. How it wasn't number one is beyond me, but it was bloody terrific. All Time Love was the next single and a lovely if haunting ballad that was one for the ages. The melody is very simplistic and understated and again, is one of those tracks that allows William's vocals to do all the work. There are more amazing funk-pop tracks in form of should've-been-a-single Ain't Such A Bad Place To Be and Think It Over; modern day masterpieces in the calm Madness that seems to mask an underlying passion of anger and irritation; and utter romance with Who Am I and Save yourself. The album abounds with experimentation, intimacy and raw musical arrangements, and once again William has outdone himself. If you are new to William and want a greatest hits version of his works, you'd be hard pressed to better my own version of an intro to his music :P

1. Light My Fire
2. You And I
3. Don't Let Me Down
4. Lovestruck
5. Leave Right Now
6. Your Game
7. Friday's Child (Andy Cato edit)
8. Love Is A Matter of Distance
9. Love The One You're With
10. Switch It On
11. All Time Love
12. Who Am I?
13. Ain't Such A Bad Place To Be
14. Hey Ya (Bonus track)
15. Don'cha Wish Your Girlfriend (Bonus track)

• My initial review of Let It Go
• My 2006 review of William live
• XO usually has amazing things to write about William. check out here and here
• I'm sensing DanUSA will have something to say about it very soon...

Sir William of Young is one of my very favourite male solo singers. In fact he is definitely in the top five, and is currently jockeying in a three way with Simon Curtis and Robbie Williams for the top spot (What a three way that would be :O )... Not only does he have the amazing ability to regrow hair, but he has successfully emerged from the monolith of the Idol series and established himself as a distinct and successful singer of fine pop-jazzy tinged-funk tunes in a way that very few people manage to do. Plus despite his plum-in-mouth upbringing, I imagine he's a right dirty fucker in the boudoir. But the focus here is just catching up on his career before he launches his assault on the charts again next week.

A non-idle idol:

"Ah as the ticker tape rained down on Mr Young looking quite elegant in a dark suit and t-shirt, he quickly and discreetly wiped the glitter from his tongue as he sang the westlife album track he had been saddled with. It wasn't really supposed to be this way, he thought, as that hedgehog haircut of the runner up blocked the cameraman's unfettered view of his carefully selected converse come fuck me pumps. Gareth was meant to win, have a startlingly brilliant pop career and sleep with big busted glamour models whose bv (bucket-vadge) is so big he can barely keep his little willy in there. He was meant to be the runner up who released an album full of covers that he had sang on the show, albeit in his own inimitable style. Then every mothers day a new album would follow - the movie songs, tracks from the musicals, the swing album, will sings the greatest hits of Steps... it was a solid plan. Now was he chance to show everyone that he was gonna make it on his own. He held the last note to evergreen perfectly and wished he had a hat to throw in the air a la Rhoda."

• Evergreen
• Anything Is Possible (tragically not a Debbie Gibson cover)
• Light My Fire
• The Long and Winding Road
• Beyond The Sea
• I Don't Dance
• Ain't No Sunshine
• The Sweetest Feeling

1. Lover Won't You Stay
2. Lovestruck
3. You and I
4. Don't Let Me Down
5. Side by Side
6. What's In Goodbye
7. Cruel To Be Kind
8. Over You
9. If That's What You Want
10. From Now On
11. Fine Line

Stay tuned for part two which will focus on albums 2 and 3, as well as more excerpts from the "unofficial" "biography"! It's "" airquotes madness...

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...

American Life:
Oh look. It's Madonna preceding her album with a soundtrack song. She must get paid a fortune for these random tunes. Die Another Day probably fitted better as a coda to Music rather than an opening gambit for American Life, but is a groovy electro pop track with an appalling video. Around about the same time, Madonna was jotting down Justin's number as she duetted on Me Against The Music with Bertney Spears. Again a decent enough pop tune but neither's finest moment. And then came the unforgettable "i'm drinking a soy latte" song that a whole team meeting at work once turned into helping me learn the lyrical rap for no reason at all. Not only did the title track of the album have a cheeky little rap about material possessions perhaps not being worth a jot if people are dying at war (take that Material Girl madonna!) but the video was rapidly changed so as not to be too controversial. Oh. My. Days. The album was full of luxurious disco beats, electro beeps, and tender love songs - the best being Nothing Fails with it's slow crescendo into strings and a gospel choir. Love Profusion is a whirling dervish of a pop song, though a little restrained, and Mother and Father despite it's deep lyrical content is probably the closest thing to disco on the entire album. Rubbished by critics for being too serious (and now she's trying to be too youthful? She can't win!) it remains my favourite Madonna album released since Erotica...

Confessions on a Dancefloor:

Madonna is going to burn this disco down! She's calling 1-555-Confide! I may be getting my long running popstars confused... Basically Madonna decided to don a purple yoga, write to Benny and Bjorn and create one of the most enduring Madonna hits of the decade. Hung Up was a brilliant return to pop for her royal horseness, even if she had to sample Abba to do so. Sorry was gorgeous dance-pop even before the Pet Shop Boys provided a rather phantasmagorical remix of it. Plus I always like songs with a little bit of foreign language in them. It does feel like she might have borrowed and manipulated the bassline from the Jackson's Can You Feel It? but this is an album where she isn't particularly groundbreaking, but does a marvelous job of channeling disco sounds and sensations into modern pop tunes. Jump is another great tune where Madonna urges the listener to embrace the changes and therefore, it fitted perfectly into the final moments of the last season 2 episode of Ugly Betty. I do get a bit annoyed when, during Future Lovers, Madonna tells us all to forget about our problems and bills. Easy to do when you are Madonna, and you are lowballing your brother on some gaudy decorating. Some of us still have 5 years of mortgage to pay! Oh and way to alienate the listeners with I Love New York - not for slamming every other city but the new york/dork couplet. It's almost unforgiveable! Overall though, it's a solid album, not perfect. Not trailblazing, but frankly who cares?

Hard Mandy:

Let's get this out there. I like Hard Candy. I know a lot of people whose opinions I respect and who are much bigger Madonna fans than I (xo, danusa, yuri) aren't particularly enamoured of the album. Others feel Madonna is following not leading, though if you have read this far, you'll probably be aware that my view is that Madonna hasn't particularly been a leader for some years now. And she's probably just enjoying being the biggest female singer in the world and wanted work with some of the biggest hip hop stimuli in the world. And why shouldn't she indulge once in a while? So bizarrely and for the first time ever, I find myself wanting to defend Madonna. Grife! The horns and dance beats of 4 Minutes are intoxicating and i STILL maintain that Justin looked great in the video and that i STILL want to dance/walk on the conveyor belt at the supermarket. Give It To Me and Beat Goes On (instrumentation!) are top notch pop tunes, while Heartbeat and Miles Away in particular have deep grooves, beautiful guitar and some poetic lyrics. And don't forget the sheer genius of Devil Wouldn't Recognise You, a rather endearing ballad that gets better with each listen. Here are my original thoughts on Hard Candy from when it came out...

So that brings the flashback bang up to date. It's not the most comprehensive, but then I'm not the most dedicated of fans. I'm sure people like XO and DanUSA could fill in the gaps with rare and unreleased tracks for a 6th cd for this imaginary boxset :)

Greatest Hits Volume Three:

1. Me Against The Music
2. Die Another Day
3. American Life
4. Hollywood
5. Nothing Fails
6. Love Profusion
7. Mother Father
8. Hung Up
9. Sorry
10. Jump
11. Get Together
12. 4 Minutes
13. Give It 2 Me
14. The Beat Goes On
15. Miles Away

Erotica:

Ah Madonna. You've just finished with your brilliantly titled, if incomplete greatest hits album. You've just showed the world every crevice and cranny in Justify My Love. What's next? A big ol' torch ballad in the form of This Used To Be My Playground, which i found incredibly dull at the time but has grown on me over the years as I have matured. Yes, Madonna was back and with a sound that was SO not representative of the album that was to follow! Yikes. So while gentle baseball playing Madonna was ok for a few months, it was soon time for the Sex book and the highly underrated Erotica. Was this too much Madonna for the world? For the first time in her career, people seemed tired of her shock tactics - she'd bared her bits for all to see in Justify, and done big booming house anthems in Rescue Me. Was a book of her lady garden really necessary? Probably not but the album Erotica was a sheer delight. Erotica was a sparse groove which introduced us to Dita, which was probably Madonna saying "hey. don't be fooled by my Playground. I still like whips and ball gags you know. I'm kinky!" but it kinda worked. And Deeper and Deeper was that ace house sound that was so popular at the time (with a nice segue into Vogue at the end). As an album it lacked the pop prettiness of Like A Prayer and returned her to her club roots. Bye Bye Baby (a european single one believes) was a cheeky kiss off to that errant lover, while Where Life Begins took hints from Janet Jackson in filthiness (Janet would one up it a year later with the BRILIANT If) Rain bought back the softer side of Madonna with a lovely power ballad and In This Life tackled losing friends to Aids. The Madonna backlash had started but it was unfair that it was here....

Bedtime Stories:

So many people disappointed with Hard Candy maybe forget that it wasn't Madonna's first foray into r'n'b stylings - and certainly not the first time she took the style of others instead of forging a new sound herself. And i'm sure lots of people disappointed with Hard Candy do remember Bedtime Stories. But prior to that there was another lovely soundtrack song in I'll Remember. I think it's one of D'luv's fave tracks but i'm too lazy to find his link :P Whatever - it was one of those tunes that if it soundtracked a particular moment in your life (end of school, college, love affair) then it worked perfectly on an emotional level and stuck with you. It's certainly one of my fave Madonna tunes. The lead off single proper for this album was a slightly muted affair for Madonna. She actually sounds quite thoughtful and pensive on this. All this was overshadowed by my second fave Madonna track ever (slightly ahead of Vogue but way way behind Like A Prayer) in Take A Bow. Sure it could have easily been the latest Pebbles/Karyn White release, but i do enjoy when Maddy taps into her lower register as she does so beautifully on this babyface ballad. And note, fact fans, i can sing the entire song perfectly en francais! I never warmed to the title track, possibly because I'm not a huge Bjork fan and it seemed to be a bit bjork-y to me! Don't Stop totally stole the beat from Martika's coloured kisses, but was a decent if silly pop tune and naughtiness abounded (again somewhat muted) in Human Nature. Not Madonna's best effort, but some real gems in there if only TAB...

Sigh. The Ballads and playing herself:


If BS was madonna reigning it in a little after all the sex, (her lady garden must have been well chaffed) then she was certainly shouting "look i'm nice too" with a ballads collection. A few new songs perforated the collection of mainly album tracks. You'll See is a great tune with some lovely vocals and a powerful baseline that all comes together perfectly in a still restrained chorus. I'm not really a fan of the Massive Attack collab I Want You (I prefer Sophie B Hawkin's interpretation) but the acoustic One More Chance is nice and i'm shocked to this day it hasn't been covered by Westlife for a Christmas single... And then came the role she had beg stole and borrowed for, and the role that is still her finest cinematic achievement. With all the gravitas of Whitney Houston shouting "he's my Bodyguard" in "The Bodyguard" Madonna was born to play Evita. And i adored the soundtrack, because well it was a musical and she did a disco remix of Don't Cry For Me Argentina, which worked so so much better than the long drawn out balcony scene in the film. The new song You Must Love Me was a gentle pleading ballad that summed up Madonna's need for adulation, but the highlight was Goodnight and Thankyou about slutty Evita's past. How perfect for Madonna and she sang it so very well!

Ray of Flight?:

I think I was suffering Madonna fatigue when this album came out because although it received high critical acclaim, I barely paid it a second glance and rightly or wrongly it's probably the only Madonna album (bar Music) that i don't know the lyrics of songs to. Frozen was all solemn and electronic as Madonna tried to go more modern - it's still largely rooted in her dance club roots and William Orbit kept it pretty much age appropriate for the 40 year old pop queen. It's art cried the fans. I put on the latest pop cd from Deborah. I'm not sure why this cd doesn't appeal to me, because the fans certainly love it (as a whole). I can barely think of anything decent to write about it! Actually that's not true, i can barely think of anything to write about it. Power of Goodbye, though, I paid attention to as the producers of Felicity cleverly used it in some of their first season finale promos and although i cared more whether Flick chose Ben or Noel (pick Ben!) the song fitted nicely. And Nothing Really Matters (Madonna's pat on the back at her new found spiritulism) is Darren's fave Madonna tune. Who knew! Oh! And To Have and Not To Hold is such a sad song, that actually the recently leaked Like An Angel Passing Through My Room would've fit perfectly with it...

Music:

Again with preceding an album with a soundtrack song! Enough already! Beautiful Stranger is a nice enough 60s inspired song that shows Madonna should really not do 60s inpired songs. Especially when that song is a dreadful rendering of American Pie. Shame on you. Especially when Time Stood Still (the other track from the goddawful Next Best Thing movie) would've made a much better single as it is one of her more beautiful tracks. Sigh. silly madonna. Luckily Music was leaking all over the then illegal Napster and one of the first tracks to appear was the weird and wonderful Paradise - it's vocoder ahoy as Madonna recalls her youth and remembers how it wasn't perhaps as perfect as she'd hoped. It's a striking song, so I was a bit taken aback when I heard Music (the single). Borrowing heavily from the Ab Fab wardrobe, it's ghetto fabulous ahoy in the video as a swirling pop song invades the airwaves. With a similar theme to Holiday, it's an anthem for letting go and having fun. Don't Tell Me is a great midtempo track while Runaway Lover and Amazing are just brilliant typical Madonna pop tunes. Going a bit acoustic guitar (i'm pretty sure she said she learned so she could play in concerts) on I Deserve It she sang of her love for Guy though if Christopher Bitchone is to be believed, Guy deserves a bit of a slap for his allegedly non gay loving ways...

Greatest Hits Volume Two, Disc One:

1. This Used To Be My Playground
2. Erotica
3. Deeper and Deeper
4. Bad Girl
5. Fever
6. Rain
7. I'll Remember
8. Secret
9. Take A Bow
10. Bedtime Stories
11. Human Nature
12. Forbidden Love
13. You'll See
14. I Want You
15. One More Chance

Greatest Hits Volume Two, Disc Two:

1. You Must Love Me
2. Don't Cry For Me Argentina (Miami Mix)
3. Goodnight and Thankyou
4. Frozen
5. Ray of Light
6. Nothing Really Matters
7. Power of Goodbye
8. Beautiful Stranger
9. Time Stood Still
10. Music
11. Don't Tell Me
12. What It Feels Like For a Girl
13. Amazing
14. Runaway Lover
15. GHV2 megamix

I admit it. While Madonna has always been part of my musical education, I've never been particularly precious about her output or fanatical the way I am about Deborah Gibson or Maroon 5. I think I was particularly drawn to her when Like A Virgin was banned by my local Mormon church, so she instantly had an added appeal. With her deal with Warner Bros coming to an end, and hopefully a comprehensive greatest hits collection (audio and visual one presumes) planned, I thought I'd revisit her albums and list what I think should be a 5 disc greatest hits box set...

The debut:


Having whored her way into a record deal, Madonna took the punk influences of the late 70s, added an element of disco to the proceedings to produce what is still a charming and addictive debut cd to this day. The three "big" singles all have something rather special about them to this day. Lucky Star is perky and upbeat, swathed in funky bass and synth lines that could easily have been in a Chic song. That'd be Niles Rodgers influence then. Borderline is a little more mellow and Madonna's vocals are absolutely perfect on this track - not perfect as in flawless, but matching the needs of the track perfectly. Same thing can be said for the 2nd best song titled Burning Up ever (Kylie rules) and the song that broke her in the clubs Everybody. Burning Up has some great fuzzy guitar work, while Everybody has this delicious refrain that makes you want to just obey the lyrics "get up and do you thing!". Nothing, absolutely nothing however, tops the evergreen Madonna classic, Holiday. The lovely ten note refrain that runs through the song, the carefree lyrics, the bouncy bass that still makes it a glorious party track over 25 years later. It's a highlight of a great party album and only a brief glimpse of what is to come in the future...

Like A Virgin:

And thus Madonna uses some classic imagery (lets hope she didn't sit down with an interviewer and say something completely twatty and moronic like "Growing up I always wanted to an icon. Part of that is being iconic." Purlease!) of Marilyn Monroe, and that lace wedding dress to become the biggest star in the world. You could barely turn around in 1985 without a Madonna song from this album, a rerelease from her debut or something from Vision Quest OST nipping into the top five. Material Girl may well be the lush pop song that defined that excessive greed of the 80s with a softer version of the Express yourself video - diamonds and pearls predating concial bras. It still defines Madonna to this day and she is constantly referred to as the Material Girl. Like A Virgin has a great pop beat and cheeky lyrics that shocked and titillated the audience at a time when Madonna knew exactly how to manipulate the media (though to be fair the media was easier to manipulate then - no myspace, no youtube, no TMZ, etc). Into The Groove was taken from the first of many varied quality Madonna movies, Desperately Seeking Susan and continued her delightful pure pop phase. It's another bouncy romp of a track that sounds great on the dancefloor and remains best in it's original mix not the travesty of an Immaculate Collection mix. The more mellow side of Madonna comes through on tracks like Dress you Up and Angel, the former of which is vastly underrated while the latter is not one of Madonna's better vocal performances. If you want proper ballads done right, her version of Love Don't Live Here Anymore is decent but not a patch on the swoony Crazy For You - a song so romantic it makes you want to say "my boyfriend is everso dreamy"... A classic collection of tunes that quite rightly established Lady Madonna with the pop children at her feet. Shame on Warner Bros though for not including that ballad and the rocktastic dance tune Gambler on the remastered edition of the album. They are depriving fans of two of her strongest songs of the era...

True Blue:

Bloody hell, Madonna. If you had kept on building on the quality of your albums like this, Hard Candy would have been out of this world. True Blue is a divine collection of pop tunes that builds nicely on the styles of Like A Virgin and expanded that with some jitter pop, 60s girls band, pretty melodies, spanish flamenco and wistful ballads. Live To Tell is so enchanting and lovely that it is indeed a place where beauty lives. Tackling teenage pregnancies and catholic guilt, Papa Don't Preach was as controversial and addictive as Like A Virgin, with some brilliant violin work and hints of classical music. Madonna was stretching it abit to be a teenage mom in the video though... Critics were finally recognising that Madonna could perform AND write heartfelt pop songs. True Blue and Open your Heart were balls to the wall quality pop that quite rightly stormed the charts (as should the song Where's The Party have done) while the lovely spanish tinged La Isla Bonita kept me charmed for years though I did think she sang "young girls with eyes like po-tatoes". Only Jimmy Jimmy is a let down with it's silly lyrics. As an opener to a long running career, Madonna was certainly on a roll as far as understanding marrying pop and image (if not the right men)...

The brief respite:


Madonna's quality output was briefly coitus interruptus thanks to the 4 song soundtrack Who's That Girl and a remix album Spotlight (that I never actually heard until about 2004!) Who's That Girl is actually a great track, all poppy and catchy but not really anything different to what she had recorded before. Causing A Commotion has big beats, a great chorus, and melodic verses that by now Madonna had worked out suited her vocal style perfectly. Can't Stop was largely similar to Where's The Party and Love Makes The World Go Around, with rather daft lyrics surrounding the perky pop. It's not the best collection of Madonna tracks ever, but fairly decent and boosted by the inclusion of the lazy languid Look of Love which is a nice change of pace from the increasingly relentless but fun pop tunes surrounding it. None of them have dated particularly well and sound a little tinny today. Spotlight from the remix album was the final throwback to the 80s Madonna sound before she decided to produce my favourite album of hers ever...

Like A Prayer:

Want to move your career forward? Throw in some religious controversy to add to your already sexual prowess, bring in a black Jesus, get your ad campaign with Pepsi withdrawn and throw in your best song ever and your status is solidified. The album was Madonna's way of showing she could grow and develop as a writer AND still experiment with different genres and styles. Launching with the title track, Madonna showed her midriff and newly brunette hair alongside her religious imagery filled video. What was important here was the gospel infused track worked perfectly well as a love song and great pop track without the visual images. Express Yourself updates Madonna's Material Girls dreams and shows that actually, fuck you fellas, sisters are doing it for themselves. It's another great pop track with amazing images that work perfectly together or apart. Perhaps realising that she needed to show her softer side, Cherish saw her rolling around in the sand, on a beach that probably took her ages to wash out of her hair and is up there with True Blue as an homage to 60s girl group pop. UK went with the strange but lovely nursery rhyme Dear Jessie as the christmas track and is lilting and ethereal. Crap video though. This was probably the first Madonna album that I played over and over again with no regard for what my family thought, and loved the album tracks almost as much as the singles. Til Death Do Us Part was the Sean Penn story and had a great frenetic pounding bassline for such a personal intimate song. Keep It Together was quite rightly an american single, and works slightly better in the remix version than the album track. I have to confess i nearly shat my pants the first time I heard Madonna yell "What do you mean it's not in the computer!" at the end of Act of Contrition and had to listen to the whole thing again. Along with Electric Youth it was my joint favourite album of 1989. The Cherish b-side Supernatural is so kooky and out there, that one can't help but love it. Geri Halliwell should've covered it years ago...

Breathless Mahony and the Immaculate Conception:


Madonna's Dick Tracey inspired album was bound to seem like a bit of a let down after the Like A Prayer masterpiece and the stunning Vogue single. It's well documented how Madonna took the Vogue dancecraze from the underground clubs onto the main pop stage with a flawless black and white video (and an amazing French "les liasons dangereuse" inspired MTV appearance). It's not representative of the soundtrack but certainly is a phenomenal and addictive single, with it's spoken middle eight and plinky house beats. Hanky Panky wasn't a great choice as a single, perhaps chosen because of it's shock value title rather than musical merit. Something To Remember and Sooner or Later are great, bluesy jazz inspired tracks that match the needs of the film and make great use of instruments. No wonder Stephen Sondheim won an Oscar for it. More is a tremendously fun song, as is Now I'm Following You (part two), while Back In Business is just marvelous. The rest isn't really fantastic but it's a very fun album. And then came the Immaculate Collection, an incomplete remixed version of Madonna's greatest hits. It was the album that made me realise that greatest hits aren't always what I want them to be. Justify My Love is a sparse almost acoustic dance groove that saw Madonna move to complete slut stage (and had scary remixes with Madonna shouting Fuck Me at the end of them!) and a house filled groove in anthem-in-waiting-but-not quite Rescue Me. It was end of stage one, and time for Madonna to get her baps out...

Greatest Hits Disc One:

1. Everybody
2. Lucky Star
3. Borderline
4. Holiday
5. Like A Virgin
6. Material Girl
7. Crazy For You
8. Into The Groove
9. Dress You Up
10. Angel
11. Gambler
12. Live To Tell
13. Papa Don't Preach
14. True Blue
15. Open Your Heart
16. La Isla Bonita

Greatest Hits - Disc Two:

1. Who's That Girl?
2. Causing A Commotion
3. Look of Love
4. Spotlight
5. Like A Prayer
6. Express Yourself
7. Cherish
8. Dear Jessie
9. Keep It Together
10. Vogue
11. Hanky Panky
12. Sooner or Later
13. Justify My Love
14. Rescue Me

Remember May 2001? I was incredibly young and hunky. Darren and I were celebrating our first anniversary by purchasing our first home which had no kitchen and hideous aqua blue bathroom (it was a fixer upper)! Kirsty and Phil were launching Locationx3 and making saps like us think it was easy to fix up a dilapidated wreck (though we made a killing on it 12 months later. Woohoo!) Robert Downey Junior ruined the best year of Ally McBeal by snorting up or something equally salubrious, but the best tv finds were on the WB with Gilmore Girls rounding off a stellar first year and Felicity extending the Noel-Ben triangle a little longer as she finished her gun toting Junior year. And what a glorious month it was for pop music. It was the dwindling last days of the Steps era of pop, but there were still plenty of gems out there, and in no particular order are seven that still have me humming to this day...

1. S Club7 - Don't Stop Moving: Paul had yet to eat all the pies and with this stomping disco track, all of a sudden, S Club moved from producing brilliant singalong kiddie pop (like the amazing Reach) to producing something that you would dance to in a club. The Billie Jean mash up remains a fave remix of the tune to this very day
2. LibertyX - Just A Little: The first two songs had gone for the "cool" factor over Hear'say's pop leanings, yet mixing that style with a sexy video, canes and a chorus that just wouldn't quit, the group suddenly became Britain's Best Hope for all things sexypop. Shame the record company fucked them over with marketing of the second and third album (now commonly known as The Feeling factor)
3. Geri Halliwell - It's Raining Men: Woohoo! Bridget Jones was in the cinemas. And this soundtracked one of the worst-best fight scenes ever and had it's own fame inspired video when Geri looked just a little too healthy for her own good, but certainly threw all her pop desperation into this basket. And it worked. Glorious. (Cue me falling out of Nightingales and screaming at a policemans size 11 feet "It's raining men get the umbrellas" Oh Paul...)
4. Steps -You'll Be Sorry: H&Claire were probably already plotting at this point and not realising that it would never get any better than the point they were at in early 2001 (though All Out of Love was good wasn't it?). I totally ignored the oh-we-wanted-to-release-this-because-it's-so-cool theory behind the boring Here and Now and focused on the fabbosity of You'll Be Sorry. They were on a space ship in the video and Claire was still wrinkling her nose and her hair didn't even move. It was all aces of bases and sad as sad could be that it was to all come crashing down...
5. Blue - All Rise: Oh goodie a new boyband that weren't as serious as Damage and came storming off the block with the utterly catchy All Rise where they put their "lady" on trial. I still think they should've recorded a festive version where they sang "one for the money and the mince pies" Now that would've been groovy.
6. A*Teens - Halfway Round The World: My fave A Teens song ever. Just a perfect slice of pop music and a brillo video where they all look like they are miles away from each other then push down the studio walls and hey they are all together again! And dance! I was SO getting down with my bad self...
7. Backstreet Boys - The Call: What would be their final brilliant single (well apart from Just Want You To Know) it was a down and dirty funky little club about one of the boys doing the nasty on their baby (that would be Nick then, probably busy bruising Paris Hilton's arm). Oh no a friend found out! How can you stop listening after that!!

Unrelated other news:

Vile Katy Perry isn't number one in the US anymore (here and here) but does seem to be delighting in the controversy her lyrics are causing. Silly bitch. Yes it's marvelous to tell the world it's not something good girls do, adding to the harm Marissa caused on the OC by deciding to be a lesbian to piss off her mom. Good gravy! Check out Jill Sobule's much more charming song of the same title. So innocently sapphic, you can practically hear Jill achieve the elusive female external ejaculation at at 1.51. Plus she sang the theme tune to Popular so you can't go far wrong with her...