The Neighbours Will Shake That A-ss Or Die.
Written: Jan 06 '06 (Updated Jan 06 '06)
|
Product Rating:
|
|
|
Pros: The Show, Graffiti My Soul, Wake Me Up-the best pop of the 21stcentury thus far.
Cons: Some dross(i.e.ballads).Love Machine, in retrospect, is kindoflame. Worst bandname in the entertainment industry.
The Bottom Line: Forget Gwen- this contains some of the most exciting and inventive pop in recent memory.
|
|
|
| kookytree's Full Review: What Will The Neighbours Say? - Girls Aloud Movies |
So, Girls Aloud. Pop strumpets extraordinaire and the prefab pop "group" who hate to love and love to hate etc etc, unless you live outside the UK, in which case you're presumably oblivious. Kicking off their careers with a bang in the suitably demented Tarantino menace of "Sound Of The Underground", they sailed through 2003 on a wave of surf guitar, lip gloss and mediocre album sales before going into temporary hiding for the recording, of this, their second effort. That they even got to a second album is a minor miracle in the cruel and punishing world of British pop, and it's thanks almost solely to the efforts of writing/production team Xenomania, responsible for the girls' first four singles and subsequently put totally in charge of this notably better sophomore record. Selling twice as much as its predecessor and deservedly so, What Will The Neighbours Say? upgraded Nadine (Irish- best singer, source of fascination in the sleb mags for losing a whole lot of weight), Cheryl (Geordie- deeply fit, soon-to-be footballer's wife, biggest media profile), Kimberley (Northern- hottest, notable for pillowy lips, husky voice and transformation from pallid blonde to damn near Latino), Sarah (Manc- worst voice, oldest, perennial fan of peroxide) and Nicola (Scouse- youngest, moodiest, cult following) from prefab pop hopers to the sparkly fairies edging towards the top of pop's shiny, shiny tree.
Whoever was responsible for giving Xenomania total control of Aloudsound 2.0 should quite frankly be knighted- WWTNS is the product of that rare moment in pop when producers and performers just click. Whilst the girls' image changed significantly for the worse between the two albums -gone was the mean'n'moody high budget gloss and in came cheap and cheesy bimbo tack (the distinction is admittedly a fine line but compare promo videos and you'll see exactly what I mean)- the material only became more intelligent, knowing and sophisticated.
Hypnotic sloganistic lead single The Show illustrates this musical growth perfectly. A terrifying vision of pop in the future, it inhabits a world where dancepop has been honed with robotic precision to eliminate any tiresome gristle (verses and middle eights for a start) and where everything -EVERYTHING- is a hook. Boasting two choruses and throwing out the rulebook on traditional pop songwriting structure, it establishes itself as mesmeric rave approximation before segueing sporadically into electropound shuffle and is nothing less than a towering pop masterpiece, bursting with the quirky wit ("Shoulda known, shoulda cared, shoulda hung around the kitchen in my underwear") and sonic invention that would be come the Aloud trademark.
Camp as t!ts second single Love Machine poses more of a problem. Undoubtedly the single that finally pushed the five into the hearts and minds of Britain's pop pickers, it gained unprecedented crossover acclaim and attention for a group who weren't exactly elusive media presences to begin with. Whilst undeniably more immediate than The Show, it's also a whooole lot cheesier to the point of offputting. An articulation of the sex war between the modern woman and the men that date her, it's tongue in cheek enough to win over ("We're gift-wrapped kitty cats, we're only turning into tigers when we've gotta fight back") and certainly never takes itself the slightest bit seriously, but MAN this is complete fromage- Time Out Magazine said it sounded like, "a hen party organised by Al-Qaeda", which encapsulates the equal parts giddiness and gaudiness on show rather well. Sonically, though, it's a hoot, an uproarious 60s rockabilly jaunt smudged over with woozy, floaty bridges but otherwise never stopping from the pounding opening to the anthemic chorus and brilliantly faux-coquettish closing lines, the sonic equivalent of an eyelash flutter and skirt flash.
Love Machine may be a love-hate kind of record but the two singles that follow are just downright bad. The only cover versions present, Jump (originally by The Pointer Sisters but sonically completely different), and I'll Stand By You (originally by the Pretenders and sonically pretty much the same) were imposed on the group by their record company for the Love Actually soundtrack and Children In Need charity respectively, and, well, they suck. Xenomania throws everything in their armoury at Jump, but a dud song is a dud song. I'll Stand By You, an undeserved Number One, isn't completely atrocious -they all stay on key at least- but it's also deeply boring and exactly the kind of song this group are not designed to sing, ie, a ballad.
Unexpectedly, then, a standout of the album is Deadlines & Diets, a bluesy meditation on unfulfilling one night stands, "devious" married men and, more inclusively, Bridget Jones style girl-in-the-city alientation. Best lyric? Probably "It's 3am and you still look gorgeous, my morning-after feeling's kicking in/I hate to say but I'm feeling nauseous - I put that down to too much gin". Hear Me Out, another slowie, is less clever but packs more emotional clout- it's basically a suicidal version of Melanie C's Never Be The Same Again, stuffed with trip hop moodiness and pathos ridden lyricism ("My heart is broken and bleeding, but it's beating"). Interestingly, it's also one of five tracks to be individually co-written by the Girls (this time it's Sarah), and it's a pretty respectable effort.
More diverting, though, is Big Brother, sex bomb Cheryl's first dive into this writing lark. Unsurprisingly, it's about rumpo, more specifically voyeurism whilst vigorously f-ucking ("Big Brother's watching me- I don't really mind"), though the slightly icky question of incest is left unexplored if open-ended. With twinkly production and a killer soaring chorus, it's only a bit better than Kimberley's attempt, Thank Me Daddy, which wisely advices promiscuous teenage girls to lie, lie and lie again to their fathers ("Thank me daddy for the things that you'll never know/Listen to the noise that I'm making not the boys on my answerphone"). Nadine's 100 Different Ways and Nicola's I Say A Prayer For You, however, were wisely left as UK extras- both are earnest exercises in solo balladry and neither are particularly interesting.
Back to the pant wettingly great stuff. Fourth single Wake Me Up is another standout and was blessed with a delightful video featuring the Aloud revving around on motorbikes whilst painting their nails, applying transfer tattoos and blow drying their hair, not to mention doing a dance routine composed ENTIRELY of hair flips (cringey genius!). A kick in the groin to anyone who might presume musical similarity to the likes of their bland, inane pop compatriots, it's based around big, dumb electric guitar snarl and crackles with sordid abandon. The lyrics circle casually around booze ("Let's sift through the haze of the past seven days/A Moet on mud, a bottle of Bud, and Monday looks divine", and, especially, the deadpanned, "Was it just the Margaritas or are you looking at me?"- I want this on a T-Shirt) and sex ("Your vice-like grip on my sherbet dip, I guess I'm getting mine") and are certainly a highlight, but it's the oppressively dark, agitatedly jagged production (hint: play this song LOUD) and assertively throaty vocalisations- the girls all sound like they have hangovers- that will suck you in and bleed you dry. A blackened bruise of a record, in a very good way.
The deranged Graffiti My Soul, though, is probably the best song on the disc, and certainly the most uncompromising- insipid background music, this is not (sorry James Blunt fans!!). Originally written for Britney Spears at the request of her "people", who wanted a Sound Of The Underground soundalike for In The Zone, it was nonetheless swiftly rejected for being too unconventional. Taking the structural innovation of The Show to it's logical conclusion, chorus is abandoned altogether for a series of accelerating refrains- if this sounds tiresome or wankishly "clever-clever", it's not. From the opening line "Spike heels and skin-tight jeans, I've got a fistful of love that's coming your way", it grabs the listener by the balls and refuses to let go. Compared by pretty much every professional reviewer to The Prodigy, the comparison isn't hard to spot as the girls surge into emphatic descriptions of dysfunctional relationships ("Your kisses taste of cyanide and that's no good for me/An open-hearted suicide ain't my philosophy/I need a walking talking mannequin that simply folds away/And never questions anything I've got.to.say.") and an unblinking narration of no-strings-attached sex which culminates in the line, "It's procreation and nothing more", the best part of the track is nonetheless the genius stutter effects spattered about like glitter on glass ("N-n-n-n-n-no more conversation!" "You k-k-k-k-k-killed my reputation!"). Jive, you are fools. FOOLS.
Here We Go is more conventional structurally but still fizzes with abandon. Oddly ominous salsa touches smoulder over a bassline that "cuts deeper than the sharpest stiletto", and the song continues the album long staple of memorable couplets ("I don't do sex but I do do second base/So I suggest you wipe that frown from off your face"). It kind of sounds like their debut hit, Sound Of The Underground, but with a shouty trashpunk chorus, and it's all kinds of throwaway fun. As is Real Life, which sounds suspiciously like Hey Ya, right down to the clapclapclaps, and bangs about like a gaggle of go karts whilst cramming in some more memorable turns of phrase- "He started as a squeeze but pretty soon became a torniquet" probably being the best. It's nonsense but highly enjoyable nonsense all the same.
Ultimately, What Will The Neighbours Say? represents some of the gutsiest, most exciting and innovative pop music of the century thus far, studded with wit, idioscyncracy and effortless urban knowing. Best of all, it's anything but anonymous- you get a real feeling of what "Girls Aloud" represent, and, well, it's not quite like anything else the industry is doing at the moment. Building on the all the strengths of the first album and erradicating most of the weaknesses, it even contains two more meditative songs that don't make you want to never listen to music ever again. Indeed, cut out the bonus tracks and the two cover versions and you have a rock solid testament of what happens when pop is done properly. The use of one writing and production team gives the record a level of cohesion utterly absent in today's "cookbook" pop climate, but equally it never gets samey or stale. Ignore the rubbish band name, the Carry On esque title, the ropey album cover- indeed, ignore the packaging altogether. This is among the best pop albums of the last decade, only superceded by their third album, 2005's Chemistry. But that's another review...
Download: The Show, Graffiti My Soul, Wake Me Up, Real Life, Deadlines & Diets, Love Machine
(Check out also the very good B-Side Androgynous Girls, cut from the album for the lyric "Pretty boys lacking passion with androgynous girls, and pretty soon s-hit'll happen, what a wonderful world"- uncensored swearing is still a no-no).
Track Listing
The Show (5/5)
Love Machine (4/5)
I'll Stand By You (1/5)
Jump (1/5)
Wake Me Up (5/5)
Deadlines & Diets (4/5)
Big Brother (4/5)
Hear Me Out (4/5)
Real Life (4/5)
Graffiti My Soul (5/5)
Here We Go (4/5)
Thank Me Daddy (4/5)
UK Bonus Tracks
I Say A Prayer For You (2/5)
100 Different Ways (2/5)
See Also:
Girls Aloud - Sound Of The Underground
Sugababes - Angels With Dirty Faces
Sugababes - Three
Recommended:
Yes
|
|
|
|
Epinions.com ID:
kookytree
|
|
Reviews written: 52
Trusted by: 46 members
About Me:
mais lindo que michael jackson!
|
|
|
- Add to My Yahoo!: 
- Add to Google Homepage: 
© 1999-2009 Shopping.com, Inc.