rachel stevens

stelfox

Beast of Burden
i'm determined to inject a heathy dose of enthusiasm and pop to this board (don't ban me, please - i'm doing it for the good of us all!) and rachel stevens' new record is a perfect opening argument for this.
it's a fucking HUGE, ballsy pop dance number that sounds not a million miles away from what grace's not over yet would have been if it were mixed by michael mayer and superpitcher.
of course, this is damned near perfect summer music and if you don't throw backflips over it, i'll be very surprised. this kind of record is exactly why i think music, and especially british pop, is in pretty robust shape at the moment.
sure, it's not going to cancel out 3rd world debt or close the hole in the ozone layer, but it's made me happier in a few listens than the vast majority of anything else i've spent time with this year.
anyway, here's an mp3 of the extended mix, just save to disk, listen, and treat yourself.
 
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john eden

male pale and stale
Yeah, just listening to this now, great stuff. Tho I actually prefer "some girls" and "sweet dreams my LA x" on first hearing.

Thanks for posting the mp3. :cool:

Perfect for the summer as you say, Dave. "I'm gonna get back on my feet again"...
 

Tim F

Well-known member
Ha ha Dave I feel for you with all those caveats!

This is a very good record yes, I'm looking forward to hearing "Crazy Boys" too which is apparently stunning.

My dance cred reference for "So Good" and "Negotiate With Love" though is Moonbootica - and in fact someone should organise that collab-o immediately.
 

hint

party record with a siren
not that keen on the song, I have to admit. always good to hear these things, though.

the gloves, however, are a different story!
 

wonk_vitesse

radio eros
agree with the jist of the argument but i don't think rachel is the right artist to inspire, especially that song, Beyonce just does it way better.

That said it does seem like rachel can sing unlike the unspeakable dildo. :mad:
 

turtles

in the sea
Nice!! I just got the radio edit of this a few days ago (via lemon-red) and man have i been playing the hell out of it. super fantastico dance-pop loveliness.

personally, between this and "since u been gone" pop music has been making me feel damn happy these days. urge to dance around singing rising...!
 

Tim F

Well-known member
No Martin it's in 4/4, it's just that those schaffel-type grooves usually sound like they're in 6/8 or 12/8 owing to the use of triplets and the swing in the drums. See also Goldfrapp's "Strict Machine", a good portion of the Kompakt backcatalogue, Whigfield's "Was A Time", Depeche Mode's "Personal Jesus", "Doctorin' The Tardis", Rachel's other schaffel single "Some Girls"... etc. etc.

"Sweet Dreams" may be my sentimental favourite too.
 

owen

Well-known member
this is great, cheers!

why it is that rachel stevens' records always sound so kompakt-esque is a bit mysterious, but a bit of mystery's a good thing now and again
 

jwd

Well-known member
Haven't heard this yet but was well pleased with "Sweet Dreams..." - looking fwd to hearing the new one.

Tim F said:
My dance cred reference for "So Good" and "Negotiate With Love" though is Moonbootica - and in fact someone should organise that collab-o immediately.

Tim, all the Moonbootica I know is the monster remix of Luomo's "Tessio" - which I completely love - where should I go from there?
 

Tim F

Well-known member
Jon, you totally need these:

Moonbootica - DJ Theme/Bulldog Beats ("Bulldog Beats" in particular is urgent and key!)
Karotte - As It Comes (Moonbootica Remix) (sorta like the Tessio remix meets Black Strobe)
Moonbootica - June/Mustang 68 (their most recent release I think)

A very good purchase as well is their mix-album <i>DJ Sounds Good</i> (which was released in Australia oddly) - has "DJ Theme" as well as their tracks "Roll The Dice" and "We 1, 2 , Rock" and lots of like-minded stuff. It's great and surprisingly jaunty and pop! Seems as much influenced by phased-disco, big beat and at times even spectral traces of trance or funky breaks. I've been describing their sound as the Fatboy Slim of electro-house (as compared to, say, the Tiefschwarz remixes which are the Chemical Bros of electro-house).
 

Woebot

Well-known member
stelfox said:
(don't ban me, please - i'm doing it for the good of us all!)

yeah you're banned stelfox. FOREVER.

downloaded this. didnt enjoy it much as 'some girls' or:

the gloves:

nicegloves.jpg
 

turtles

in the sea
Come And Get It

I thought I should revive this thread to note that Rachel's new album is an honest-to-god pop masterpiece. Shockingly consistent, high quality all the way through. Tracks like "funny how," "crazy boys" "negotiate with love"...(not to mention so good AND some girls)...goddamn pretty much this whole thing is brilliant.
 

anhhh

Well-known member
bipedaldave said:
I thought I should revive this thread to note that Rachel's new album is an honest-to-god pop masterpiece. Shockingly consistent, high quality all the way through. Tracks like "funny how," "crazy boys" "negotiate with love"...(not to mention so good AND some girls)...goddamn pretty much this whole thing is brilliant.

i always skip a couple of tracks, but i agree with you, a good to great record.
 

Grievous Angel

Beast of Burden
I'd just like to use this thread to say that Pussycat Dolls have absolutely no right whatsoever to make a record as good as Don't Cha. Quite magnificent.
 

Tim F

Well-known member
Paul have you heard the original version by Tori Alamaze (it was floating around at the end of last year/beginning of this year)? It's a bit more goth. Opinion seems to be split fairly evenly on which version is better.
 

3underscore

Well-known member
2stepfan said:
I'd just like to use this thread to say that Pussycat Dolls have absolutely no right whatsoever to make a record as good as Don't Cha. Quite magnificent.

Well, it was quite questionable whether they had the rights to record it, isn't it? The original version of the song is so much better than theirs (and their version is pretty good).
 

stelfox

Beast of Burden
they had every right to record it. tori alamaze signed away any rights to it in order to get out of her recording contract, it was written by cee-lo and he just took it and ran with it. i do think tori's version is head and shoulders better than the PCD versh, though. it does so much more with so much less. i was pretty dismayed when i heard the new cut with busta sounding awful and those horrid brass stabs all over it.
 

Diggedy Derek

Stray Dog
Don't Cha I don't think is that great actually, after a few listens it loses any shock value and seems a bit contrived. Plus the interchangeability of the dolls themselves, and the way they sing the first person lyrics together is rather weird for me. Not as good as, say, that filthy "lick my ___, kiss my ___" track from a year or so back, whose sheer pulsating insistence certainly made it ahem <DISSENSIAN HAIRSHIRT> intellectually compelling </HAIRSHIRT>.

Rachel Stevens, yeah, her good tracks are absolutely outstanding aren't they. Although Some Girls is a blatant rip off Strict Machine by Goldfrapp, the "hey!" glam-rock shouts are wonderful. Popjustice did this graph of how good her singles were, the way they osscilated wildly up and down, and concluded that the single after the atrocious More More More was bound to be the best yet. It was funny at the time.
 
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