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Berger Bests 2011 So Far

Like an electro Bootylicious, Berger is back in business with what turns out to be a slice of Robyn-esque perfection, but can you handle this? Melancholy that doesn't demand emotional investment (but can if you wish), it can be experienced on many levels - for me I opt for the level known as "on my laptop sipping coffee trying not to miss my mouth", but I imagine some people might be moved enough to dance or even might misinterpret the sadness and actually just top themselves (I don't think they can handle this). Just beautiful - my ears are drooling for more. If saying it would be the 4th best song off her last album is the worst that can be said about it, that's no bad thing (personally it's up there with her robot porn from before). I'm in love with it. There is a misty taste of reggae - get The Knife on it at once. I could imagine Diana Vickers knocking something like this out for her next album.

Roxette - Charm School (2011)

If I ever wondered what a solo Per Gessle solo album sounded like, then Roxette's long-awaited new studio album Charm School gives me a 70/30 idea. Marie's youthful spunk that ejaculated everywhere on Hotblooded is more vericose veins these days, and one can't blame these pop-rock legends for simply acting their age. Worth the effort, these songs evoke soft nostalgia with the odd throbbing electro impulse just to prove that their hearts are still in it.

Rootsy opener Way Out isn't exactly 'rad' or up their with the car-crash charisma of Crush On You (from 1999's popcentric masterpeice Have A Nice Day), but is no less spirited. As per usual here on this record, Per is the main driver, but Marie spikes the chorus with delicious distaste - she's possibly thinking 'and just where do I feature here?'.

Catching a glimpse of honesty and plaintively stoic elegance, Marie's statuesque ballad comes up next. No One Makes It On Her Own is poignant and restraint, but emotionally crippling. Strings are metaphorical crutches for a narrator who has lost her footing and at something of a loose end. I'm in love with the way Marie laments "causing quite the commotion" with experience and distance. Suffered fools and the consequences glady, it must have been love or something. Those aching backing vocals, like those swooping doo-wopping 'whhooooooaaaahhh' ones from Soul Deep slowed down, are unmistakably Rox.

If I were being kind I would rave about its swanky Girls On Film riff, but She's Got Nothing On (But The Radio) is lacking too much Marie to recommend itself as their comeback single. The chorus has potential - the synth sounds drip like sweat beeds and its exhilirating final lap sounds wonderful once all the final layers are wrapped around Per's lead vocal. Roxette daring to sound under-produced? Things will never be the same again... It's already gone top 20 in my favourite country Germany, so I'm happy for them. Marie sings her judicious middle-8 like she's swallowing thistles and it's moments like these that makes a Roxette fan feel very content and not able to ask for more. A bluesy-80s cocktail that could do with a bit more rocket-fuel to just add that fizz missing in the first two thirds.

The lush emotionalism of Speak To Me is a haunting reminder of Roxette's bristling and seductive chemistry (you can guess whom brings what element). Per's morbid verses are concerned with "bitterness", "gracefullness" and "faithlessness" (etc), shadowed by chugging rock sounds and Marie's signiture moans, and that feminine treacle of hers is a neverending supply on the power-ballad chorus. This should be their chart-hitting UK comeback single - it's just great.

Marie's physical gifts have never tempter her to overdramatize and even calling a song Glad You Called is as unpretentious as it gets, addressing a nervous relationship problem (I'm guessing something a bit more high brow than chlamydia), sounding like one of those 'zany' Tourism acoustic numbers recorded in a telephone box. Far from boring, Marie's singing a diary entry if not the phonebook.

Only When I Dream sounds like one of those 'go to sleep' Crash! Boom! Bang! tracks crammed in right at the end. Marie joins in on the affliction during, you got it, the chorus. And not one to 'bore us' remember, Per overcomes his writer's block with Dream On - where does he come up with such a varied subject matter? Strummy yumminess, like a forgotten and brilliant Brit-Pop b-side.

The album's sole electricized 'stomper', Big Black Cadillac, is another Per-geared drive-thru of hooks flying left, right and centre. And thank God. Marie chips in Real Sugar style, and this could be a single. Choice lyric 'I know he missed my touch, I didn't miss him much' has real buying power from Fredriksson. This track is certainly the boldest stroke here. Single #3 if they drive the album that far.

Marie Fredriksson is a woman, people. Her very female version of Everybody Hurts is called In My Own Way. She's no fool, but "now I'm a woman" is just naff and endearingly so. Before Cher threatens to sue, After All is actually one of Per's perpetual hardons for wanting to be in the Beatles. He's done this better (June Afternoon), and this is fine and everything (chirpy even) but it's not what I want dominating Roxette's comeback splash. Strong, dignifiedB and earthy, Happy On The Outside doesn't hurt at all - poised production and fussy emotions reach elegant heights, with a gorgeous piano refrain.

Making grand demands sound low-key, gorgeous closer Sitting On Top of The World tinkles and wallows in a heavenly aroma of Marie's expressive vocals that make you well up, and production that is soft-focus, off-hand, serene and synthy. And I love it!

The songs mostly don't provoke Marie's signiture vocal attitude (at least for any sustained length beyond cut-throat middle-8s or chorus cackles in between a lead from Per), but standouts On Her Own, the gristly Speak To Me and Sitting build to high emotional climaxes. They cheer the fuck up on Big Black Cadillac and those greasey fucked-up chords on the slightly uncomfortably sleazey She's Got Nothing On. The floppy acoustic songs mostly sung by Per, which dominate this album, are not so much impressive as they are stellar. I prefer the pent-up punchiness of "gotta, gotta, gotta, gotta crush on you, uh hu" but will take my country-tinged Way Out and less-immediate fuel of Limosine where I can get them. The production that once knocked me out and made me see stars (the hi-NRG belter Stars, the Chic-meets-Duran Duran explosion of The Look, and the swooshy bittersweet aspirations of One Wish) has dissolved into grainier riffs, unhurried grooves and subtle remembrances. That's not to say that Roxette don't go for it - there is not one single dud, but my youthful cravings for the illusions of the remarkably wearable Dressed For Success, ice-cold foamy power-ballad fizz of I Could Never Give You Up and fresh-faced romance of Paint (we were promised a return to the sound of Look Sharp! remember) are put aside to enjoy softer sensations and the occaision fuzzy glow of 80s rock. The live CD is pretty essential - Marie begins to relax and sweetly marvels "oh my God". From it, Silver Blue steals the show.

Rating:
8/10

Lady Gaga - Born This Way is OUT and proud

She's all about being 'out' (of ideas, etc), and so her brand new track is now just that too - it's out okay? If you have a 'problem' with her new single 'coming out' then you either have ears, taste or a repressed sexual appetite for male ass (and if you are a girl make that candles, period dramas and tuna fish). A strident, bouncey little disco track along the lines of Express Yourself via Kylie's Light Years, the rapid-fire beats from the Utah Saint's Something Good and Geri Halliwell's Bag It Up. A loooong way off deserving any hype (it's endearingly naff and almost manages to be unpretentious), I think I'll be able to enjoy this track but if the hysteria builds as much as it did on Bad Romance then I'll ditch this bitch faster than Lindsay Lohan cleaning up a line of coke. I'm surprised it's so frivolous... but it's still as (lyrically) self-concious as ever (which makes me thinks she's one of those "additional lyrics" co-writers!).

Billie Ray Martin - Sweet Suburban Disco

Gutter-glam electro madamme Billie Ray Martin's seething sensations continue to beguile as the German techno-Dusty/Dietrich dance diva and balladeer extraordinare treated and tweeted her faithful fans to a free download. Previewing a hefty remix package due on the 28th next month, the murky shades of Oriental mistique meets no Berlin disco sauna dark room in particular of Sweet Suburban Disco is a faster Bright Lights Fading - if it got anymore sleazy the artwork would need to feature a sling. Ever the play-it-safe lyricist, "she counts her blisters like every party she's ever missed" could be complexion-perfection or sinister botched surgery with the visible staples to match. Grimacing with narcacistic stoicism, "the pain still lingers on" is something of an addiction as dwelling on such neon-lightedness is nothing she hasn't done before. I just hope she challenges herself a bit more, but this is dependably Billie. Co-produced by Mike Vamp of Berlin-based electronic dance whores Märtini Brös, Vince Clarke of Erasure is on remix duty alongside Severino, Luke Solomon and Ray Grant. 2011 is set to be a very active year for the singer who has not released a studio album since 2001's outstanding Eighteen Carat Garbage: her long-awaited solo album is set for release at some point, her long-awaited Opiates album is set for release whenever it happens, and a collaboration with Hard Ton will probably see the light of day whenever that happens as well. Billie will also tour with Lady Gaga in 2020 if she can "find a minute to even think."

Download.

Roxette - She's Got Nothing On (But The Radio(

Roxette - She got nothing on (but the radio) from Mats Udd on Vimeo.

Not much to say ... it's not amazing is it? Recycling the same kind of sleazy riff as Girls On Film, this just isn't much of a Roxette track - in fact Marie hardly opens her gob until the subdued middle-8. Her vocal on the wooshy and wistful One Wish was awesome so we know she can do it, but I think the days of the chaffing-leather heat of Hotblooded have been bled dry. We shall see come the release of Charm School - as disappointed as I am by the first single, my excitement for the album has not diminished.

Linda Sundblad - I'm A Star

Wetting our appetities before launching her iminent Melodifestivalen campaign, Linda Sundblad has a goofey new pop song I'm A Star available for free on her website - go download it here. It's been cheering me up for the past two days, sounding like a rainbow of pop influences including Britney, Rihanna and Will.i.am (but actually in a good way). Don't say you weren't warned.

Cheryl Slams Gamu

Above: Cheryl still hasn't seen the back of Gamu.

After being shunned by the UK's fastest-selling racist Cheryl Cole, X-Factor's Simon-seeker Gamu has somehow managed to stun the world by having newspapers print false rumours that she has been signed by 50 Cent's music label. After You're My Sunshine being so edgy and all, is Ring A Ring 'O Roses on the cards to next year's auditions? I'm guessing as much as Cheryl probably already calls her the black plague as it is. I hope Gamu does make a triumphant return on this year's contest as it will mean another 'toughest, limpest and lifeless-est year of me lyfe' again for the nations racist sweetheart Cole.

Get Ur Freak On

It's on kids, Freak Asylum have showcased some new pics from their new video. Happy 2011 K-Lo fans!

It's official, fan-of-the-tan Kelly Llorenna is into swinging. In fact, she says she's mad for it.

Best Singles of 2010: 20-1

01. Angel - Corona
After the pop-rock missfire of 2000's And Me U album, Olga returns olda n' wiser, bringing Corona back to its roots - tragic gay clubs. Angel tinkles with sexy synth shimmers, glistening piano ripples, arctic trance temperatures and her own raspy rejoice (a fiesty trigger of manic excitement that gives surprising heat). Filled with an insatiable rash of stylish atmospherics, its slushy trance trimmings are perfect to really ignite the energy and wanton abandon of Olga de Souza's eccentric charisma, emphatic delivery and previous ability to lip-sync for her life (she famously never used to sing the tunes herself). Souza goes full-throttle for the thumping chorus, sounding possessed and slightly scary whilst infectiously cackling away to herself 'I'm hot tonight' in a dizzy frenzy of borderline-confidence and exuberantly tailored eurotrash trance-pop with plaintive undercurrents yet never under-sold.


02. Free To Love Again - Katie Price
Gleaming with loathing, lust, crippling disdain and other salty staines, this literally sounds like a car-crash of remnants from the decade that brought us Alexia and a debris of Gina G remixes, with its utter-gutter sense of shamelessness and dazzling display of scattering piano keys setting the scene within its first 3 seconds! With a bitter taste of KY and rusty cum, stench of poppers and toxic plumes of pink caressing gay clubgoers not sure whether to be offended or scream like bitches for more: Katie's tripple-penetrating cocktail of lavishly lubricated italo-house, seething vanity and sheer hard-boiled adrenaline re-invented the genre of dance music from the 1990s and left pop slags all over the world gaping for more. No love is lost as she kindly sneers such septic lines as the magnificently insincere "I'd be a disappointment to you every single day" with the kind of slinky, cock-crazed kinkiness not heard since Britney's Gimme More. Botoxed up to her eyeballs, even ex page 3 models with disabled children have feelings too you know. With more of a head-rush than downing a dozen vodka shots, Price's salivating return to music charted lower than her cleavage, but promises more eventually and I for once cannot wait.


03. Echoes Love - Jennifer Rush
Despite stapling her face to look like a paper-mache panda bear, her incredible soggy-soprano voice is unstoppable (just don't ask her to sing live - doctors told her a maximum of 0.5 facial expressions a day). With electronic pop elements that get sexier, slicker and denser with each spin, Echoes Love is a dance-pop fan's wet dream. Its disco-arousal is most explicit during the middle-8, which almosts bursts into Kim Wilde's 90s treatment of If I Can't Have You, except poor Jenny probably couldn't afford the royalities, and some of the countable seconds that follow erect the euphoria so high I was almost tempted to shoot this straight to the top of my list (the track itself shoots its load at the 2:58 minute mark with a gust of Jeniffer's gorgeous ad libbings that sound a bit like "haaaaa-aaaaa-aaaaa-aa-a" if I am not mistaken). The rapturous energy is continued on the faaabulous remix package.


04. Tickles - Elin Lanto
As far as remixes go, the Almighty edit of this absolutely stole the show. Tarting up this song sounds like it must have been an utter joy - it peaks so fucking high that I sometimes believed I too had a vagina needing scratched. In the words of RuPaul, Elin Lanto's pussy was on fire with this one. Love made her stupendous! We know exactly what she means by tickles - for guys it's a twitch not a tickle (unless you're a bottom).


05. Pacific Coast Highway - Hole
The song that makes being Courtney Love actually sound worth it and then some. Almost joyful in its wistful aching 'for what I'll never have', Courntney coaching belief whilst slurring poingnantly 'your whole world is in my hands' is a proud and bittersweet moment, stumbling into something out of reach but felt nevertheless. 'Miles and miles' of reasons to be beautiful is now 'miles and miles' of melancholy and regretful twitter-updates. The fuzzed-up riffs are breezy, solid and resonant with the rock icon's unmistakable sense of gutter elegance: backing vocals fly you into the waves to "drown" and be reborn red-carpet ravaged, rehab-revitalised and irresponsibly ravishing.


Joint 06. Blackout - Heidi Montag
Whilst the world continues to wait for La Toya Jackson to find a cure for AIDS that rhymes with iTunes, the even more selfless self-promoter Heidi has dived right in with the next best thing and released a debut album that arguably ejaculates its richest flavour with this sweet and innocent pop serum that has more juice than Beyonce's water retention. Squeeky clean slut pop perfection from Hollywood's D-listed D-cupper, sounding like a vapidly sleazy Jane Wiedlin coked up and cocked up to the 9s with deliciously icky vocals thinner than dental floss. We live in a cruel, twisted and misogynist world, and yet cuts like this (and the album Superficial offers more where it came from) substitute amazingness where some people rely on talent and natural body shapes. Like, "whoah-oh-oh-oh" as she rap/sings - take that Nadine. Heidi's fame fatale was an early front-runner of mine for album of 2010.


Joint 06. Better Than Her - Matisse
So I fucked up: I forgot about this, but had always intended it to be in my top 10 anyway. With slinky persuasion, an imodest hook and a vocal more nasal than Kylie singing whilst gaffa-taped, Matisse was all set for summer-baked pop par excellence with the best blow-job boasting lyric since Paris Hilton's Nothing In This World. Only the rules in music are: vagina, talent and a disco beat = obscurity, diminishing returns and the odd cruddy PA if you're lucky.



07. Lights Down Low - Kim Wilde
With peircing blue eyes that could make icebergs seem moderately habitable, Kim's beauty and passion on record were undiminished. More than equalling the glamorous distaste apparant in her voice on tracks such as Never Trust A Stranger, her big comeback track found her on blistering form. Glamour and sleaze chaffing perfectly as Kim agrees with democratic promiscuity oozing out every pore, 'I know where this could lead ... what you want is what you see'.


08. Wonderful Life - Hurts
The new poster boys of pop noir came up with that special something - a bona fide classic. Drafty paper-cut chorus and verses that get progressively charged with masculine frustrations.


09. Once - Diana Vickers
There was so much to dislike about 'The Vickers' as she likeably calls herself in the 3rd person: talking about herself in the 3rd person; sounding like a seal having sezarian without anesthetic; and being more contrived than a katy Perry innuendo about cocks. However, Once was the killer tune its writer Cathy Dennis hadn't produced since the days of Sweet Dreams and Toxic. Her album tanked: clearly it should have been called Once Upon A Time. The song was so good that British record buyers refused to fork out on the album twice after it got released to sustain the massive interest of her top 30 follow-up The Boy Who Murdered Love.


10. Better Than love - Hurts
Otherwise known as the dawn of the new Depeche Mode. Skin-crawling electronic, fervid morbidity and haunting euphoria are grinded together under a contracting bassline, and an almost horrific ecstasy via an instrumental middle-8 instrumental seizure that sounds like liquidising the galaxy.


11. You Lost Me - Christina Aguilera
By far the most outstanding vocal performance of the year, this stargazing torch ballad unfolds from the 'vulnerable' deflation of the pre-chorus to the 'raw' outer-body emotions of thinking the whole world is just completely fucked up. Literally going through the motions: a genuine composition of beauty. It's almost too melancholic for its own good - Aguilera sounds positively suicidal and scarred for life. We all have demons, but to tap into them with such conviction is something I'm just in awe of her for. The comedy Hex Hector remix can give you those extra 3 minutes on the treadmill for sheer hilarity alone.


12. Clap Your Hands - Sia
I am fooled almost everytime I hear this song's intro into thinking New Order's Bizarre Love Triangle is playing. Its winding guitar melody from the intro is almost identical, which can only be a good thing. I heard it in Europe on the radio a lot - dazzling songraft, spine-tingling excitement with playful energy.


13. Stop The Music - The Pipettes
The starry-eyed finale that sounds like a transportation to nirvana via Saint Etienne's Avenue and Kylie's Light Years cloud-sifting backing vocals. And let's not forget the shoulder-jiggable song that comes before it.


14. Let's Dance - Linda Sundblad
Sundblad's wanton chorus goes on the rampage to 'face the music' like any other sensible binge-drinking clubber who loves Madonna and vodka.


15. Fire With Fire - Scissor Sisters
The gay brother to The Killer's Human and surrogate father to Kim Wilde's Real Love. It's the Rex The Dog remix I bat my lashes for however.


16. Candy - Mini Viva
Like the godchildren of Betty Boo, these girls executed one of the most unassuming pop songs of the century. Everything about it just burst with attitude and focus. Airtight pop working at full capacity: an intense sugar fix.


17. Alejandro - Lady Gaga
Picture it: Eurovision 2010; Ace of Base open as the Swedish entry with a bulging bass, acidic synths burning through the speakers and Jenny's plaintive fury delivering those sneering lines towards those cliched Spanish waitors who drugged and daisy-chained her without leaving their phone numbers afterwards (that is what the song is about, no?); and then at verse two a part of their set slides up to reveal the appalled kryptonite-eyed Viking princess beauty of Linn as she struts forward in an all black ensenble and sparkly cross necklace that weights a tonne, so heavy in fact that actual midgets have to drag it forward as she moves closer like a serial killer, to join her sister whatshername, floating like the grim reaper of dance-pop past, and breathes in the audience's deafning screams as if it were the 'unimportant air' Deborah Harry sang about on that song called Maria. This amazing, thumping song makes me think of this - if that makes me sound insane then I obviously need a new heroine dealer.


18. Poison - Nicole Scherzinger
If only this were the PCD as we'd be enjoying an album to go along with this already. At least we have one more person, besides Dannii Minogue, making Cheryl Cole look completely useless, racist and irrelevant. What's most hilarious of all is how old Nicole sounds - at first I thought it was Dawn Penn's big comeback!


19. I Like It - Enrique Iglesias
More 'banging' than my favourite fantasies involving being stranded in Afganistan (bringing all those soldiers together of course - I'm a lover not fighter), Enrique whined as assexually as ever and yet somehow I remained turned on by muscle mary's from New Jersey in the video helping the Hero singer blag himself his biggest US hit in years.


20. Like A Lady - Monrose
Trannytastic trance-sexual slice of pop from the now-defunct German girlband of whom I seriously thought were a bunch of trannies when I saw them repeatedly on the music channel Viva (I remember thinking 'wow, what a genius concept', what with the song's name and the album being called Ladylike). More po-faced than my initial perceptions, the taught tempo and sharp vocal poise nails what is a sharp, sleek and succinctly chic procedure of vogueing dance-pop trashiness.

Other landmark lists in the world of blog:
Best Singles of 2010: 40-21
Best Singles of 2010: 60-41
Best Singles of 2010: 80-61
Best Singles of 2010: 100-81
Best Singles of 2009
Best Singles of 2008
Best Singles of 2007
Best Singles of 1998
Best Singles of 1997
Best Singles of 1996

Corona - Saturday Night (New Single)

Although I didn't appear to think much of this in my review last month, Saturday looks set to be the second single to be lifted from Corona's fantastic euro-dance album Y Generation. And here it is, given an addictive new remix:

And here is the Dan Panico radio edit:

Cee-Lo Green - No One's Gonna Love You

Proof that lists fail - how could I miss this Paul Epworth produced tune for Cee-Lo Green? Okay, it's a cover and hasn't been released yet, but this just goes to show you how good music can slip through your fingers if you write someone off as shit for not being a woman singing about being in a club with fierceness to be delivered with dignity intact or not. I was searching for Epworth's gorgeous mix of the Shaz Bags ('Shaznay Lewis' if you're nasty) anthem Never Felt Like This Before and then got something else instead. On a sidenote: can Celine Dion please now call herself Cee-Leen please?

Best Singles of 2010: 40-21

21. All Night Long - Burkey
An echo of the 90s Konica TV commercial, a bass that penetrates deeper than money can buy and Burkey grabs herself one of the year's seriously smazing pop songs.


22. Only Girl - Rihanna
RiRi exploded over radio with this thumping rave erection - any more exposed and her next video will be filmed live inside her uterus.


23. Not Myself Tonight - Christina Aguilera
The epic middle-8 is a tour-de-force of unhinged histrionics, at which point in the video Xtina looks like Savage-era Annie Lennox, whilst overall the misplaced Bionic era was slammed harder than a Kardashian filming herself with a black man or two. Credible internet gays can be so unforgiving, and these days so can her chins.


24. Perfect Nobody - Linda Sundblad
When she's not sniggering about faggot-gay dances (no, seriously), Sundblad's so-called Swenglish makes perfect sense, it's along the lines of the sentiment within the title of another song by Billie Ray Martin called Anyone Will Do For A Heartache. With a raw and wintry fragility and piano keys more wonky than Robyn's tombstone teeth, this is very much her Promise To Try moment, however, on an album that is so close to the perfection of Like A Prayer it almost hurts as much as the singer's accidental homophobia.


25. Oui mais... non - Mylène Farmer
Simplistic sophistication, the French pop queen claimed back her crown enlisting the Eurocheese sleaze of RedOne and the results were completely on her own terms - her dodgy raps are to die for.


26. Gypsy - Shakira
One of four slick album highlights co-written by The Bravery's Sam Endicott, this acoustic midtempo was the soundtrack to a long lost episode of Xena: Warrior Princess (am I the only one getting this?). The Freemasons jizzed it up somewhat, but it's a bit of a tampon to be honest (ie, sucking up the juice).


27. 2 All My Girls - Linda Sundblad
The chorus is a full-speed collision of Gabriella's On A Mission (I forget which came first) and v-signage attitude. One of Max Martin's most solid efforts in years, but sadly the world wasn't to know about it.


28. 4th of July - Kelis
Fragmented dance incisions constructed to make perfect sense - although this might seem relatively low, the album Flesh Tone is nothing short of remarkable, with the essential listening experience being from start to finish and no other way. Is that a lame justification for not ranking it higher?


29. Te Amo - Rihanna
Ace of Base meets Grace Jones.


30. When The Beat Drops - Ezcapade
Whatever happened to this? Catchy as hell, gorgeous singer with a look that most convincing-trannies would kill for, and production that could peel off skin. A very instant song that sadly never took off the way it ought to.


31. Commander - Kelly Rowland
If only she had spoke up a bit about Dave Guetta producing this it might have caught on a bit more. A minor if not amazing hit single - Kelly is rumoured to have brushed this off by deciding to ditch the diminishing dance returns for a return to redundant Rn'B. I hope those rumours are just that as Ms. Rowland actually fills in a nice void left by the likes of Melanie Thornton's signature La Bouche tunes, albeit in a makeshift sorta fashion.


32. Rude Boy - Rihanna
Poor RiRi is obviously dating the wrong gay guys if she has to keep asking this guy to get it up and take it.


33. Love Keeps Calling - AnnaGrace
Speedy Euro-trance sounds, moans that echo, a bait-biting vocal delivery and bass more solid than Dannii's boob job, the namesake AnnaGrace (really some sort of Lasgo-IanVanDhal incestua-trance collaboration) breathes new life into the sound of 2002, 2003 and even sprinkles a touch of ice-cool summer sensations into the mix as well.


34. What's My Name - RiRi
If only I had caught the bug for this song sooner then it would have earned a higher placing, it's soothing reggae na na's melt into you like a balm, sway like trees on the beach and it's all so care-free insoucient and effortless. RiRi is the new superstar of her generation.


35. The Flood - Take That
Hardly an avalanche, the chorus eventually 'broke' for me recently, but boys I really do draw the line as water sports (not my thing, but your next lead single can certainly be called Tough Top Orgy).


36. Alors En Danse
Strangely, this never registered in the UK but my travels around Germany in the summer were like groundhog day with this song at times. What a shame that for once I don't fancy a black rapper.


37. Express - Xtina
One of the better Back To Basics style track from the Burlesque soundtrack.


38. My Wicked Heart - Diana Vickers
Under The Bridge by the Chill's meets Whoop by the Vallance.


39. OMG - Sabrina Washington
With a song called In My Mouth that promises to challenge Jenny Frost's Don't Fuck With Me for most trashiest unreleased song on my want list, OMG serves as a juicy appetiser with a questionable aftertaste.


40. Can't Fight This Jawline - Junior Caldera ft. Sophie Ellis Bextor
With a voice that can be as hard to take as I imagine certain basketball players, Sophie charmed the pants off of the Russians who granted her a well-deserved number 1 hit.