DANGEROUS AND MOVING

t.A.T.u. (album)

Remember when T.A.T.U. did the Eurovision Song Contest? They nearly went and won it too (imagine the outrage from the tabloids if they had), but it was around that time that the press started jumping on their heads and things started to go very quiet for the duo. Two singles, one album, one Eurovision entry and then… nothing. Not really much of a surprise, after all, they were marketed on a gimmick – “Look everyone, lesbians dressed as schoolgirls!” “Where? – er… I mean, good for them” – and gimmicks will only get you so far, just ask the Fast Food Rockers. Unlike the Fast Food Rockers, once you get past the “Look everyone…” factor, T.A.T.U. did actually have a few storming songs to fall back on. Yes, there were some dodgy tracks, but All The Things She Said? Come on, be fair, it was great. That’s why I was a little disappointed with All About Us, as a comeback single it reeked of Eau De Retread. I didn’t really know what to expect with this album – it could be variations of All About Us or it could end up playing a blinder. They’ve ended up playing a blinder, in fact this album is the equivalent of the band scoring from fully forty yards and then running round the pitch kissing the badge on their shirts – blimey, there’s a mental image for you. Not only that, but they’ve somehow drafted in Sting and Richard Carpenter to give them a hand. Now Sting’s not done much that’s good since the Police imploded and Richard Carpenter is one of the High Priests of Easy Listening, so how they got roped in is anyone’s guess, but it works out okay so I’ll let them off. The stall is set out at the start with a teaser for the title track coming to a sudden halt after 49 seconds – it’s fast, energetic, contains wailing guitars and stops dead before the album’s a minute old. After that, it’s onto the single (more of which previously) and then the first new track proper – Cosmos (Outer Space) – and what a track. Quite simply, this has to be a single. It’s a jet black pop song, and is so downbeat that the first few lines are practically spoken. Not one shard of light is allowed to escape from this song. Brian McFadden would never dare touch a song like this. I love it. Friend Or Foe is another song that ought to be a single and for similar reasons. Gomenasai is the first slowie and even so, there’s more to it than your average slowie. I read somewhere on the Internet (a reliable fountain of facts, allegedly) that this is meant to be an apology to their Japanese fans for letting them down in the past. Even if that’s incorrect, the song is a very big apology for something and they sound like they mean it too. You don’t get many bands saying sorry like this. That aside, the general theme of the album is defiance – as an example, during Perfect Enemy they sing “No more confession, not sentimental, I am now something experimental”. There is one oddity – the only Russian language song Obizienka Nol. Apparently it translates to Monkey Zero, and judging by the number of times the word obizienka is mentioned, there’s a hell of a lot of monkeys involved in this song. If I was going to sum up this album, and I might as well, I’ve already used up 600 words to get this far, I’d say buy it – it’s great. Considering the flak they’ve had, to come up with an album as good as this is practically a miracle.

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Daniel Powter

My personal rule of “Always be wary of songs containing the word “baby” in the chorus” has come up trumps again. This reminds me of early Elton John for some reason, but while Elton was doing this years ago (and he was first to boot), we’ve already got the likes of Keane and James Blunt putting out similar stuff (and with a bit more feeling too). I thought Bad Day was tedious enough, but this… this is just sterile.