Lopez Blogs

Hurrah! I am really looking forward to this year's Your Country Needs You for several reasons. For those who don't know, this is a BBC show to determine who represents the Britain that is Great at Eurovision in May. It is quite exciting this year because the winning tune is written by Pete Waterman. This is very good news indeed. It also features long time fave of mine, young Sammy Taylor as part of UNI5. And as part of the audition process, they are having to sing classic Stock Aitken and Waterman songs. This all adds up to 90 minutes of brilliantness and frankly if you are spending your Friday night anywhere else you are clearly a) in possession of a life or more likely b) wanted for crimes against pop. Shame on you!

(Of course, I have had to trade half an hour of watching Judge Judy in order to convince Darren to DVR the second Corrie, so I can watch this. Compromise and snuggles is why we are in our tenth year everyone!!)

Oh already it's very exciting. There are about 14 people cheering in the studio audience and they are making it sound like 100. God bless the BBC. To be fair, it actually looks quite packed and although I'm not a fan of violence, I would quite like to throw a broccoli quiche in Graham Norton's face. Ooo, I'm a force to be reckoned with I am! Moving on from him though, there's a brillo run through of Pete Waterman's career with clips of Kylie, Jason, the Rams, Rick, my beloved Steps, Westlife (surely more of a production role?) as well as brief snippets of Sonia, Big Fun and er, the Reynolds Girls. Oh, I feel I should totally kneel as Pete walks on the stage. Amazes.

ACT ONE ~ Karen Harding: She has previously won a karoke competition where she beat Joe McElderberry, which isn't really saying much is it? The footage of her winning that competition shows her practically fellating a microphone, which is a pet hate of mine! Makes you popular with the boys though. She's singing What Do I Have To Do. One of her backing dancing has a look of rohypnol rape in his eyes. Be scared Karen! She's not properly amazing to be fair - it's like she forgets to dance half the time, but then remembers so bounces up and down a few times to make up for it. Bless, etc. Graham practically slaps her across the face by saying "oh it's tough being first isn't it?" which is a nice way of saying, you're a bit shit really love. She really should have performed the single mix of the song...

ACT TWO ~ Alexis: Hello Alexis. Who cares what you sound like?! I also like his hair - mine is rubbish at the moment as it's going through that ghastly can't-do-much-with-it-stage of growing out :( Alexis looks proper decent in a fairly shiny suit and has lovely eyes. I think it's a good time to point out that this is completely live without the backing track vocal support available of the X Factor. Once I'm over the shock of it not being Rick singing, his vocal improves and it ends up quite good overall. Plus of course he is pretty and has great pop star hair....

ACT THREE ~ UNI5: It's Sammy Taylor! On television. Looking quite sexy obviously. Considering the group have only just gotten together, they seem quite at ease with each other and utterly charming. They are singing Last Thing On My Mind, which I adore is being introduced as that number 71 Bananarama smash, rather than the probably better know Steps version. Lovely harmonies and some decent non-steps dance moves in the chorus. I wish Sammy had more vocal time, as I know he has such a great vocal - oh wait, the boys are doing a bit now and they sound quite delightful. And look like they are having an absolutely brilliant time. Pete says he thinks they didn't do very well, and as he picks the final 3 it's not looking great :( Boooo, I could do with a new boy-girl pop group :(

ACT FOUR ~ Esma: She is quite snotty, everything is very oh gosh it's positively pip pip to be on this show, what a smashing honour. She's going to sing Donna Summer and it's probably going to be This Time I Know It's For Real, though I'd prefer I Don't Wanna Get Hurt. And then she starts to sing and gives a really confident and great vocal performance in the verses. It's a bit shrieky in the chorus though so I'm almost grateful when it gets back to the verse. Hideous hideous last night, so while she had a great voice in bits it was a bit terrible and karoke in others. Oh Esma... Of course Pete loves her. He has clearly decided who he wants at this point of the game!!

ACT FIVE ~ Josh: Another poshie with a quite nice silk scarf on. For some reason in his VT he keeps throwing his head back and laughing with a very wide mouth. He has very nice teeth, and again nice popstar hair. He's doing Jase the Face's Too Many Broken Hearts and it's a bit gutting to see that he doesn't have his nice scarf cravat on anymore for the live show. And that he doesn't have his guitar with him to show he is a real rock star like what Jason was. Nice vocal performance, smooth, good control in the higher notes. Dances like a goon though!

ACT SIX ~ Miss Fitz: Weren't they on the X Factor?! I think I quite liked them. I hope they do some brilliant harmonies. Ah, they are saying they are singing Steps, which is why they (quite rightly) said Last Thing On My Mind was Bananarama. Even though they are singing Better The Devil You Know. Which surely is definitively Kylie. Oh and it's all over the place. They can't even click fingers in time. There are hints of how good they could be and it's being pulled together towards the end. The sound seems to be all over the place with this show! Personally I'm still laughing from Jade non-Sugababes saying she liked Josh when he was on his knees. Dirty Bitch!

GROUP SONG ~ ABBA: Uni5 actually sound rather brilliant singing the start of Take A Chance On Me. Oh it's that medley Pete Waterman did a few years back with Steps and B*Witched and the like. Oh look at Sammy dance :) Show Alexis again you stupid camera man. Oh there he is :) That is all!

Ooo, Pete is picking (picked before the show began) the three he wants to sing in his final 3. Ew. Esma is the first through. Already this isn't looking good. It's no melodifestivalen is it?! Oh pretty Alexis is through so it's balancing out nicely. He should really put a group (UNI5) through next shouldn't he?! But no, it's "i've got a girlfriend, me" Josh :( Not that I mind Josh, but I was obviously rooting for UNI5 :/

THE SONG FOR ENGLAND: The song is called That Sounds Good To Me which sounds good to me. If it is as amazing as Hotel Rival's Second Best To None, then it should be fairly bonza. Oh good, it's uptempo which bodes very well indeed for saving the night for me. Oh it's about to go poppers o'clock. Yes, indeed it's a typically Pete Waterman song but in a fairly anthemic way - plus they rhyme "just like the laughter it's the happy ever after" which is obviously very amazing indeed. So not particularly groundbreaking (you bring the sunshine, i'll bring the good times), but very me and very brilliant-yet-shit in that classic sounding pop way that for better or worse, I'm an absolute sucker for :) Alexis sings it first and is ok, very lovely to look at still but a bit pitchy. Esma is next so I'm going to the bathroom. Apparently she totally fucked it up, but she pushed through, like she was in labour. She must be gutted! Josh absolutely is the best though - hasn't forgotten the words, and isn't pitchy. I would so have this song as number one for four weeks in my charts. I'm so old school! Can't be bothered to wait for the results, but it better not be Esma...

Hurrah it's Friday. I shall go through my normal ritual of playing Steps' Stomp (for the line "thank god for the weekend...") and probably watch Coronation Street, even if the Gail as a murderess storyline is a bit poo. Other than that I will endeavour to catch you up on some foxy new boy pop, which we all know is the most attractive pop of all. This is a fact that cannot be denied. Right, enjoy - I'm off to make a nice hot chocolate. Rock n roll!

UNI5 (Sammy Taylor)

It's no surprise at all to "regular" readers that I absolutely adore Sam Taylor (see my recent write up on Chemistry is Dead). I found him to be quite charming frankly. His voice and foppish good looks are made for a pop career. And if needs a bit of a boost to accomplish that, I'm not going to grumble - particularly if he is going to form a mixed-sex pop group that has the potential to sing a song for Eurovision written by musical guru and sometime genius Pete Waterman. If I was a football fan, I would probably yell something like "get in" at this type of news, then do that clench fist and pull it in towards you while looking at it proudly manouevre. Oh you know what I mean. Anyway, back to UNI5 - they all look adorable (check out this video), Lee is a proper bobby dazzler too and Sam tells the world that his fave Pete Waterman song is Kylie's Step Back In Time. Amazing choice. I wanna funk too. Anyway, hurrah for Sam I say, and I'll be following the clearly made for me UNI5 with avid interest :)

Khris Lorenz

While Khris has announced on his myspace that he is moving towards writing and producing over singing, there is no doubt that his own tunes are still worth checking out. It's a heady eclectic mix of styles in each tune that proves to be rather alluring sound; there's elements of thrashy rock, trashy pop and aggressive electro - each attacked with vigour and enthusiasm and aggression to match the mood of the song. I Don't Want A Girlfriend is a blistering electro-rock kiss off that has an addictive chanted rap running through the middle 8 and chorus that elevates the song to aceness; Bounce has enough pop elements in it to be entirely appealing, yet retains a harder rock edge to it. The juxtaposition of the musical styles could be seen as abrasive, but they completely work and the music is like a blast of invigorating fresh water on a hot sunny day. Be sure to check out his latest EP on iTunes...

Kyle Brylin


Kyle not only has a rocking pair of headphones, he's quite effortlessly managing to churn out an edgy brand of dance-pop that is instantly memorable as much for the persistant beats to his assertive choruses. It constantly astounds me what people can come up with in their bedrooms these days (oo-er) and tracks like the fuzzy If They Only Knew is a whip smart bit of electro-pop with a bit of an industrial edge to make it stand out. The effects on his voice really match the mood of the song and as he writes all his own stuff, it's clear he has a great knowledge of what makes a good pop song with a hard beat to it. Love it when he says "round 2"... And god bless 'im, he's not afraid to whip out the odd softer side of me cover version - particularly with a lovely acoustic Last Christmas; also check out his vibrant video of Story of our Lives. He exhibits a real charm in this videos and his voice really stands out. Definitely one to keep an eye on. For now, check out a free download over at arjanwrites...

Other ace boy pop:
Ola Joyce (courtesty of Alien Hits)
Fabio Lendlum (courtesy of DontStopThePop)