Tuesday, April 05, 2005
Wicked Whisper
Each night before we go to bed (my darling), we whisper a little prayer to any Gods, Goddesses or Secret Service agents who may be listening. Said prayer runs as follows: "Dear Almighty Being(s), We understand that you've probably got your hands tied sorting out wars, natural disasters, famine, disease, the Noise Next Door and other such horrific events which plague the earth, but if you find a spare minute could you to see to it that Girls Aloud release another mediocre, by the numbers cover version, as we don't think that I'll Stand By You was quite bland enough to undo all the good work that their previous single releases had done. Thanks!". Well, it seems that our prayer has been answered as it's just been announced that the next Girls Aloud single will be none other than a cover of Chris Isaak's Wicked Game.
You might think that it's somewhat unfair to criticise the song before we've actually heard it, and that's a fair point, but ignorance has never stopped us before in the past and we feel pretty convinced that we're going to be proven right on this point. Wicked Game is the sort of song that people who don't actually like music claim as one of their favourite songs because they think it's a little bit left of centre, i.e. it's not Westlife, when all it is is a crappy, dull, maudlin ballad, which is not to say that it doesn't have it's place, but that place is soundtracking the moment in a film were a broken-hearted man sits on a bridge, looking down at a photo of the woman who has left him/been kidnapped/died/cursed to turn into a tomato should salt fall on her while weeping, just as a drizzle begins to fall all around him, not in the pop charts.
On the one hand, given that 6 tracks have already turned up on singles, we should probably congratulate them on not actually milking the album dry, although given the, ahem, underperformance of Wake Me Up they probably didn't really have much choice in the matter, on the other, we simply don't want to see the girls constantly falling back on doing covers, unless said cover, as we've said many times in the past, is of Fuzzbox's Pink Sunshine with Nicola getting the "When I'm good I'm wicked at the same time" line, which would have genius written all over it. This, however, has "Quick! Let's cash in on the forthcoming tour" written all over it, and will no doubt be tossed off with all the care and attention of aged hooker on her 5th client of the night. We can even picture what the video's going to be like; essentially I'll Stand By You with the lights turned down a bit. Possibly with a scene set in a car for the instrumental break.
Still, at least... No, it's no good, we can't think of anything positive that might come out of this, unless you think that swelling Mr Isaak's bank balance to be a good and noble aim. And we don't.
You might think that it's somewhat unfair to criticise the song before we've actually heard it, and that's a fair point, but ignorance has never stopped us before in the past and we feel pretty convinced that we're going to be proven right on this point. Wicked Game is the sort of song that people who don't actually like music claim as one of their favourite songs because they think it's a little bit left of centre, i.e. it's not Westlife, when all it is is a crappy, dull, maudlin ballad, which is not to say that it doesn't have it's place, but that place is soundtracking the moment in a film were a broken-hearted man sits on a bridge, looking down at a photo of the woman who has left him/been kidnapped/died/cursed to turn into a tomato should salt fall on her while weeping, just as a drizzle begins to fall all around him, not in the pop charts.
On the one hand, given that 6 tracks have already turned up on singles, we should probably congratulate them on not actually milking the album dry, although given the, ahem, underperformance of Wake Me Up they probably didn't really have much choice in the matter, on the other, we simply don't want to see the girls constantly falling back on doing covers, unless said cover, as we've said many times in the past, is of Fuzzbox's Pink Sunshine with Nicola getting the "When I'm good I'm wicked at the same time" line, which would have genius written all over it. This, however, has "Quick! Let's cash in on the forthcoming tour" written all over it, and will no doubt be tossed off with all the care and attention of aged hooker on her 5th client of the night. We can even picture what the video's going to be like; essentially I'll Stand By You with the lights turned down a bit. Possibly with a scene set in a car for the instrumental break.
Still, at least... No, it's no good, we can't think of anything positive that might come out of this, unless you think that swelling Mr Isaak's bank balance to be a good and noble aim. And we don't.
