Tuesday, 17 June 2008

The More Tragic The Better


Throughout her "tumultuous" decade-long career of euphoric babbling, music has served as a hedge against Alanis being a willing fool (if anyone wants me to elaborate on my hedge theory - check out the video to Thank U for proof). She quite obviously writes to keep herself sane, to avoid any sense of being outwitted by an emotion she can't control or describe using the medium of song, and when a Hollywood shitcom actor takes time out from his busy sit-ups schedule to cheat on her, Alanis just knows this, okay? If you listen to her new album, the fact that she knows her fiance dumped her gradually begins to seep through, much the same way the unzipping bassline of Straight Jacket kills off any white picket fence dreams with the defensive growl "I don't know who you're talking to with such fucking disrespect" before relishing the twisted behaviour with "this shit's making me crazy". However, she may only be ordering a Pizza - 3 tracks in and we just don't know what is up with her yet this time.

Like her mile-long hair, Flavours requires some initial untangling before it flows, and opener Citizen of The Planet is more knotted than Joan 'Gollum' Collins combing out a wig husband Percy put in the washing machine by mistake. The dense recipe recital is a misplaced murky turkey, merely serving to highlight a return to the familiar decorative sound of 1998's Junkie album. What else is on the menu?

More inviting is the graceful yet anthemic first single Underneathe, which is in awe and astonished with still moist tear-stained recovery, whilst the baton-change of producer duties is already apparant as Guy Sigsworth provides her most hypnotic setting since the tinkling-focus plunge of Thank U. The jangly ballad is tender and cautious and she bows to a bigger explanation, revisiting the theme of soaring bender Joining You.

Soggy tampon Not As We is a heartbreaking piano ballad test-driving a new found restraint to her vocal range. The odd sensation continues on In Praise of The Vulnerable Man, a sunkissed relation to the Sugababes' New Year. Each verse begins with her singing "you" as if struggling to breathe or not shout, like an accusation suddenly escaped as she contines "... are the greatest man I've ever given head to in a theatre" or something. There is also a dissarming echo of Deetah's 1998 pop-rap gem Relax.

On track Moratorium, Alanis really should remember to close her fridge door - chills creep into every corner, with an emotionally-broken narrative similar to The Couch. The atmospheric arrangements could almost be lifted from the film The Day After Tomorrow - I do hope Jake Gyllenhaal never dumped her too, which he probably has no idea about anyway. The chorus tinkers like a disco in the morgue causing danceloor cramp - the body count is presumably her ex-boyfriends whereby she "declares a war on failed relationships". Close that fridge, Alanis!

A bleeding sky hovers over the singer on the foreboding Versions of Violence, a gravity-defying hot air floats with cathedral chanting before something scratches and the searing chorus is worthy of her best torrid screachers from her first two albums. The marathon chorus of Torch puts more strain on an already well-weathered emotional landscape, and is the perfect counterpart for the gushing sadness of her crestfallen verses. It's clear there is no sprint to the finish here.

Conversely, Alanis finds pace as a burning sunset treacles through on Giggling Again For No Reason, an atypical divine rush of sighing adrenaline. The shimmering flutter activates an ascent to the albums highest peak of melody, a horizontal speed into blinding white light.

Incomplete has a deliberately unconcinving chirpiness to it that suggests Alanis doesn't really believe that she'll be one of those "30th anniversary" ladies and would rather enjoy her own personal pursuits of discovery. The chorus relinquishes the appeal of Stepford-esque bliss and is much more satisfying as a consequence.

Overall, the pureness to her vocal is a relevation to behold - by holding back she has much more impact and resonance like never before. A sincere clarity unravels throughout tracks 2-11 into a beguiling abandon that is all her own collision, coralling rage and an elegance of temperament into the proper setting.

Giggling Again For No Reason

In Praise of The Vulnerable Man

Monday, 16 June 2008

Too Gone, Too Long

I haven't reaally been posting on this for quite some time; a shame as it can be absorbing distraction and fun to lay down my pseudo-bizarre and contrived affectionate thoughts on some of pop worlds most imperial, trashy and melodramatic divas on offer. I used to truly love posting on certain message boards, but it's extremely hard to swim in a tide of text speak and reactionary swirlings of venom - is that non-specific enough?

I'm listening to a clutch of very accomplished albums, which include Ladytron, Alanis, Cyndi and the usual sustained-awe for Dana, Dannii and the Sioux. To the left, to the left (Edit: it's actually to the right), is a small gesture designed to meet the demmands of whoever might stumble upon my humble blogging district, and the result of this poll shall determine the spotlight focus of my next posting. Hopefully, I shall regain a bit of messaging momentum as I am the first to admit I have had some recent uphevals, despite my usual online loiterings, but with the aforementioned albums I am still very much adoring music as a kind of controllable autism.

Monday, 12 May 2008

Disco Dracula's Botox Masacre


The unique otherness of Dannii's disorganised, daft disco delirium reinvents the genre of what people who speak English call "dance". Her one woman show... an amusing disorder, dispatching like a mysterious religion, consistently outperforms Kylie on mythical merits alone. Her strict diet of laziness hovers over the whole project, with a nimble appetite for original material making sure there is no way in hell she'd ever lower herself by having a hit album or, hold the stomach tight, a number 1 single anywhere but in Japan or made-up club charts that don't even exist. Dannii will not be broken, ever - and that's just her forehead.

However, she will allow herself to be tampered with, as on her feel-good opening opus 'Touche Eclat' Me Like That, which marks her territory distinctly with a vivid pounding from Jason Nevins. An excited Dannii only then wasted all her energy by ripping the staples out of Joan Collins' scalp in order to steal the former Dynasty stars favourite wig, and subsequently had no enery left to move in the video; instead the mega buzz generated from auditioning gay-for-pay dyke dancers stunned her into full collapse when a squeeling D finally couldn't take anymore pain of standing up and breathing at the same time. (8.5/10)

She regains her conciousness with the sinewy aspartame injection Feel Like I Do, which glints with unassuming menace and quite possibly is overrated, but I love the chaffing bassline rubbing Dannii's thighs red raw - it has a razorblade sharpness to it more lethal than any shaken-Pepsi-can explosion of Perfection or YWFAM's sedated sunkissed seduction (is Sunny D sing it whilst snorkling in the shallow end, of her bath?). It glows with a radioactive irritability to stay still and erodes all the fake-tan sheen of her AATW associations. Dance is clearly Dan's secret outlet for her same-sex cravings, "it's my only way to lesbo" seeps a torturing agony to relieve herself on a sticky dancefloor. (10/10, 7.5/10, 8/10)

Equally messy, Perfection is more spreadable than Dannii in a dyke bar enquiring about a sling, and is as much a guilty pleasure as pulling back for the full facial - if Dannii runs out of SPF for her baps and forehead she knows what to do. The trashtastic grimness of being a Dannii fan took a new dive into swirling currents of glazed abandon. (7.5/10)

Meanwhile, when grief and lust collide and curdle, the tight and disciplined So Under Pressure spurts sisterly sympathy as Dannii hisses and groans in order to show a bloated and bald Kylie how much she wants a hit single. Taking her older-and-plump siblings bullimia into consideration (D just doesn't have the stomach for it), she can't resist taking a non-botox jab: "I'm sorry you couldn't keep lunch down ... You know I can't be there whenever you want me to" and refuses to clean up the mess, literally, leaving Special K with a toilet bowl crusted with dry vomit. She then pays the price when Kylie gaffatapes her in the boot of her 4X4 - "mmm, ooh, mmm, mmm" breathes Danoushka through her flared nostrils as I'm Sorry coos with the elegance of a cow being slaughtered. (8/10, 10/10)

Still high on the idea of risk, Love Fight is the clubcentric flare-up I've been waiting for, etc, wherein she gives her wimpering frayed clit a rest and wants a black eye instead. The gas-bubble intro teeters like blowing into a glass of milk using a straw, and an inexplicable standstill, better saved for a video edit, both disqualify her affirmingly life-threatning quest for sexual climax via a clenched fist. When Dannii roars "on the floor!" a lesbian stampede marches all over the poor bint. (8/10)

After her near-death experience, I Will Come To You is the sound of Ms. D waking up in a strange hotel while ants devour her love cake. The global sunbathing epidemic of Danniigoose let's loose on the ubiquitous plight of global warming and her own concious negation of family life and career on 'Round The Pool. Both are tangible strands of where she could have travelled to musically with a bona fide studio album. Club Disco is the spit trying to compensate for lube, the split ends to her usual and expected full gloss sheen, but has enough momentum to excell allow entry when it matters. (7.5/10, 7.5/10)

Redeeming her "free access" excesses, the oozing tranquility of Do You Believe Me Now has the tenderness of excess botox trickling down Dannii's football tight forehead after a painful session from her "doctor" (goes by the name of Nathan apparantly). Her endurance obviously reminds her what is important in life and sings obediently to suggest she must really love this lesbian kiss-n-tell stripper she's leaving a voicemail to. (9/10)

Perhaps the only dance song about having a colonic, the disco coma Gone unravels inertly, coasting on a faux-Moroder bassline and only tightens up for a focused acceleration on the brief middle-8. Her shrill testimony retreats into herself, but she does claim she's very hands on supposedly anyway. (6/10)

The best parts of Club Disco reinvent her ravaged genre, and forcefully introduce some of the old zest back into her bloodstream, with her fundemental principle of "vagina and a disco beat" completing a compendium of her elevatary dance achievements. Her chaotic and unruly attitude towards her career coherently consists of unconnected raw elements - a decorative chain of tacky mash-ups, puppy-fat dance boppers, scalpel carved electro eroders, all hang between 6 month release gaps and fan-droid anguish for more. It's just good to have her functioning!

Album highlight: "On the floor!" as Dannii sentences herself to death via a lesbian stampede.

(10/10, "I know it's all my fault" - Dannii Minogue)

Tuesday, 29 April 2008

The Dancefloor Wouldn't Recognise You


The obvious mission of 4 Minutes aside, Hard Candy lacks a bonafide grandiose classic for all else to hang: this means the record is a low-key affair requiring a bit of patience to come to terms with. Madonna's septic and shrill vocals are often painfully delivered like a botox jab too many - even she must have screwed her face up whilst singing Candy Shop's blistering steam of "get up out of your seat" (and on the shimmying chorus she sounds as if trying to squat provocatively but now can't get back up again). The jagged electro tingeing the edges on Heartbeat is much better, and can safely join the others (Annie, Steps, Paris Hilton, er, Melanie Thornton) and keeps her safe for another week.

Her glum tenderness here is not alone: the precoccupied pathos of Miles Away is bittersweet frustration and not too dissimilar to the sandpaper texture from the Jason Nevins edit of Nothing Fails. It is alarming how flat and tame her dance cuts are though, like a bullimic trying to purge on an empty stomach - the beats just don't lubricate Madonna's opening.

Undeterred, She's Not Me could have been Madge judging a drag pageant, but is able to find a perfect balance between predictable lyrics and a barren sense of melody. The track sounds as if it wants to pluck up the courage to sample Pink Floyd's Another Brick In The Wall, but she isn't able to hold her nerve as on the glass-shattering grip of 1992s broken determination anthem Thief of Hearts. A song that almost has its own credit sequence becomes a classic, if only for a glimmer.

However, there is astonishment on this record - the twirling synth ascent vehicle Incredible saves the day (that would be just the 28 minutes then Ms. Ritchie) and develops into a chaotic grunting disco climax whilst remaining bouncy and laidback (think Kelis, Roller Rink). This rippling flutter is the first and only ecstatic moment wherein the promise of her working with The Neptunes genuinely feels as if they are operating on the same wave length. More familiar sounding, Devil Wouldn't Recognise You combs the lukewarm nightfall air with a clawing vocal calmly disraught and wounded but Madonna's muse remains a mystery.

Between sounding as if yelling to wake her kids up for their Kaballah class, her collab whores are more than keen to take over in a most unwelcome fashion - but Madonna doesn't "do" interaction on record. In fact, most of the album feels like one big loop of the chalkboard scraping "hey Britney..." If Pharrell was so keen to remind me he produced a few numbers he could have just left a post-it on my fridge or sent an email - Timbaland just sounds like nasty skidmarks some poor 50 year old is left to clean up afterwards (oh wait...) At least eager Justin is on competent form, like a pupil on his best behaviour.

Now that she's found her feet, Dance 2night is pleasant enough workout I might absent mindedly appreciate whilst shopping for jeans and waiting for the snarly assistant to get a pair in my size. Madonna can scew her face up and wriggle her booty all she wants, Hard Candy is the wrong fit - it might just take a few listens to loosen up.

Friday, 25 April 2008

All But 4 Gays Required

Dannii's stunning Great Wall of China weight loss (concern was first raised on DDB) was showcased on Australian TV last week, allowing all but 4 gays required to lift her off the ground whilst cooing an emphatic performance of Xanadu. Reports that Danoushka was carried off stage in a stretcher were later confirmed by her much older sister Kylie who still persists on trying to overshadow Dannii with a new album, X, which has so far outsold all of Dannii's fan releases put together. Some people just don't give up.

Shifting Piles


With Madonna's 4 Minutes inevitably reaching the summit of the charts as it was supposed to (think the sound of an elephant shifting about the dancefloor with a bad case of piles), it's a perverse glory for the 49 year old MILF. The track, presumably a countdown to the menapause, is basically Timbaland and his bitch Justin wanking into Madge's goldfish-like gaping mouth she's so weak and passive on her own song (I'll grant her that "no hesitating" is the main hook for me). However, the acrobatic video is beyond marvelous, flaunting herself as if she has no idea what the track even sounds like but still fully aware of herself from all sinewy angles. I still can't figure out who she resembles in the video: a clean Courtney Love circa 1998; a freshly fucked Nicholette Sherridan; or a singer called Madge.

It's Been A While...

...but doesn't Britney look like Micha Barton on some L.A drug bender in the now-old new video Break The Ice?

Monday, 10 March 2008

Divine Romance


The plucky, swirling momentum of Divine Idylle by Vanessa "mind the gap" Paradis is an addictive pop rash impossible not to keep insistently itching like a maniac with no arms (thank goodness Kylie has 2 of these attachments or her new European single would make her look like a fraud). In amongst a swirling, smiling orchestra, Paradis' breathy vampish voice is nubile and nimble, whilst the gatecrashing guitars are invaluable to her sparkling energy. With the lyrics roughly translating to "My madness, my craving, my lubie, my romance" it sounds like a KY ad campaign isn't far away if her, ahem, music dries up.


Divine Idylle

Tuesday, 26 February 2008

Don't Forget To Catch Me

If you thought a song called People Get Real would consist of finger-waving Jeremy Kyle sound bites and street-savvy colloquialisms then speak to the hand and get a DNA test – Saint Etienne’s Sarah Cracknell resists the urge to holler “you ain’t my real mutha anyways” by reuniting the raddled 90s pop scene with revised 1960s kitsch so dreamy it’s beyond hallucination. Cracknell’s foamy and breathlessly quiff-like cooing won’t worry Whitney, but does the job wonderfully with her menacingly sweet abilities, as on the dense melancholy of Avenue, swirling in delicious candyfloss nostalgia. Kiss & Make Up sung by Donna Savage floats ashore giving you memories you never had in the first place.

Counteracting these warm tones of lush promenade promise, the stoic disco coping strategy Like A Motorway is a lucid account of detached echoing grief – Cracknells cracked façade absorbs into the lurid Moroder bass line like ink bleeding onto paper, with the untouchable fluid fatality of reading a suicide note mirrored to the greediness of an intrusive newspaper headline. Her frozen horror fades into the horizon but with lingering calculation.

Further on in their discography, the cosy “hold tight” stargazing flight of Stars Above Us gave the group their best chance of a hit single since the Motiv8 rampage He’s On The Phone. With a possible dance project igniting the rumour mill perhaps once more they are on the cusp to deliver disorientated pop perfection all over again.

People Get Real

Kiss & Make Up

Avenue

Like A Motorway

Stars Above Us (Eric Kupper Radio Remix)

Saturday, 23 February 2008

Waite's Weightless Orgasm & Smirking Ceremony

South African starlet Genevieve Waite is a riot of eccentricity on her 1 and only album Romance Is On The Rise; her sultry allure presents an untampered raggedly elegant style that is effortlessly charming like a telling hic-up of gin bubbles. As on the sun-soaked bonus track Pink Gin & Lime, her drowsy drawl (a shredded, expressive rasp) and whimsical clasp of daft kitsch is sharper than the heels she stumbles in as her stories slide into dreamy stupors ("pink gin & lime for a fake ballerina, out of her mind from sniffin' dry cleaner" is the helium highlight here) . Piano keys are pervasively pressed as if rippling a pool of champagne, but trip over themselves on the jaunty Times of Love, which stumbles merrily - Waite's weightless orgasm of infatuation chuckles she hasn't left the house for days (does she use gaydar too?). The trumpeting Slumming On Park Avenue could be an alcoholic Mary Poppins "sniffing everything in sight" with its giddy glee intermission feel, whilst the self-assured jazzy show tune Biting My Nails catches the jiving songbird in the act.

Her wide-eyed carnage is hushed into a sweetly yawning torch ballad on American Man On The Moon where her ponderous crooning sounds delicately overcome like a jewellery box ballerina gently winding down. Elsewhere there is the soft strum of the nose-blowing ballad Saying Goodbye, the chic disco drive-thru of White Cadillac, Those Trashy Rumours moves slower and the dried up tears of Danny. The stifled resignation of Girls offers her breezy humour more wickedly straight moments: "girls are running 'round in your head, you'll wish you liked boys instead." Her often poignant elixir of tender innocence and indulgent decadence equips her perfectly to cover Velvet Underground's Femme Fatale, wherein the casual lyric "hear the way she talks" could have been especially tailored for the beguiling chanteuse. Waite's infectious insouciance creates a dainty scenery littered with lyrical quips and campy flourishes of flagrant truth. With each listen, her perky entertainment of spirited flamboyance and smirking ceremony is never remotely diminished.


Pink Gin & Lime
Times of Love
Femme Fatale

Wednesday, 20 February 2008

Move Along, Dion!


Celine's fluttering forray into faceless hyper-barmy Euro-dance slams the piano keys with itching grit and feerless surrender to the grooves taking (chances) over her otherwise signature sense of restrain. Dion applies simplistic ideals in order to aid the quivering quest to free her quaking heartache at all costs - she'll quite happily interrupt family squabbles in exclusive restaurants such as Little Chef by bursting into her dance track gem Just A Little Bit of Love. Her well-publicised ability to express earnest emotion using her forehead is given alarming relief to give Celine no other option but to impulsively hit the dancefloor in order to solve the worlds problems.

Just A Little Bit of Love

Monday, 11 February 2008

Fully Booked Functioning Dance Dealer


Apart from having a fully functioning vagina (or otherwise), the other main criteria for being a credible dance diva beyond being "down with the Gays" is to be in it for the long run. In-the-mix Euro Minx and Dutch dance dealer Amber lays her cards on the table better than ever with her revved-up belter Just Like That, more than 13 years after she first started with her tracks produced by the Real McCoy helmers. She delivers more regularly than a fully booked prostitute in Iraq.

The Jason Nevins Remix hardens her sound, fleshing out her already tough-if-slightly-bonkers lyrical 'tude. Nevins decorates the track as if fawning over Flash Dance by Deep Dish, before it plunges like a Mogul Skiing onslaught.

Voodoo's absorbing allure, ponders the sharp edge of a knife. A chorus carves consise scrutinised adrenaline worthy of her best harcore euro bafflers.

Amber is a dance deity and even if these remixes were what was required to salvage an arguably patchy album not entirely committed to dance, they prove her to still be in contention as a thriving force equally strong as when she started if not more.

Just Like That (Jason Nevins Club Mix)

Tuesday, 5 February 2008

Bullet-Proof Euro Boppers


Taco-sized Italian Alexia shuns all traces of modesty and obviously believes she is quite the catch, proudly propositioning men to "feel the vibe, whoa-whoa-yeah" on one of her best album track slices of rampant Hi-NRG harassment, Make You Happy. Not taking no for an answer covers familiar subject matter for the diva (Gimme Love, I Want You, to name but two others), but Alex laughs off her restraining orders to belt out another bullet-proof Euro bopper with her unique sense of dancefloor mayhem.

Make You Happy

Monday, 4 February 2008

Prozac-Pumping Happy-Slappers


Corona's belated 1998 sophomore album fell short on their trademark bouyant Hi-NRG happy-slappers, but the prozac-pumping pulse of The Power of Love at least skims the surface of what should have been an everlasting disco orgy. Vocalist Sandy Chambers' shit-gritting breazy delivery determins to "be the bii-est" (Note: not the most bisexual) like no other faceless session singer before her, and is effortless like power steering. The face of Corona - half Brazillian Goddess, half human skyscraper - Olga Souza had to make do with a video budget cheaper than a shoplifted pregnancy test, yet still strikes her unmistakable poses whilst wearing a pink wig that would later be stollen by a young Britney Spears. The self-referencing title track, Walking On Music, surfs a more ecstatic wave.

The Power of Love
Walking On Music

The Power of Love video

Fall In Love With Business Men


Polish Plavka Lonich will do just anything for a Visa - she doesn't need one but when a fat man in a suit says he will give her one then she is ready for just about anything. The Bosche & Lomb factory worker once sang on Jam & Spoon's mega hit Right In The Night (Fall In Love With Music), but her restrained-yet-powerful quality was a thing of beauty on the follow-flop-up Find Me. Sounding ripe like bleeding cherries, her caramalised connection to the apocaliptic trance is poised perfection. The bleak sounding Find Me gives her an eloquence beyond experience (her phoney Visa pursuits have took her places that would make a whore blush, etc), and the haunting Angel (Ladadi O-Heyo) is possibly even more stark with its flamenco flutter enticing the chace. Her vampishly detached iciness carves a sharp vocation that is impossible persuasion.

Find Me
Angel (Ladadi O-Heyo)

Angel (Ladadi O-Heyo) video

Wednesday, 30 January 2008

Frat Boy Ejaculation


After sensibly wiping up his "liquid dreams" Ashley Parker Angel still can't prevent himself getting into sticky situations. His Max Martin fired debut single Let U Go chugs along ferociously much like Kelly Clarkson's Never Again but with an actual melody. His frat boy sense of loss is endearing if a little clumsy, and we'd all know exactly how to step into this high maintenance girlfriend's shoes if he doesn't make his decision soon. I'm Better wears the same shirt inside-out - "it's cool we talk about whatever" just adds to his thank-God-he-is-pretty appeal.

Let U Go
I'm Better

Tuesday, 22 January 2008

Hey Bitch, You're Not On The List

I love lists more than I love people so finally I can offer my favourite 69 tracks from 2007. As Jamie Lynne might sob whilst clasping a now frayed tampon, it's better late than never.

69.

Soundbluntz - Maybe You'll Get Lucky

Morbid vocals that could send shudders through a corpse, that's because no man is safe from the macabre, morose sexuality of a woman who looks like a she does her own DIY chemical peels with a rusty cheese grater.

68.

Kelly Llorenna - I Will Love Again

With the sex appeal of a battered haggis in a corset, Llorenna's lungs srurpass themseves, flopping harder than the lid of her tanning coffin (she sleeps in an actual tanning coffin you see).

67.

Dana International - Love Boy

Israel's finest/ugliest rent boys are assembled for the video.

66.

Jessica Simpson - A Public Affair

65.

Mel C - I Want Candy

64.

Kelly Rowland - Like This

Kelly shakes her bony ass like never before.

63.

Paul Van Dyke ft. Jessica Sutta - White Lies

Pussy Posse singer delivers Dannii-esque strut-fest.

62.

Love To Infinity ft. Kelly Llorenna - Sweetest Day of May
Still sings like she is gasping for air in the tanning booth (she rolls herself in cow dung for that last minute 'top-up'), whilst adamantly making use out of a track worthy of any mid-90s dance classic.

61.

Darren Hayes - On The Verge of Something Wonderful

Thundering 80s-sounding self-loathing anthem. Kind of works.

60.

Kylie Minogue - 2 Hearts

I'm being strict because if this was the Harris & Masterson remix then it would be far higher -she just doesn't know her audience anymore..

59.

Nicole Scherzinger - Baby Love

Mushier than a tampon left out in the rain as Donna Summer once sang.

58.

Sophie Ellis Bextor - Catch You

The bristling shimmer at the end saves an otherwise disappointing choice of singles.

57.

Robbie Williams - She's Madonna

To include Robbie Williams in any 'favourite' list makes me want to choke faster than how I dream it will be with a 9ft tall basketball player, so this was an unexpected return to No Regrets form.

56. Kelly Clarkson - Don't Waste Your Time

If she was really brave she would have called her album this as well.

55.

J-Lo - Do It Well

"I've never met a man so fat" is one of my catchphrases too.

54. Izabel Guzman - Love Song

53.

Scooch - Flying The Flag

52.

Mifi - Be Without You

Gina G in a parallel universe, if Ms. Gardiner could sing.

51.

September - Until I Die

50.

Roisin Murphy - Overpowered

Drips like leaving the tap on whilst industrial porn anthem Movie Star surely is the greatest song since Annie Lennox's Little Bird.

49.

Hilary Duff - Stranger

Only to the charts.

48.

Lola - I Can't Take It

I'm sure she can. Just buy an ice-pack. And a wheelchair.

47.

Robyn - Handle Me

What kind of "Nazi" can't handle a 4'4" Swedish pop minstrel with dodgy eyebrows? Robyn's got her barbed wires crossed.

46.

All Saints - Chick Fit

45.

M.I.A - Boyz

44.

Yeah Yeah Yeahs - Down Boy

Highlights the fact that Show Your Bones was actually rather patchy.

43.

Timbaland - The Way I Are

His body issues don't excuse bad grammar - at least he not was wearing a vest again.

42.

Fergie - Glamorous

41.

Siobhan Donhaough - Don't Give It Up

40.

Therese - Feelin' Me

39.

Klaxons - Golden Skans

Even I can't resist beautiful indie boys every once in a while.

38.

Joss Stone - Tell Me

Impromtu televised sermons prove to be her true calling yet this very TLC-sounding ballad forgives her anything.

37.

Girls Aloud - Sexy! No No No...

36.

Isabel Guzman - When You Were My Friend

Guzman won't quit putting up all her songs on Myspace - will anyone bother to buy her album?

35.

Garbage - Tell Me Where It Hurts

Just ask Lola.

34.

Nelly Furtado - Say It Right

Worthy of a 70s whore-ballad from Cher or the poise of Aaliya.

33.

Unklejam - What Am I Fighting For

32.

BWO - Chariots of Fire

31.

Tori Amos - Bouncing off Clouds

30.

Infernal - I Won't Be Crying

I gigantic sample parades stomping glamour whilst triumphantly bringing down an ex a peg or two.

29.

Tracey Thorn - Raise The Roof

28.

Debbie Harry - Two Times Blue

Like a birthday present to her gay grandson, Harry let's her hair and her tights down on her best since any other solo single you are able to remember.

27.

Alphabeat - Fascination

26.

Dana International - At Muhana

Revved up to spit at her critics, this is shows Rihanna's Shut Up & Drive how it should be done.

25.

Gwen Stefani - Early Winter

24.

The Killers - Read My Mind

23.

Dannii Minogue Vs. Jason Nevins - Touch Me Like that

Jason Nevins gives an immobile Dannii a fresh pounding in her quest to sing the ultimate Ibiza anthem; it couldn't have been that great or Danoushka would have actually moved in the video.

22.

Spice Girls - Headlines (Friendship Never Ends)

Tying in with their "narrative" more than anything else, it's just as good as any album track from their third. Subtly layered to reward repeated listends, just a pity it fell on death ears unlike the concert which was monumentally life-changing.

21.

Danny - Play It For The Girls

"Girl" rhymes with "world" - okay, we can let him off this time.

20.

Roxette - Reveal

The teetering Attic remix deserves a higher placing, as does the spellbinding Kleerup edit, which parts ways using strings almost identical to Arcade Fire's Rebellion (Lies).

19.

Victoria Beckham - My Love Is For Real

Vicky B's sunkissed dance-slam finally splat and positively melts like Rebecca Loos in the arms of V's husband David.

18.

Dragonette - I Get Around

Initially I couldn't be bothered listening to another stylised electro outfit, but this gets under the skin being the ultimate soundtrack for doing a walk of shame (well when it's warm enough not to care about losing your jacket the night before).

17.

Siouxsie - Into A Swan

16.

Soundfreaks ft. Andrea Britton - Counting Down The Days

15.

Billie Ray Martin - Undisco Me

Billie's unfinished-sounding Undisco Me is so fabulous you'd need to request a diet avion afterwards.

14.

Pay TV - Work That Body

Mirror gazing on the treadmill has never been more delightful or shameless.

13.

Celine Dion - Taking Chances

Having to wait until Celine finally soars so dramatically she burns off her clit is unsettling to hear her so refrained. Watch the video to see the hilarious lenghts Celine will go to meet someone off the internet for a random shag.

12.

Sugababes - About You Now

11.

Ashamed - Bertine Zetlitz

More sardonic narcissism from Norway's finest.

10.

Robyn - With Every Heartbeat

Usurping otherworldly melancholy. She's doing well to follow this up with a top 10 and 20 hit when everything else is so minimalistic in comparison. Good to have her back so radically strong.

09.

Shakira - Pure Intuition

Sounding like a 2007 update of Soft Cell was a Spanish #1 and ought to have been huge everywhere else if given the chance.

08.

Rihanna ft. Jay-Z - Umbrella

Hearing Glaswegians taunt Rihanna's "ella" repition from their moving cars is a unique anf terrifying experience. In reality Rihanna had simply never heard the word before and was asking for reassurance from her producer.

07.

Freeform Five - No More Conversations (Richard X Remix)

Richard X's plunging remix has fromiddable style like an appalled Marlene Dietrich collaborating with Dead or Alive.

06.

Lucky Twice - Lucky

Double-threat and just-good-friends euro duo rekindle Whigfields hey-day memories.

05.

Vanessa Paradis - Divine Idylle

Unassuming pure 60s pop perfection. A french #1 single.

04.

Dana International - Hakol Ze Letova

The most gorgeous gust of pathos to arrive like a winter chill, Dana's unclear misery seeps through the language barrier, and is a beguiling and mystical opus.

03.

Girls Aloud - Call The Shots

Swirling pathos, like love going down the plug hole, Nicola's stunning middle-8 projects towards the stars and creates their most stunning moment yet. More devastating than realizing someone has blocked you on MSN.

02.

Ultra Nate - Automatic

Sharply executed grime has Ultra on her finest form to date.

01.

Britney Spears - Gimme More
Big B's gloriously murky comeback single shone just enough twinkle from those dead eyes to become easily the most exciting track to hear in a club all year. The wrenched electro ska accompanying the line "we can go down" is so swanky it's a wonder there's not more single mothers taking up drugs. Over to you, Jamie Lynne.