Single Releases 19/11/07

Basically, I'm short of time this week.

Suffice to say that the Spice Girls song is dreadful. But that hardly matters in the overall scheme of things.

I do like Saving My Face by KT Tunstall though. I thought I better add that in.

KT Tunstall LIVE

A big queue at the Chippy meant that my food for the entire day, Toblerone notwithstanding, amounted to a dodgy burger at the van opposite the Apollo. This all did mean however, extra time for booze in the Union. A very underrated pub experience. Even if I can't repeat much of what was said.

So it was onto the palatial Apollo itself, skilfully avoiding the support act, to take our seats. Now I'm a big Tunstall fan and do actually like Drastic Fantastic very much (unlike some other fans who've been with her since the beginning) but there was something just not quite clicking for a lot of this concert for me. As I've said before, the first time I saw her live was so special (and quite unexpectedly brilliant - in the sense I had no real idea what to expect) that nothing has quite managed to live up to that since.

Which is not to say that this was in any way a bad evening, because it most certainly wasn't, even if it had it's, dare I say it, dull moments.

I'm sure the 10 people in attendance who have Acoustic Extravaganza loved Ashes and Gone To The Dogs, but they were two songs I had no real desire to listen to. And if I'm being honest, making a big deal about swearing ceased to be hilario when I was about seven years old. And continuing in an honest vein, I can't say I cared much for the "witty" banter at times.

Still there were great swathes I thoroughly enjoyed. THE highlight had to be Black Horse & Cherry Tree, which in it's own way is telling. The likes of Suddenly I See and Hold On came close, even if I'm one of the few people who actually thinks Hold On was a great single.

A good night then, but not quite a great one.

As an aside though, I am in love with one of her backing singers.

Drastic Fantastic - KT Tunstall

This album was second only to Rilo Kiley in terms of my most anticipated album of 2007. Yes this was more important than Kate Nash mainly because Eye To The Telescope was one of my most loved albums of the past few years. Indeed I remember with a fondness having to change my top albums list of 2004 list about 3 seconds before I was due to unveil it to the world because even though ETTT had only been out for about 2 weeks before the end of the year I had to include it.

Of course all this ignores the fact that Acoustic Extravaganza was a complete waste of my time, but as that's not a "proper" album I'll continue to treat that as an aberration that I need not bother with. But in many ways it signifies the problem that Tunstall faces. Eager to stay true to her roots she may be, but when your debut album sells 4 million copies your record company want something similar next time out.

And indeed we get two KT Tunstall's for the price of one here. We get the glamour pop princess on the one hand (one only needs to look at the cover picture), whilst the old folk KT still wants it's time in the spotlight. You cannot deny that on certain tracks, radio-friendly pop mega sellers were certainly in mind.

In might come as little surprise to anyone who's had more than a passing conversation with me that the pop side of things is very much to my liking. The likes of Little Favours, If Only and Hold On are instantly memorable. Indeed, despite it's lack of a decent chorus, I was singing Hold On for about three days after first hearing the album in it's entirety - a feat all the more remarkable considering it's playing in isolation never moved me all that much as a single.

I Don't Want You Now and next single Saving My Face aren't quite up to those levels but are both good songs as well.

I have to admit that it all gets a bit too pedestrian for me in parts. Paper Aeroplane and White Bird are not terrible songs, but can't really hold a candle to the slower songs from ETTT and without being too unkind, Beauty Of Uncertainty might well prove to be my cue for a toilet break at the upcoming tour. Slim it down to 3 minutes instead of 5 and it might have kept me interested for it's duration.

Still all is not lost on this side of the coin. Someday Soon just enchants me. Its simple, but wonderfully heartfelt and is the song that most grabs me like Heal Over did on its predecessor.

It's hard to say that it's better than Eye To The Telescope, and I have to admit to not really believing the "you have to be drastic to be fantastic" line that Tunstall has been spinning, but that doesn't make this a bad album.

It has enough shiny pop hits to captivate the casual fan who loves her on the basis of Black Horse & Cherry Tree or Suddenly I See and also, despite my ambivalence to some of the tracks, enough of the softer/acoustic side of KT that drew in other people as well.

The only "negative" I can really come up with is that at times it seems as if KT is trying to be all things to all people and as such it doesn't have the cohesive brilliance of Telescope and it's not the great leap that it might have been. Still, whilst it may not be convincingly "Drastic", at least it's a lot closer to being "Fantastic".

Single Releases 03/08/07

Ok so first an apology. Yes, I did totally forget to review KT Tunstall's comeback single Hold On.
So better late than never...

It's good. I can't quite see why she keeps insisting it's got an "R'n'B" vibe to it, but maybe that's just me. My only criticism of it would be that it could do with a catchier chorus. It's not a bad chorus by any means but it drags the song down slightly. As for the "you've got to be drastic to be fantastic" thing, I'll hold judgement on that until the album.

Onto this week's stuff.

Girls Aloud slam back on the scene with Sexy! No No No. I'd prefer a question mark instead of an exclamation mark. But anyhoo, it's a decent effort. Not as catchy as their best stuff but it does have that tinge of maniacal genius that all their best stuff has. The opening is brilliant; the rest of the song doesn't quite match it. The "duh-duh-dirty mind" bit though is perfection.

Rhianna may be boring as a pop star, but she comes up with some cracking pop singles. Ok, so she's "presented" with them, but Shut Up & Drive is very good, although it's New Order recreation isn't as good as the Soft Cell driven SOS. But as I've said before; in pop terms what else is these days?

Bring out the Roast Chicken because James Blunt is back. 1973 is pretty awful though. And I'm speaking as someone who hasn't got sick of his album. He's come back with the kind of song the record company wanted him to come back with. It just doesn't have that soaring quality that his best singles have had. Ok, that High had.

Candie Payne's record company have finally decided that my tipping her for success in 2007 needn't mean the end of her career by getting Mark Ronson in to remix One More Chance. A good job he's done too. Now all I need is people to actually start buying her records.

Isn't this a "big name" single's week?

The Editors return with that one song they always do. Fair's fair though, they do do the one song very well. I'm growing less and less enamoured with his voice though every time I hear it. Watching them live may be a painful experience...only joking Gee man.

Is there a worse single this year knocking about than Plain White T's Hey There Delilah? There may be, but this is definitely on the short list. I particularly love how this song's success somehow is supposed to signify a good thing. It's not. They're rubbish, the song is rubbish and, in effect, this is naught but a novelty record.

Speaking of awful novelty records, we come to Beautiful Girls by Sean Kingston. It's a close run thing over whether this is worse than even Plain White T.

Of course both of those will sell thousands more copies than Lucky Soul's One Kiss Don't Make a Summer but then life isn't fair. Why it's been released now, instead of the height of the summer is beyond me, but then I don't run a record company do I?

Paramore's Hallelujah is a nice little track. Nothing earth shattering, but good all the same.

Dan Le Sac vs Scroobius Pip are seemingly awesome. The Beat That My Heart Skipped is another winner.

As mentioned before, Bonde do Rolê don't quite have the killer single that would see them doing a "CSS" but Solta o Frango is a typically good track from them all the same.

Beauty & Crime - Suzanne Vega

It seems almost strange that Beauty & Crime is Vega's first album since 2001's Songs Of Red & Gray (she has kept busy in the mean-time with touring, and playing virtual gigs in the online world of Second Life) but almost immediately you realise that that makes it her first album since 9/11 had it's permanent effect on the place that Vega calls home, New York.

The spectre undoubtedly hangs over the album. Anniversary is the most obvious and explicit statement about the tragedy, but there are strong echoes in the likes of Zephyr And I (which includes dreamy backing vocals from KT Tunstall) and Angel's Doorway (which sees Sonic Youth's Lee Ranaldo providing some guitar riffs).

I will admit that it's nothing particularly new, but then Suzanne Vega has no need to change. Always a class act, this album is no different.

The literate lyrics are as punchy and relevant as ever and most of all the feeling as a listener is one of realising just how pleased you are she is back and the realisation that we've been missing something for the past six years. Here's hoping we don't have to wait that long for the next one.