poptimists | Let's talk about the Sugababes album

is that all?

i've heard the single but that's it. the graun round up mentioned something about there being so many writers yet it still cohering or summat and also "fourth album? bored now" or similar...

Well don't listen to the Graun.

I've only given it one listen - I enjoyed it a lot, every track sounded pretty good whereas previous Sugababes albums have had one or two that annoyed me.

However there weren't any real OMG moments.

The best track is probably "Joy Division".

joy division?

not a sugababes track about the concentration camps i assume?

No, it seems to be about capuccinos.

oh yes it does have that brilliant line about delicatessens.

So nothing as irritating as Virgin Sexy then?

I think I might get this on the way home tonight. Push The Button has proved a 'grower' as ver criticks say.

"Ugly" could indeed be really irritating if you don't like big self-empowerment songs. But since I liked Xtina's "Beautiful" nothing in that line phases me any more.

you think so?! i'm not really feeling 'joy division'. my favourite by quite some way is 'bruised', which is EXQUISITE. 'red dress' is storming too (xtina hollers! and such a tune); 'gotta be you' is rubbish as crunk qua crunk but if you treat it as something completely different it's not so bad; 'it ain't easy' = 'personal jesus'; 'follow me home' is in the vein of those lush ballads which were virtually the only good things on three; 'ugly' is icky on first listen because it's just 'unpretty' redux and has horrid acoustic guitars but after about a month you will love it despite yourself.

the rest range from mediocre to dull, but i'm definitely pleased with the album.

Only heard a five-track sampler (sans 'Joy Division'), and I didn't like it. It had lost all the edginess and menace which made that last run of singles so arresting, replaced by sugar-sweet pop with no bite, yet not enough joy to substitute for it. And whoever wrote the lyrics to 'Ugly' should be shot.

Listened to most of the first half in HMV last nite. "Red Dress" is fantastic. "Push The Button" just gets better and better. When the guitar intro to "Joy Division" started I thought the beat was going to be double the speed it actually was - still a good song though. The title doesn't feature in the lyrics, I think (heh, anticipation (http://www.google.co.uk/search?hl=en&q=sugababes+joy+division+lyrics&btnG=Google+Search&meta=)!).

I need to hear the other three again before passing judgement.

Can't decide whether to get the CD from Sainsbury's or Amazong. Ah, dilemmas.

I like it, I do, but it's kind of... backburnered.. it's not jumping out as life-affirming and essential, so shall be going back in two weeks and trying to pick through it again. "Red Dress", "Joy Division" and "Bruised" I would agree are the standouts beyond "PTB" which may be their.. ooh.. fifth best single now? (behind "Overload", "Run For Cover", "Freak Like Me" and "Round Round", would be sixth if "Million Different Ways" had been a single).

It's good enough--doesnt have as many great songs as the Rachel Stevens; doesn't have the drama of the TaTu, and, just cos I'm listening to it now, it doesn't have the inventiveness or the fun of the Fannypack.

I like it, but I'm not sure how I'll often I'll be going back to it, in, say, January/December.

it's odd, my relationship to the sugababes album compared to the r stevens one. the r stevens is 'better', obviously: there are more good songs, there are more great songs, the great r stevens songs are better than the great sugababes songs. HOWEVER i also find myself returning to the sugababes far, far more often, and i expect it to be a pretty massive commercial success (whereas r stevens will flop dismally).

i'm actually disappointed with the tatu - nowhere near as start-to-finish magnificent as 200km/h.

I agree re: RS not selling, but wonder: WHY!? I read somewhere, forget where, that the RS was too "knowing". Is this is perhaps why it won't sell?

But what does "knowing" mean in a pop context? Is it always a reference to irony? Bandwagon jumping? Because I don't get any hint of irony from the sounds on the RS, and if we're speaking of bandwagons, we must mean Goldfrapp running with the schaffel sound two years too late (again)?

Does it just mean, then, that it is attempting to sell to a "niche" market with KNOWledge of musical lexicon of "schaffel", "electro", "trip hop" "Adam Ant" etc, AS WELL AS the wider pop consumer bunch? If so, I don't think I'd particularly wish to class myself away from the average consumer (I AM still a consumer, just 'cos I can spot a schaffel beat). Could this be a use of "knowing"?

So, does it really just boil down to the fact that hipsters or whatevah you want to call them, DOWNLOAD and don't buy the RS? Are these really the BIGGER market for RS?

Are the Sugababes not knowing [anymore? cf. "Freak Like Me?]? Is being knowing wrong?

I was thinking on the bus this morning that a surefire way of getting r stevens to sell would be vicious popbitch rumours (spilling over into the tabs as well). maybe not with immediate effect - in fact in the short term there'd be a lot of nasty jokes, and the perception that her popularity was on the wane - but the comeback should be v successful indeed.

britney, xtina, sugababes, tatu, even girls aloud - gossip and rumours have had the effect of giving them enough personality/sense of a real life person behind the music for them to appeal to people for whom that matters (ie most people unfortunately). as much as i love r stevens, it's impossible to discern ANY personality in her voice at all - and she's not even a robot like britney, neither is her singing endearingly amateur like the aloud and sugababes, she's just a girl who hits the notes. it could be anyone.

i think what this proves is that for the public at large it can never just be about the music.

I read somewhere that she has tiny feet? :)

Doesn't she have WEBBED feet?

"Hello, Sun. It's about "You-Know-WHo. You know. Yes, S-Club. I have that scoop on her FEET you were looking for...Yes, that's right...they're WEBBED."

$$$$CHA-CHING$$$

Sorry that was so long/rambling/pointless.

I should have KNOWN better. Arf.

I've been thinking about what you said, Lex. I don't know what it is, but there is something about RS's voice that I really enjoy. Perhaps it really is just the competence, I'm not sure; personality isn't everything: look how quickly, and perhaps regrettably, Pink disappeared off the radar.

I still don't think either the new Sugababes or RS is as good as One Touch. "Soul Sound" is a shining diamond of a song forever.

I really enjoy RS's voice too. I still haven't pinned down what it is. She's not robo-blank, she sounds invested in the songs and the lyrics etc. I can imagine her as the narrator/protagonist in all of them without any problems. But at the same time...she's devoid of personality, any sense of Who Rachel Stevens Is. Kylie does this too, but by now Kylie songs come with so much cultural This Is Kylie National Institution baggage that it doesn't matter.

I do think RS's voice is one of the most intriguing instruments in pop right now because I DON'T KNOW HOW IT WORKS, in the senses of both 'how does she create that effect?' and 'what is this effect anyway?'

Taller in More Ways is totally outstripping Come and Get It right now...

It's ever so lush.

Let's talk about the Sugababes album

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Humble Pie, of sorts