Jump to content

Blitz

Members

  • Joined

  • Last visited

View Profile Find content

Posts posted by Blitz

    Yeah Stripped wasn't that popular in the U.S was it? :( Did well here though - was my fave album for a whole year :D

     

    the whole 'dirrty' image didnt go down to well i dont think... 'stripped' didnt do that bad there, just under 4 million copies sold!! 'stripped' is still my favourite album, 'back to basics' is gettin VERY close though... :wub:

    Yep, she needs a Canada no1! lol I don't think it will do it in US though :(

     

    she could well do it in canada, her airplay is gaining, she should climb in US too by a litte bit, not enough for top 5 though... her downloads are really stable in the US!! :yahoo:

    BILLBOARD review!! its a GREAT review but his said 'stripped' nearly career suicide!! :o :angry:

     

    When Christina Aguilera released her garish, sexually charged sophomore effort, Stripped, in 2002, it seemed that she pushed her obsessions with tweaking taboos just a little too far. Sure, she could still sing, but her music was now driven entirely by skeletal club grooves and explicit carnality. It was a bold break from the teenybopper persona she was desperate to shed, but it was overcorrective steering, taking her a little bit too far down the road toward a grotesque caricature, particularly in her ugly video for the album's lead single, "Dirrty." All this grandstanding provoked an intense reaction, not just among fans but among her collaborators, who also wondered if Christina was going a little too far, but she managed to keep from sinking largely on the strength of the ballad "Beautiful," an empowering statement of self-love that managed to dampen "Dirrty"'s impact even if it didn't erase it. It also set the stage for the next phase of her career: as an outright old-fashioned diva, much like Madonna or Cher. Smartly, she followed this path for her third album, the sprawling, deliriously entertaining double-disc Back to Basics. The title alone on Back to Basics is an allusion that perhaps Christina herself thinks she might have gone a little too far with Stripped; she stops short of offering an apology -- she even has a song where she proclaims she's "Still Dirrty" -- but this album's emphasis on songs and singing, along with the fixation with the big-band era, does suggest that Aguilera is ready to be once again seen as a world-class vocalist. Nevertheless, Back to Basics also makes clear that Stripped, for as flawed as it is, was also a necessary artistic move for Christina: she needed to get that out of her system in order to create her own style, one that is self-consciously stylized, stylish, and sexy. As the endless series of pinup photos in the album's booklet illustrates, Christina is obsessed with earning credibility through association: she dresses up as a big-band vamp and drops allusions to Etta James, Billie Holiday, and Aretha Franklin, all under the assumption that listeners will think of Ms. Aguilera as the heir to that throne. While she may have the vocal chops to pull it off to a certain extent, Back to Basics doesn't quite feel like it belongs to the classic soul and R&B tradition, even if the second disc is designed to be an old-fashioned jazzy R&B album, complete with bluesy torch songs and occasionally live instrumentation. Aguilera's instincts are too modern to make the album sound classic. She remains stubbornly autobiographical -- she disses departed producer Scott Storch on "F.U.S.S.," again addresses the abuse inflicted on her mother by her father, spends much of the album detailing her love for her new husband, Jordan, and always filters everything through a very personal filter that makes this seem like a journal entry à la Alanis Morissette (even "Thank You," subtitled as her dedication to her fans, isn't about the fans; it's about how Christina has inspired them, saved their life, or kept them going while stationed in Iraq -- all stories recounted in the voicemail that runs throughout the track). Her lyrics remain bluntly direct, particularly when she talks about sex: "Candyman" makes her cherry pop and her panties drop, while the "Nasty Naughty Boy" will receive "a little taste of the sugar below my waist." That combined with the slick, precise computerized production means that even when Christina tries to sound classic, she winds up sounding like the present. But that's what's good about Back to Basics -- even though she strives hard to be a classic soul singer here, she can't help but sound like herself, and surely there is no other big-budget pop album in 2006 that bears the stamp of its auteur so clearly. As she did on Stripped, she has gotten to indulge herself here, but where she was more concerned with sound than structure last time around, on Back to Basics she spends just as much time on song and structure, often coming up with strong, memorable ballads and dance tunes on both the dance-oriented first disc and the slow-burning second. Of course, she reveals more than she intended through her indulgence. Try as she may to sound like a classic singer from the '40s, she really seems to have learned all of her moves from Madonna in Dick Tracy; whether she's shaking her hips to a canned brass section or breathing heavily into a microphone, every move seems to have been copped from Breathless Mahoney -- and that's not just on the campily retro "Candyman" (which sounds like a rewrite of "Hanky Panky"), but it's also true on the deliberately modern numbers like "Ain't No Other Man," whose stabs of sampled brass sound straight out of early-'90s jazz-rap. When Aguilera does stray from the Madonna template here, it's to wander into Fiona Apple territory on the second disc -- with its loping piano, "Mercy on Me" is a dead ringer for anything from When the Pawn Hits the Conflicts He Thinks Like a King. There are hints of a couple other artists here -- some echoes of Norah Jones on the torch songs -- but the fusion of Madonna and Fiona Apple is so inspired and unexpected, it sounds original because nobody else would have thought of it, or put it together in such wildly weird ways as Christina does here. Sure, Back to Basics is way too long at two discs and some of it doesn't work quite as well as the rest, but it has far more hits than misses and it holds together as an artistic statement (certainly more so than any other album made by one of her teen pop peers). It may be all about style, it may be a little crass and self-centered, but it's also catchy, exciting, and unique. It's an album to build a career upon, which would be a remarkable achievement by any measure, but coming after the near career suicide of Stripped, it's all the more impressive. ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine, All Music Guide

    Can't wait to hear this! Wonder what kind of song it's gonna be :o

     

    it sounds like a great r'n'b club banger track... i've heard a clip of some other girls singing it and the lyrics are HOT, christina will be AMAZING on it:

     

    'TELL ME, WHAT YOU'RE THINKING ABOUT WHEN YOU GOT ME THERE WAITING PATIENTLY...'

     

    like kalen said, it wont affect her 2nd single, we wont get 'tell me' released here till late oct at earliest!! :wub:

    Isn't the album like number one in over 20 countries :o?

     

    Australia

    Germany

    Ireland

    Netherlands

    South Korea

    UK

    Holland

    US

     

    so thats 8 countries so far... although US aint confirmed yet!! should debut #1 in canada and new zealand for definate too, we will have to wait and see on other countries!! :yahoo:

    CHART DATE: 08/21/2006

    LAST UPDATE: 08/21/2006 14:22:04

    NOW IN: 26.44%

     

    LW TW artist / album label power index

    -- 1 CHRISTINA AGUILERA RCA/RMG 73,830

    BACK TO BASICS

    -- 2 TRACE ADKINS CAPITOL NASHVILLE 38,666

    DANGEROUS MAN

    3 3 NOW THAT'S WHAT I CALL MUSIC V22 SONY MUSIC GROUP 32,022

    VARIOUS

    -- 4 CHEETAH GIRLS 2 WALT DISNEY RECORDS 24,937

    SOUNDTRACK

    -- 5 CHERISH SHO'NUFF/CAPITOL 23,271

    UNAPPRECIATED

    -- 6 LYFE JENNINGS SONY URBAN/COLUMBIA/CRG 23,063

    THE PHOENIX

    26 7 JOSH TURNER MCA NASHVILLE 17,264

    YOUR MAN

    9 8 NICKELBACK ROADRUNNER/IDJMG 14,567

    ALL THE RIGHT REASONS

    11 9 RASCAL FLATTS LYRIC STREET 14,332

    ME AND MY GANG

    6 10 KIDZ BOP KIDS 10 RAZOR & TIE 12,403

    VARIOUS

     

    this is the US chart with a percentage of sales from the smaller stores, sales of BIGGER stores will be included in the update tomorrow, thats when the sales will soar!! :yahoo:

     

    Posted ·

    Edited by Blitz

    so we ALL know this is gonna be his 2nd single from his new album... this should leak in the next week or so, hopefully!! this can be the OFFICIAL thread for it... i've heard clips like some of you others and im SO excited, sounds like a REAL stomper!! :wub:

     

    diddy commented on MTV this week:

     

    The next single from Diddy's upcoming album, Press Play, will be "Tell Me," he told MTV Europe. "It's still part of the seduction phase. ... Christina Aguilera is on there, and she has one of the greatest voices in the world. This track is very very intense. It's the perfect follow up to 'Come With Me.' " ...

     

    'Tell Me' Clip (11 Secs)!!

    YAY! GO CHRISTINA FORUM!!! :cheer:

     

    I decided this was the friendliest of all the forums, so I've set up camp here. You'll find me in't corner with my diet coke with lime and cadbury stash. :P

     

    ugh, diet coke with lime... :P COKE ZERO baby!! :yahoo:

     

    well done, another week top 3!! :thumbup:

    whats that :wacko:

     

    :lol: its like you get to meet some of the neighbours cast and do a quiz and karl kennedy and his band plays... its REAL bad but fun, we left though before then end, way to cheesy, karl kennedy LOVES himself!! :rolleyes:

    the charts are now rolling in... :dance: first post updated!!

     

    she debuts at #1 in korea and holland!! so that adds to UK, Ireland and Oz now... we should have #1 debuts in canada, us, new zealand and germany also!! :yahoo:

     

    not so good in czech republic at #24 and #49 in poland... oh well, with new singles should climb!! :thumbup:

    Hmmm she's added Candyman and Back In The Day to the music player on her myspace site. Bit surprised to see Back In The Day on there...

     

    its not that big of a surprise... it was said from the beginning she wanted BITD as 2nd or 3rd single!! i LOVE it personally, would be BIG in the US... BUT i think she will listen to the fans, there are better single choices IMO!! :dance:

    I agree, I'm not sure if Candyman is commercial enough :(

     

    of course it is... its a grower, although i liked it on 1st listen, i LOVE it now, a fave track!! :wub:

     

    both 'hurt' and 'candyman' are getting airplay in the US :o they are the two most played tracks on US radio, so its deffo one of them!! :yahoo:

    Yeah I actually think you're right Blitz. Ballads always do well at Christmas. She released the Voice Within at Christmas. Though in saying that there's always more competition and so it's harder to get a number 1.

     

    who cares out gettin 'hurt' to #1, that single will push the album to the max at christmas, she would sell bucket loads of albums... plus 'hurt' is an amazing song so it will easily make top 5 if not top 3!! :wub:

    I can't wait for her to tour with B2B! If she does Birmingham I'll DEFINATLY be going :o

     

    i'll be going to b'ham twice and manchester twice, saving them pennies!! :yahoo: dont worry your head, she will definatly be going to b'ham... i have never seen her in concert so i might die when i get there!! :lol: