21. Vitamin C - Sex Has Come Between Us / Last Night
10 years too old. Poor Colleen, she made the best pop princess album of the naughties, but looked like Britney’s babysitter. The slightly morbid lust of Sex Has Come Between Us is slithery and agile enough to rival Holly Vallance’s State of Mind and B's In The Zone alike, and pre-dating them by nearly two years. The More album is an outstanding pop document. Last Night is of course the well scratched cover of The Strokes breakthrough hit put in the disco spin cycle with Blondie's Heart of Glass instrumental: utterly cheapskate but creates a high price tag for itself.
22. Alanis Morissette - Front Row / Thank U
Like having a million dictionaries thrown at you and being completely transfixed – like being in the chaos of someones dream. Thank U's unforgettable dangling carrots and Glenn Ballard's production that was on the same scale as Massive Attack in moments like both of these songs. Other album highlights: Baba, Are You Still Mad, Unsent, Joining You, I Was Hoping and The Couch.
23. Garbage - I Think I'm Paranoid
Pugnacious robo s&mer Shirley has 'issues'; confrontational and angrily beautiful. Manson’s irrational desire reaches breaking point, the fury of the chorus is channelled into one of their biggest and best choruses (the glam-grunge sneer-fest Only Happy When It Rains probably should have been my choice, but this song is just cooler). Her heartbreak sounds like an anorexic staring at someone eating pizza: completely miserable and just waiting to pounce.
24. Liz Phair - Polyester Bride
Polishes herself off to play Sheryl Crow at her own game and music wins. “You’re lucky to even know me, you're lucky to be alive.” Whitechocolatespaceegg will also see you around if you’re clever enough to be alive and buy it. Go on ahead now.
25. Luscious Jackson - Naked Eye
Hypnotically aloof and ice-cold, Jill’s calculating rap decides “wearing nothing is divine”, the sleek vocals compete against murkier sounds, all working together separately but in unison. The chorus is built from three lanes: the main vocal and two shades of backing vocals that wrap together like ribbons. Quite the package. Like this then try: Under Your Skin, City Song, Lady Fingers and Nervous Breakthrough.
Somewhere in between shit and amazing were 2003 blink-and-you-did-miss-them dancefloor whores the Cooler Kids, comprised of knob twiddler Kaz Gamble and current Shiny Toy Guns vocalist Sisely Treasure. Ex Luscious Jackson diva Jill Cunniff was appointed 'groove godmother'. It's almost conceavably an actual Luscious J track from their swansong Electric Honey album (the basement disco of Nervous Breakthrough blows off steam from the same kettle). Their Punk Debutante album wasn't as great as their debut single, but sizely treasures Morning Star, Viva La Fever and E Is For Everyone were plausibly decent. All Around The World is pure ecstasy without the need for innuendo.
Something gorgeous and luminating is in order, and the crisp and redemptive 'Refrigerator Box' remix of Ladyfingers by Luscious Jackson restores my faith in a band I always believe never truly fulfilled their unique promise of flair and slightly stuck up attitude: the pure-sounding guitar riff (like a cross between Mmm Bop and Halleluja) just seems to thaw out all the badness. Helming from New York and signed to the Beastie Boys label Grand Royale, they were about as cool as Ricki Lake yet afforded themselves the luxury of an occaisional amazing song, with singer Jill Cunnif's sly vocal always adding depth despite her lack of range. Their impressive scattering of sporadic highlights included their single breakthrough hit Naked Eye, Here which featured in the 1995 Clueless movie, the city-dwelling ennui of City Song and Under Your Skin which sounds like music the title character from Daria might have listened to with her fictional best friend Jane. However, my introduction to them was seeing an advert for their 1999 album Electric Honey in the pages of an NME magazine I took with me on holiday to Majorca when I was 15 and going out of my mind with loneliness, bless. So whilst I was giving my parents hell with dramatic outbursts and inwardly not having a clue what to do with myself, I saw their image and was intrigued by the cutesy name and album title alike, which was helpfully reviewed positively in the same issue. It is strange when one is in an emotional panic - 'teenage angst' - and suddenly an image can just penetrate you with something stunning and intriguing; I knew I had to get this album.
Above: The original line-up in a still promoting the album Fever In Fever Out in 1996 (L-R); Kate Schellenbach, Vivian Trimble, Gabby Glaser, Jill Cunniff.
The mix-tape I brought with me on holiday included: Hole (She Walks On Me, Doll Parts, Celebrity Skin, Malibu, Miss World (live), Garbage (Vow, I think I'm Paranoid), Marilyn Manson (The Dope Show), Depeche Mode (Enjoy The Silence), No Doubt (Just A Girl), Placebo (Allergic To Thoughts of Mother Earth), Smashing Pumpkins (1979), Kate Bush (Running Up That Hill), Texas (The Saint), Tricky (She Makes Me Wanna Die), Bran Van 3000 (Drinking In L.A) and Steps (Love's Got A Hold On My Heart - rushedly taped from the Jo Whiley show on Radio 1). I remember the last minute panic before leaving about getting all the songs I wanted taped and waiting for the Steps track to get played on the radio as it was not yet released; and I have never bought a single Steps CD I should add. Music was my crutch at this age, and felt like my secret revenge on people, with or without it I was starting to feel autistic or someting. Upon my return, my purchase of the album did not disappoint and welcomed me back to enjoying pop music properly since my Spice Girls and Madonna obsessions had dimmed whilst I tended to my teenage anguish. The week before my 13th birthday, my 2 best friends stopped speaking to me just like that: at first it was only 2, but by the next day my other two friends followed suit and let's just say after a whole day of sitting in class on my own and filling up break time with long walks, I needed something a bit more sophisticated than 'zig a zig a' to help me through this quite bizarre predicament, to compensate for the sheer embarassment. More and more, music had became my intense, personal and private coping strategy - I still do it and actually get very agitated unless I can hear whatever new sound I happen to be craving. My long-winded story is basically that with Luscious Jackson, it was a return to pop, to embrace a genre of music that I felt I had to banish in order to perhaps give me something of a defence having pretty much dropped off the social radar (it wouldn't actually be until I was 17 that I met my best friend - it does feel weird to discuss a period which to me just feels like a black hole that sucks me in if I dwell on it too long). Nevertheless, it was a great summer as I could not stop buying 2-3 new albums every week, which my Mother would pay for perhaps out of pity or guilt (I remember giving her massive lists incase any were not in stock), and whilst Luscious Jackson were not the most influencial of my purchases (1999 was the year I got into the life-changing Deee-Lite), I have fond memories for a this group of slightly average-looking New York women who knew a half decent tune when they seen one, and clearly thought a lot about themselves which I suppose is exactly what sucked me right in there and then. I still remember fixating my eyes on their image, wondering what the music sounded like beyond what had been descirbed - I knew enough. On the actual album: the original version of Ladyfingers is a bristling summer gem with the typical LJ lyric 'she is standing with her suitcase ready to run incase you are wondering why she is so quick to come and go', the basement thump of Nervous Breakthrough is pumped up and squares up to dry hump the Spice Girls' Who Do You Think You Are without flinching (it is also similar to She Wants You by Billie Piper), the dreamy and haunting Christine featuring country cadaver Emmylou Harris, the tarty Space Diva spills the beans, Summer Daze captures the comedy of unbrearable emergency toilet dashing, the aloof rampage of Sexy Hypnotist satiates the thirst for another Under Your Skin but as sung by Shampoo, Friends is maudlin and could have been perfectly poignant for an episode of the sitcom, the cosmic love ballad Beloved, and the tipsy Fantastic Fabulous featuring Debbie Harry who is too embarassed to contribute anything beyond a voicemale. Put it this way, the line on the latter 'making up all the friends for the friends you need' was akwardly bittersweet but the mock-impressed scorn really singed the thread for me. Much like the me ten years ago, they were always suspicious but made their mark when it counted; this remix is aching and fragile, revealing a little courage behind the facade.
