Single Releases 11/12/06

Ah, Christmas time. And this week we get all the songs that the record company don't think are quite good enough to be the Christmas number one but that they still want to be "in the running" for promotional purposes. Let's crack on shall we?

Oh Lily Allen. Sure to be "front-running" on all my year end musical "best of" categories. Littlest Things is a lot more mellow than you would expect from her but, as ever, it's still fantastic. The "the first time that you introduced me to your friends and you could tell I was nervous, so you held my hand" bit almost makes me cry. Almost.

Lil' Chris' Getting Enough is also quite brilliant. Yes, it's just that Buzzcocks one with different lyrics and more modern tune, but that doesn't change the fact that it is bloody brilliant. And as for those saying "gettin' enough? He's only 16 for Christ's sake"...well isn't that what all 16 years olds think about these days anyway?

Late to the party considering the film has been out a month, Chris Cornell finally releases the Casino Royale tune, You Know My Name. It has a powerful chorus, but the verses are a bit on the boring side.

As if Savage Garden weren't a bad enough concept on their own, Cascada take Truly, Madly, Deeply and add an addictive techno beat. We can only hope that this abomination earns enough money to mean that Darren Hayes doesn't need to attempt another solo album. (Incidentally, his first solo album wasn't all that bad actually).

Wind It Up is still absolutely fucking terrible.

P Diddy teams up with Aguillera. I bet you're just as excited as me! Tell Me isn't bad though. True, it's not exactly good, but this is P Did we're talking about here so let's be thankful for small mercies. Snoop Dogg is better, with That's That being good, but "rap" honours have to go to Eminem (and all the rest of the people on the song - I'd list them but I am going out tonight) who's They Don't Know proves that the "retirement" may well have been the ideal tonic for his career.

Illegal it may be Shakira, but if that's the case, why is your new single so bad? Well, not bad. Just dull and uninteresting. Not one of her best...

Kate Price and Peter of the land of Andre hit us with A Whole New World...of pain mostly. Whether or not that dreadful "outtake" really was the former Jordan or not is immaterial when the single itself is dreadful. But ask yourself, is it really any worse than Westlife? At least this has the upside of being for charity.

In "novelty" terms it's also better than Cliff Richard's "21st Century Christmas". Cliff is an easy target I know but when he serves up something like this, he deserves all he gets. Still even that has marginally more going for it than Ricky Tomlinson's "Christmas My Arse". Only about five years behind the zeitgeist there Ricky.

But then again, even Ricky Tomlinson is preferable to El Chombo. Dreadful. And even if it is a "joke" that doesn't excuse it being so dreadful.

Matt Willis chooses this week to capitalise on the British public awarding him for chomping on a rat's penis by releasing Don't Let It Go To Waste. (There's a joke there isn't there?). But really, his solo singles have been getting worse as we go on. Still, he's not descended to Son Of Dork or Fightstar level just yet.

What makes all this all the more piontless in many ways is that the X-Factor winner is bound to get the Christmas number one anyway. Boo hiss, and all that.