i make no apologies for the fact that i love the pop icon that is kylie.
from her tacky 80s pop, via genre stretching and audience testing collaborations with the indie royalty of the day (manic street preachers/nick cave etc) through to the sublime electro brilliance of slow she has shown a supreme level of taste and class that few others in her enviable position would have bothered with.
not for her the shock tactics of gobby-n-annoying (though sometimes excellent) madonna, nor the tabloid rubbish a la britney, instead kylie has been a proper star of the old school order, whereby her evasive coy smile and minimal press, speak far louder and resonate deeper than a thousand column inches ever could.
in fact, my determination to get along to glastonbury 2005 was actually spurred on by the hopes and wishes that kylie would be one of the headline acts.
however, as we now know, this was not to be.
when a friend recently asked if i was going to try and do glastonbury in 207, my answer : no kylie, no point.
so, when the dvd of the showgirl extravaganza dropped on the door mat a while ago, i was concerned that the bubble in which i have held her would burst.
would the dvd reveal the fact that kylies voice is nothing without her studio surroundings, would she be able to carry such a large show on her miniscule frame.
well, if you haven’t seen the dvd then shame on you.
it is by far one of the best live shows i have ever pumped out of my homesystem, the pacing, the costumes, the lights, and yes, the voice, are all quite dazzling. so i am chuffed to bits to tell you, that this companion piece, recorded last november in sydney following her break from the pop machine, also stands up as a wonderful listen even without the jaw dropping visuals and dance routines.
interestingly, the last few months have seen several pop acts releasing something which up until recently has been the catalogue swelling artefact for a rock band, the live album : madonna, pet shop boys have both released their take on this, so it’s only right that kylie should do the same.
as with the show, the flow is broken into several acts, showgirl, everything taboo, dreams and the superb kylie/madonna pop mashup of pop paradiso, but essentially this is a greatests hits set with the crowd cheering like mad and revised instrumentation (the swing jazz revised the loco-motion !!), so for the fans it’s a totally perfect filler while we all await the new material that is supposedly on its way later in the year.
oh, and when she belts out to her homecrowd, ‘and this is one of my dreams’ during the synthetic string drenched drama that is ‘dreams’, i swear if you don’t get shivers up your spine, then you’re a heartless bastard.
brilliant brilliant pop music.