7TH SEPTEMBER 2008

 

Pussycat Dolls - "When I Grow Up"

Official UK Chart peak: #3

 

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We touched briefly, at the last PCDs entry, on how Nicole Scherzinger was now toiling hard towards a solo career - which had all but hit the dumper by the start of 2008. Singles had been released from her canned debut album 'Her Name is Nicole' to little fanfare, airplay or sales, and Interscope saw no point in carrying on with the project, especially since it'd now been a year since the Pussycat Dolls had released any new material or toured. And meanwhile, back in her day job, things weren't exactly going swimmingly either.

 

Carmit Bachar had hung up her thigh high boots and suspenders for good in 2007, and even a hammed up reality TV search to find her replacement (the god awful 'Pussycat Dolls Present: The Search for the Next Doll' on The CW Network in the US, aired a year later here in the UK on 4Music which had just launched at the time of this single) had failed to bring any new blood to the group. So by the time September 2008 had rolled around, the litter of PCDs was a member short.

 

 

And to add insult to injury for the members of the group who weren't Nicole, most of their second album, 'Doll Domination', consisted of tracks recycled from their de facto leader's binned solo project. 'When I Grow Up', produced by Rodney 'Darkchild' Jerkins (who we've already met on entries for Destiny's Child and Spice Girls) was one such track, and was a song about the naivety and pitfalls of wishing to be a star, famous, drive nice cars and have groupies (or boobies as most seemed to think the song said when it first came out).

 

It was fine, but really that's about it all was. Just boppy for a couple of listens but highly irritating after that. Not to mention that the song's main hook line 'But be careful what you wish for, cause you just might get it', suddenly rang true in more ways than one. Here suddenly was a group with a lead singer whose heart was really not in it, and four backups who suddenly felt about as relevant as the Supremes that weren't Diana Ross. We'll touch on this a bit more with the remaining PCD entries to come, however, as the next sting in the tail from their label and management as to how to approach this situation was bordering on the terminally failing.

12TH OCTOBER 2008

 

Sugababes - "Girls"

Official UK Chart peak: #3

 

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Sugababes v3.0, circa October 2008. Back with a new album, "Catfights and Spotlights" in time for the autumn (and their seventh overall)? Check. New single all over the radio like a rash? Check. Straight in at number one like the other lead singles before it? Aaah...not to be the case this time. Perhaps it's best we start off from where we left them at their last entry.

 

Talk of recording a new album had been rife all throughout the summer as the girls gigged and played festivals the UK and Europe over. There'd also been much talk of the fact - from Keisha in particular - that it would be a return to the more soulful, hook laden R&B vibes that the original lineup all the way back at the top of this thread had been all about. So everyone was pretty surprised when what met their ears upon the radio premiere of this single was well, this.

 

 

Two years' prior to this, high street pharmacy chain Boots had run a successful TV ad campaign, the soundtrack of which was 'Here Come the Girls' by Northern Soul legend Ernie K Doe. Universal Island spotted potential chart paydirt with the song by default, and some bright spark thought it perfect for the Babes v3.0 to re-record in a modern style. On paper a good idea. In practice a hot mess of the worst kind. If the 'Sugababes are a brand not a band now' camp had been waiting for a more perfect missile to launch that would declare the Babes as all but over music wise, 'Girls' was it. Under the hands of a lesser band, it would have just been a fairly inoffensive remake of a song from an advert.

 

Under the hands of the Babes v3.0, and coupled with quite frankly one of the worst music videos I've ever seen (the ghost of Appleton's "Fantasy" seems to rattle its chain quite strongly here), it was quite simply trashy as they come, the falsified soundtrack to a dozen 'girls' night out' compilation CDs that litter the shelves at Tesco and Asda every so often, the mental image and stench of a day old Lambrini bottle drenched across it. Top 3 with a bullet, yes, but once our next two entries to this thread arrived on the scene, it was disposed of as quickly as one of Boots' own brand wet wipes - and the parent album, as we'll see, suffered an equally worse fate...

Wow I forgot how girl-groups dominated the last half of 2008. :o

 

I've never been a fan of The Saturdays but I admire the fact that they worked hard to become a household name. At the time of when 'If This Is Love' charted at #8, I remember thinking that they'd be very lucky to get another top 10 hit - how very wrong I was. :lol:

 

Was the PCD Presents: The Search For the Next Doll really that bad? :kink: I LOVED it. Sure, it was pretty trashy and basically an ANTM rip-off but GOD it was entertaining (Girlicious was great too). Having said that, the Dolls were very much past their best in 2008. I never warmed to WIGU. I tried to like it but it was just all over the place as a song.

 

I think 'Girls' was a major misstep for the Babes. It reeked of them trying to cash in on the retro/soul revival (Amy, Adele, Duffy, Gabriella Cilmi) which was kind of confirmed when they chased trends with their next lead single.

'Girls' has probably been one of the best earners for the Babes as a long-runner though; its still played on plenty ads and as backing music on TV shows eight years on, where a lot of their other songs have fallen by the wayside. I'm presuming they still get royalties.

 

Definitely as you say, a brand rather than a band. And likewise for the Dolls. What a car crash When I Grow Up is when seen as a commentary on Nicole's career as a whole.

'Girls' has probably been one of the best earners for the Babes as a long-runner though; its still played on plenty ads and as backing music on TV shows eight years on, where a lot of their other songs have fallen by the wayside. I'm presuming they still get royalties.

 

Definitely as you say, a brand rather than a band. And likewise for the Dolls. What a car crash When I Grow Up is when seen as a commentary on Nicole's career as a whole.

 

Well since Girls use a sample of Ernie K. Doe's Here Come The Girls, he would get a portion of the royalties. Only Keisha is credited as a writer out of the girls so would get more royalties. I can't imagine they would get lots of money, I think the label/managment seem to absorb a lot of money from the Babes.

 

It feels so weird that Girls, Up, When I Grow Up and Can't Speak French are all from the same year. They all feel like big songs and from different years in pop.

Hello all...just briefly before today's entry...as we are now at a stage where the entries are less frequent to this thread, and I have my boyband review thread that I wanna keep moving as well, as of today new reviews will be posted every Sunday. Thanks for all your lovely comments as always! Onwards we go...

 

19TH OCTOBER 2008

 

The Saturdays - "Up"

Official UK Chart peak: #5

 

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As we've already seen, and as any great girl group will tell you, having a debut top 10 - nay, number one - hit is one thing. Following it up is quite another. It's striking that fine balance between it differing enough from your breakthrough hit but being interesting enough to suggest a good, long career is in order. As was the case with The Saturdays in the autumn of 2008. 'If This Is Love' had at least put the ball out there, now it was time to get it rolling.

 

As 'Up', their second single went to radio at the start of September, I had (thanks to a good friend of mine in the industry at the time) been in posession of several of their album sampler demos, which had been on loop all that summer, and this was the one I kept coming back to with repeated listens. And, after all, wouldn't you?

 

Written and produced by Swedish production giants Quiz and Larossi with Norwegian based singer songwriter Ina Wroldsen - who'd go onto write the majority of their many other hit entries we're yet to meet, as well as tracks for Britney Spears, Shontelle and Leona Lewis amongst others - everything about this release felt right at the time.

 

 

With a positive/rebellious call to arms to a lover, and nay, to their general audience - "I'm ready for the lift off, keep steady beat / Cause I'm ready for the big jump, keep up with me / If you lose me then you know, you're just a bit too slow / I only go, up, up" - it was female solidarity wrapped up in Topshop relatability, with the sort of effortlessly catchy but cool, slightly staccato electropop backing Rachel Stevens would have been proud of.

 

It was also in the eye catching, bright and breezy video that the first of one of many iconic looks of The Saturdays was cemented in place - their infamous black dresses with opaque coloured tights that they promoted the rest of the single campaign in - a knowing but affectionate nod to their late 90s pop greats in bright, matching outfits. A guest slot performing at The Clothes Show Live event in Birmingham also quickly established them with a growing fanbase as everyone picked their favourite ('I like the one in the blue tights' etc).

 

All this combined to send 'Up' soaring skywards into the UK top 5 - bettering their debut by three places, and it went onto spend the next four months inside the top 40, all the while with their next two entries that we'll meet speeding onto even greater things. If there'd been any doubts at all, there was no disputing now that The Saturdays had arrived and had put pop on the map again...

I always found the success of 'Up' surprising. But then with the likes of Katy Perry and Britney smashing around the time, I guess it makes sense that a shamelessly pop song would break through...

I remember hearing Up on the way to uni, I think it had a mid afternoon premier on Radio 1. And people called/text/emailed/tweeted? in to say it wasn't great. I loved it (of course) so I was really pleasantly surprised to see it go into the top 5.

26TH OCTOBER 2008

 

Girls Aloud - "The Promise"

Official UK Chart peak: #1

 

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If there'd been any doubt whatsoever at the end of summer 2008, those doubts were now swiftly eradicated. For everyone, it seemed, now loved Girls Aloud. Having just wrapped their biggest tour to date, and playing V Festival again - this time on the Main Stage, a sure marker if any of their reversal in popularity and fortunes in two short years from when they last played - in some ways, the same audience that voted them into the band six years previously on 'Popstars: The Rivals' was now, in a way, rediscovering them.

 

And the reason? Well as we touched on at the last entry, Cheryl had just made her debut as a judge on the fifth series of 'The X Factor' and was winning plaudits all around from public and critics alike. By its end, she had mentored and bought to the final that series' winner in Alexandra Burke. And as the girl from Newcastle ascended to national treasure status with gleaming hair and the emphatic, maternal tears of a Greek goddess, she and the rest of the girls were about to release "Out of Control", the biggest studio album of their career.

 

But, in true GA style, things didn't get off to the easiest of starts. The same five girls that had rocked up in velour trackies to Brian Higgins' Westerham headquarters all those years ago, stroppily rejecting the early demo of 'No Good Advice' were now glamorous, sophisticated women. He and Miranda Cooper understood this growth in their fortunes clearly. What was needed was not another 'The Show' or 'Sexy! No No No...' or 'Something Kinda Ooooh'. What was needed, in Brian's own words, was 'the theme tune to the biggest girl group on the planet'.

 

 

And, all jokes about a similarity to the 'Blankety Blank' theme tune aside, that's precisely what they got with 'The Promise', the album's lead single. Or at least, it very nearly wasn't. Just as Polydor had had to talk sense into the girls to release 'Love Machine' in 2004, now it was the same situation in role reversal. The girls have all recollected over the years about how much of a fight they had to get it to be the first one out the blocks. Nadine, now living in LA, even threatened to walk out of the photoshoot for the single cover unless they agreed to release it before, through gritted teeth, Peter Loraine and Colin Barlow at Polydor gave the all clear for 'The Promise' to be their first single, and hair and make up worked away at Ms Coyle as if nothing of event had passed.

 

Even leading up to its release, a couple of critics had called the girls' diversion into 60's styled, Phil Spector-ish girl pop sounds that the likes of Duffy, Gabriella Cilmi and Adele had been ruling the airwaves with all summer their 'pop suicide'. How swiftly then, those words had to be eaten when this became their fourth UK number one single, followed by the arrival of the 'Out of Control' album at the top of the charts two weeks later, and then, to their elation the following February, the song finally picking up their first BRIT award for Best British Single at the 2009 ceremony.

 

'The Promise' is unquestionably a special record. I'd say it's probably not their absolute best overall - we've already met the two entries I consider to be their absolute best - but what Brian Higgins said about this being their 'signature tune' is absolutely correct. They needed this kind of record at this stage in their career. Not to mention it came backed with a memorable video of them with full on beehives and shimmering, Supremes style gold sequinned dresses, inspiring many a hen do mock up in the year following (even several of the 'Loose Women' panellists recreated it for a Children in Need sketch), it was majestic and triumphant and a sign that their efforts were finally paying off. Everyone really did love Girls Aloud.

Haven't got to my favourite Girls Aloud effort yet, but we're well on the way to it now. Interesting details about The Promise!

The Promise is near the bottom for me in terms of Girls Aloud songs. I really can't stand to listen to it.

The first product from this rebirth - a so-so cover of Jermaine Stewart's 1986 Transatlantic Top 10 smash - was about a million miles away from the classy, evening gown and dramatic strings backed antics of 'Download It' or 'Stuck in the Middle', whilst they piled on more fake tan than their old Popstars contender Nicola Roberts did in the first three years of Girls Aloud, with a video totally missing the message of the original. One more single, 'Lucky Like That', stiffed at #55 the following year before they split to great indifference...

 

Sorry for being late with this but I think Clea's cover of WDHTTOCO was good, I remember it amongst the 80s remixes of the time. The Shapeshifters style production in the song, which dominated at that time was great too.

Edited August 28, 20168 yr by TheSnake

30TH NOVEMBER 2008

 

Pussycat Dolls - "I Hate This Part"

Official UK Chart peak: #12

 

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Another PCDs entry from Nicole Scherzinger's binned first solo album 'Her Name is Nicole' now. And eschewing with the trashy and desperate antics of 'When I Grow Up', second single 'I Hate This Part' went for Rihanna style mourning of a dead end relationship, with musical backing that was sounding dated even as this came out.

 

Utilising the same backing track that had been in effect on Ne-Yo's "Because of You", Kylie Minogue's "All I See" and Jordin Sparks' "One Step at a Time", this so-so midtempo saw Nicole go balls to the wall on the lead vocal hogging duties - in more ways than one. Cast your minds back, if you will, to the last three Destiny's Child entries we met in 2004/5, and what I said there about them essentially now being 'Destiny's Child featuring Beyonce'.

 

 

The same was true of the PCDs and Nicole, only the difference between them and DC, where the 'featuring Beyonce' bit was only in the metaphorical sense of that credit, Interscope/Robin Antin made the absolutely mental decision to start literally and actually crediting the records, late Supremes stylee, as being 'Pussycat Dolls featuring Nicole Scherzinger'. There are ways to illustrate harmony and solidarity as being all present and correct in your girl group to the public, and this was not it.

 

Coupled with easily one of the dullest and most cliched music videos I've ever seen - all sultry dancing in the desert, in the rain - I wasn't in the least bit surprised when this broke their run of consecutive top 10 hits, peaking at #12 and failing to go any higher after that. We've three more entries to come from them in 2009, but it won't end prettily, let's put it that way.

Edited September 4, 20168 yr by ThePensmith

I LOVED The Promise when it came out. Plus the XF performance of it was great even though Cheryl looked so nervous throughout.

 

PCD's second era could've been so much better if their second album wasn't just Her Name Is Nicole but presented as a PCD album. But at least their upcoming soundtrack redeemed them a lot in my eyes.

 

2009

 

4TH JANUARY 2009

 

Sugababes - "No Can Do"

Official UK Chart peak: #23

 

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A decade into this thread, and we start the 2009 entries with the girls who'd been it's most successful act as certified by the Guinness World Records. However, as world records are only as good as the year they're published, they're there to be lost as well as made - as Sugababes v3.0 were to start finding out to their peril this year.

 

All told, even with "Girls" heading into the top 3, the campaign for "Catfights and Spotlights" (even with eight years distance a horrible album title) was indisputably their worst performing since "One Touch" sales wise. It crept to a #8 debut in the album chart before swiftly falling, despite earning some of the best reviews of their career from certain quarters. I was one of the eventual 60,000+ purchasers of that album, and to be fair the critics did have a point.

 

"Girls" was a serious misfire for a first single in more ways than one. The 'brand not band' commentators on the girls' every move were rubbing their hands with glee by this point because suddenly, unlike the "Change" album being led off with "About You Now" which set up a strong campaign with good sales and success, here was one that wasn't going so swimmingly and led off by an advert song as if to prove their point.

 

 

It was just rather unfortunate then, that "Girls" was by nowhere near a fair marker of what lay on the album, but thus turned any prospective buyers that were sat on the fence off. Tracks like "You on a Good Day", "Unbreakable Heart" and the dramatically titled "Murder One" would, had fate not played a hand, have made for far more interesting singles and thus entries to this thread. But alas "No Can Do" is the only other single we'll meet from "Catfights and Spotlights".

 

Once again, as with "Change" still being swamped in the backwash of airplay and continued run for its chart topping predecessor a year previously, this track suffered the same cruel fate and joined "Soul Sound" and "Follow Me Home" in the small list of Sugababes singles that failed to make the top 20 upon full release.

 

The trouble with "No Can Do" is that it's a pleasant number, sure, but again, as with "Girls" it's nowhere near the best song on the album. An urgent rethink was needed with their label and management, and as we'll see with the remaining three entries to come it was in an unlikely shape at that point in their career. And that's got another story to tell all of it's own!

Edited September 25, 20168 yr by ThePensmith

I LOVED The Promise when it came out. Plus the XF performance of it was great even though Cheryl looked so nervous throughout.

 

PCD's second era could've been so much better if their second album wasn't just Her Name Is Nicole but presented as a PCD album. But at least their upcoming soundtrack redeemed them a lot in my eyes.

 

It was lovely their X Factor performance. Just a shame the producers didn't ask them back to perform their imminent next entry on for the final I always thought!

 

And ah yes. I'd almost all but forgotten one of the next PCD feat. Nicole entries was in fact not on the 'Doll Domination' album at all initially. Or indeed that it was quite so big a hit!

18TH JANUARY 2009

 

The Saturdays - "Issues"

Official UK Chart peak: #4

 

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Girls Aloud - "The Loving Kind"

Official UK Chart peak: #10

 

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January 2009 - one of the coldest starts to a new year in recent memory for all concerned, on a weather and economy front. But the fortunes for the girl group were the highest they'd ever been - and for now, the highest they'll be again for some time in this thread. And both of Fascination's leading girl group lights were inside the top 10 - albeit at vastly different stages of their career.

 

If 2008 had been a promising start for The Saturdays, then at the start of the 2009 there was a brimming sense of hope and optimism in the air, what with their debut album "Chasing Lights" having gone gold, and 'Up' over halfway through its run further down the top 40. Meeting it on the way down was 'Issues', their third single and their first ballad, and one of their many singles we've still to meet that's stood up well seven years on from release.

 

 

Written by the New York based songwriting team of Evan Rogers and Carl Sturken - who'd worked extensively with Rihanna on her first couple of albums - it's a gentle, guitar driven R&B pop outing that really showed off their vocals and harmonies to full effect - even more so on the many acoustic performances they delivered of this single on TV at the time, which was the first showcase of Una and Mollie's talents as guitarists - something that was unheard of for any girl group before or indeed since.

 

It courted a fleeting amount of controversy when first released, owing to radio programmers mishearing the word 'stab' being in the chorus' line "Can't decide if I should slap you or kiss you". Not wanting to inadvertantly advocate domestic violence, it was quickly re-recorded to substitute the line as "Can't decide if I should leave you or kiss you". Not quite as effective, but it did the single no harm at all as it eventually climbed to its peak of #4. As promo finished for this single, news broke that they'd be chosen to record that year's Comic Relief single - and all around thought a number one was surely coming their way next - or was it?

 

Meanwhile, over in the Girls Aloud camp, the second single from the chart topping "Out of Control" album was out in the ether, but perhaps bizarrely, compared with just three years previously, when they flogged themselves around the TV/radio circuit to promote "Whole Lotta History" to the death, they were nowhere to be seen. True, a lot of the performances and promo for "The Loving Kind" had been done in the run up to Christmas, including on their ITV special 'The Girls Aloud Party' (on which they did a performance with James Morrison of his "Broken Strings", which was riding high in the top 3 thereafter).

 

But there was definitely a sense of worry in certain quarters. After all, so hellbent had Fascination become with maintaining the girls' top 10 hit rate, that this, their 20th release, had a lot riding on it by proxy. The fact this just made it in there, with hindsight, speaks volumes. This was Fascination and Polydor's preferred first single from the album when the debate raged on between them and the girls over having "The Promise" come out first - which was part of the problem here, given that single was still completing its run in the top 40 and continuing to get extensive airplay when this peaked.

 

 

The other reason? It featured a co-write from Neil Tennant and Chris Lowe, better known as electropop gods the Pet Shop Boys, who'd been writing and recording with Xenomania for their own 10th studio album, "Yes" which would soar chartwards that spring, just after they won an Outstanding Contribution award at the same BRITs ceremony that the girls picked up their Best Single gong for "The Promise". This particular aspect of "The Loving Kind" was emphasised very heavily in a lot of the press around the album, as was The Smiths' guitarist Johnny Marr's contributions to "Rolling Back the Rivers in Time" and "Love is the Key".

 

The sudden heavy reliance on these credible big name appearances rather overshadowed everything else. Take away the fact that Neil & Chris have written on this single, and this is, I'm sorry to say, "Call the Shots", but a poor photocopy, and nowhere near as enjoyable with seven years' distance. The single release did however, give us one of the girls' most stunning music videos (and last to be directed by Trudy Bellinger, who did "Sexy! No No No..." and "The Show") and also one of their best B-sides, the much loved Nicola/Kimberley led "Memory of You" which became a fan favourite. After their BRITs triumph the following month, they'd go decidedly quiet again whilst Cheryl and Kimberley joined Gary Barlow and pals up Mount Kilimanjaro for Comic Relief - but it was to be, in many respects, the quiet before the storm...

I think it's doing 'The Loving Kind' a disservice calling it a lesser CTS. :lol: I definitely see the similarities but TLK has a lot going for it that makes it a great song in its own right. :P I always find it a bit haunting... I think it's the "sometimes I watch you when you're sleeping" line. :lol:

I absolutely disagree on The Loving Kind, to me, it is the pinnacle of Girls Aloud and one I come back to year on year even now. Call The Shots pales in comparison.

 

I would say that the radio edit lets it down a little. This will be an issue with their next single when it rears its head, too.

 

The album version, which has slightly different instrumentation is a lot better and it's the one that makes it into my music collection.

 

 

It's also interesting to see the balance of vocals, as Cheryl and Nicola's stars were rising.

Edited October 15, 20168 yr by 360Jupiter

1ST MARCH 2009

 

Pussycat Dolls feat. Missy Elliott - "Whatcha Think About That"

Official UK Chart peak: #9

 

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And now for a welcome hello to one of the leading female lights in hip hop, one Missy Elliott to this thread. Her next entry is some five years off yet - as indeed is the group we'll meet that she collaborates with - so for now, here she is on a third Pussycat Dolls entry from the 'Doll Domination' album that sounds what you might expect a third Pussycat Dolls single from their second album to sound like.

 

"Whatcha Think About That" is probably the best of a bad bunch we've encountered from this era of their career thus far, but that's about all the praise I can muster for this. The backing is at least a bit different - all clicky clacky electro tinged R&B that at times sounds like the sort of thing that would have been on the first Rachel Stevens album or like Madonna's work with Bloodshy and Avant for her 'Confessions on a Dance Floor' album.

 

 

But then Nicole's a-yellin' all over the shop about leaving her wrong doing man at home and seeing how he likes it - territory they'd covered previously on 'I Don't Need a Man' with far more fun - and then whatever attention I could bring to this single is quickly lost. Even with single sales on an upward turn once more, there'd be few who could instantly name this now, save for as answer on Pointless.

 

The girls were by now into a world tour, which would signal the start of the end of their time together - exacerbated even more by the release of their next two entries to this thread - so as with a lot of these things as we've already seen, the extra curricular dramas began to eclipse the musical achievements, top 10 hit or not. Somehow, in this instance, as back then, I was failing to find a will to care.