KYLIE MINOGUE
by KYLIE MINOGUE
If ever an artist could be seen to have grown up in public, it is Australia's
favourite daughter, Kylie Minogue. From bubble-headed "I Should Be So Lucky"
days to present-day Kool Kylie - via all manner of media-hounded direction
and lifestyle changes - Ms Minogue has emerged on the other side, blinking in
the sunlight like some zoo creature kept in the dark too long. With this eponymous
LP (originally to be titled "Impossible Princess" but renamed following the
moronic mourning over Diana), Kylie displays all her feathers: drop-dead cool indie ones,
pink fluffy disco diva ones and sleek sex siren ones.
It is with one of those SexKylie tracks that the LP opens, "Too Far" being filled with sultry deep breathing noises and yelps, before metamorphising into a big beat number, Kylie doing a Homogenic Bjork, but without quite so much cred. Another Eastern-rhythm drenched dance track - "Cowboy Style" - follows, sounding like Danielle Dax at the disco. Then we are in to the trio of recent singles: the Manics-penned "Some Kind Of Bliss", "Did it Again" and "Breathe".
"Some Kind Of Bliss" is unmistakably MSP, with its anthemic structure and bombastic chorus, but with lyrics by Kylie it becomes a less polemic and more personal thing, sweeping you along in her heady exotic worldview. Making you wonder what "Little Baby Nothing" would have been if she had agreed to sing it, the song sees Kylie's cred rating go through the roof (although the indie snobs would disagree - but fuck them). "Did It Again" also treads the indie path, launching a cat attack on some unnamed female adversary ("clever girl...little miss genius, you make it hard on yourself"). Kylie with claws.
"Breathe" chills the mood of the LP out a little with its ambient sounds and just-got-out-of-bed vocals, floating through space in a silver chrome flying saucer with the windows steamed up. Laid-back and languid, it is a million miles from Kylie's beginnings - beginnings that even she has forgotten, but which sadly some still cannot forgive.
A couple of diva tracks follow, starting with the shadowy cinematics of "Say Hey", a pulsing track that throbs away in your head in a mildly diverting but on the whole forgettable manner. "Drunk" is next, another Bjork-ish beat driven number that sees Kylie standing atop a neon-lit pedestal proclaiming "I'm not happy til you take all of me" in one of the LP's standout tracks. With her influences orbiting her head like moons round a planet, she is centre of the universe she has carved out for herself and - finally - appearing to be enjoying herself on her own terms. You can't criticise her for that.
"I Don't Need Anyone" is the other Manics-penned song on the LP, and their influence is immediately apparent with this upbeat and uplifting track. "I don't need anyone except for someone I've not found", she states, as guitars explode like fireworks around her. Proof if nothing else that the Manics haven't lost their midas touch, the song once again underlines Kylie's irrefutable coolness. You can criticise her when the Manics write songs for you too.
Admittedly the LP is not without fault, and the limping and unremarkable drawl of "Jump" is testament to that, but soon things are back on track with the Republica-influenced dance bluster of "Limbo", a frantic and frenetic shot in the arm. "Through The Years" with its slow-paced trippy pace is another piece of filler, but LP closer "Dreams" finishes in majestic fashion, with a Barry-esque string-soaked lament for "the dreams of an impossible princess". As the track fades out with Kylie singing "it's a way of dealing with all the feeling, keep believing in dreams", the sense of a mature and in-control adult prevails, one with her head in the stars (although admittedly sometimes obscured by clouds), but with her heart always in the right place.
