IF YOU COME TO ME

Atomic Kitten

Hey kids, guess what? This is bland, midtempo pop! What are the chances of that? They must be astronomical! You have to admire the sheer gall it must have taken to release yet another carbon copy of Eternal Flame (like the first one was any good to start with but that's another story), even Westlife have moved on - so to speak. The annoying thing is that once upon a time Atomic Kitten did some songs that even I could listen to without wanting to hurl the radio across the room in disgust (I Want Your Love even sampled the theme tune to The Big Country (or The Only Rhyme That Bites for those of us that remember the early nineties)), but as soon as Whole Again hit number one the magic formula had been discovered and that was the end of that. It's sad to see a band give up so easily, but there you go.

HOLD ON ME

Phixx

The little keyboard riff in this reminds me of Hungry Like The Wolf for some reason - that's not a bad thing in itself, at least it's not anything by a certain female threesome. This actually isn't quite as bad as you think it could be, in fact it sounds like a boy band doing a Duran Duran tribute song - by that I mean pre-1986 Duran Duran, when they were good. It might not be groundbreaking by any means, but it there are worse things to listen to. However, I do have two "but"s to add. Firstly, it's one of those songs that's sung by four people when one could probably manage quite happily - makes you wonder why they can't tailor songs to fit the number of people who will be chirruping along to it. Secondly, the name Phixx. What a stupid name for a band that is. Lads, my advice to you is to donate the extra x to charity or something, you don't really need it.

CHIHUAHUA

DJ Bobo

What sort of a DJ name is Bobo? Somehow I can't get this image out of my head of a circus clown larging it in Ibiza, but I think that could be just me. Yep... pretty sure it is. So how shall I describe this? Well, it's this years (deep breath now) Ketchup Song, Hey Baby, Blue (as in Eiffel 65), Mambo No.5, Gym and Tonic and Freed From Desire to name but a lot. You know the sort, an annoyingly catchy song that everybody buys because they heard it when they were on holiday somewhere nice and then after about three listens becomes so irritating you end up wanting to reshape the disc with a blowtorch. If you've seen the Coca-Cola ad with the passengers dancing on the tube train, you know this one. If you haven't, then it's an updated Mambo No.5. Either way, by the end of next week you'll probably have had a gutful of this song. Me, I'm already there.

LOW

Kelly Clarkson

It doesn't say much for her last single (Miss Independent, fact fans) that the most memorable thing about it was the scarf she wore in the video - the last time I saw a scarf that long it was falling off a satellite dish with Tom Baker still attached to it. Unfortunately, she's going to need more than a simple scarf to rescue this song from total mediocrity, because this is so colour-by-numbers it could come with free paint pots. She's done pop, now Kelly Clarkson is going to rock. From side to side with a vacant stare, by the sound of things. From the Almost-Like-Avril-Lavigne's-Losing-Grip start to the standard MOR rock chorus, this is a pile of tedious pants from start to finish. If I were you, I'd steer well clear of this, but I'm not so it's entirely your choice.

HURT

Johnny Cash

I read somewhere that this is getting a re-issue. About time too, I say. Now, I'm not really a fan of slow songs, but this is a belter. It starts off nice and quiet with the man himself singing along (and he doesn't try anything silly like aim for notes he knows he can't hit anymore, he simply stays within his own limits) and then builds up and up and then... stops. Sounds simple, but this song's a thing of beauty. This deserves to be utterly huge.