Gay&Night-ZiZo April 2014

IN 1988,
KYLIE MINOGUE
RELEASED
HER FIRST
WORLDWIDE
SINGLE ‘THE
LOCO-MOTION’,
AND QUICKLY
BECAME AN 80S
POP PRINCESS,
CLOSELY
MANAGED
BY BRITISH
SONGWRITING
THREESOME
STOCK, AITKEN &
WATERMAN AND
SIGNED TO THE
PWL LABEL.
SHE’S ALWAYS
HAD A VERY
STRONG GAY
FOLLOWING:
IT’S SAFE TO SAY
THAT BETWEEN
KYLIE AND
THE LGBT
COMMUNITY, IT
WAS A CLASSIC
CASE OF LOVE
AT FIRST SIGHT.
WITH THE
RELEASE OF
HER TWELFTH
STUDIO ALBUM
KISS ME ONCE,
IT’S A GREAT TIME
TO LOOK BACK AT
AN AMAZINGLY
INTERESTING
MUSICAL CAREER
THAT HAS BEEN
26 YEARS IN THE
MAKING.
1988_ KYLIE
The record that started it all. ‘I
Should Be So Lucky’ is a brilliant
pop song, and when people
say the name Kylie, this song
goes hand in hand. As singles
go, Kylie’s fans have always
had a soft spot for ‘Je Ne Se
Pas Pourquoi’ and its longing
chorus. HIDDEN GEM: ’Turn It Into Love’. One of Kylie’s
greatest skills is to convey melancholy in the pure pop
form, and this is one of the earliest, and best examples
of it. The chorus is anthemic, and fans often wish she
would revisit this classic again, and perhaps even rerecord
it. RARITY: ‘Getting Closer’ and ‘Made In Heaven’
are fun early b-sides, though hardly essential.
1990_ RHYTHM
OF LOVE
The four singles culled from her
third album all hold lofty ranks
in the list of Kylie essentials.
‘Better The Devil You Know’
is Kylie’s prime entry into the
gay pop classic sweepstakes.
From those opening synths it’s
apparent her sound has evolved,
and that sweeping chorus just DOES NOT QUIT. ‘Shocked’
and ‘What Do I Have To Do’ boast iconic videos and killer
choruses, and ‘Step Back In Time’ is 70’s pastiche that
manages to be thrilling without feeling forced (unlike
her dreadful take on ‘Celebration’ a couple years later.
HIDDEN GEM: ‘Things Can Only Get Better’ is the kind
of self-help romp that could only have existed in 1990,
and it is a blast. RARITY: ‘Better The Devil You Know’
was one of the first songs recorded for this album, and
its original mix (released as a b-side as the ‘alternate
mix’) sounds a lot closer to the pop of her first two
albums. Legend has it that Kylie heard it, and rejected it.
The new mix was the song as we know it, beefier, more
modern, and far more mature. Worth a listen, if only
to see an example of what is one of the first times Kylie
asserted herself on her sound. Her image change gets a
lot of attention in terms to this era, but her sound also
took major leaps.
1994_ KYLIE
MINOGUE
No one could have seen
‘Confide In Me’ coming. A huge
hit, clocking in at over five
minutes, this was new territory
for Kylie. The stunning string
arrangement, mature lyrics,
and Kylie singing her heart
out make this a high water
mark in her career. To watch her perform this live is to
see Kylie in all her glory. The rest of this album played
around with the trends of the time, and the album, like
Madonna’s Bedtime Stories from the same year, has
aged well, if only because it feels far more organic in its
instrumentation and production. Kylie’s voice is the real
revelation here though, belting in ways never seen in
the PWL/SAW days. ‘Dangerous Game’ and ‘Automatic
Love’ see Kylie pushing her vocals to the limit, and
‘Put Yourself In My Place’ is a not-to-be-missed ballad,
gorgeous, sultry, and devastating. HIDDEN GEM:
Remixed for single release by Brothers in Rhythm, some
are partial to the soulful jazziness of the album version
of ‘Where Is The Feeling’. RARITY: Kylie would sing her
cover of Prefab Sprout’s ‘If You Don’t Love Me’ on her
Aphrodite Les Folies Tour, but she originally recorded it
in the KM94 sessions, and it is lovely.
1989_ ENJOY
YOURSELF
‘Hand on Your Heart’ is a
knockout of a pop song and the
rest of the singles here, bar her
cover of ‘Tears on My Pillow’,
are all really great examples
of the PWL sound. While many
dismiss this album as a retread of
the first, it is worth noting how
strong some of this material is, as
evidenced in her re-workings of ‘Hand on Your Heart’ and
‘Never Too Late’ on 2012’s Abbey Road Sessions.
HIDDEN GEM: ’Heaven and Earth’ is a cheese-tastic
squeaky clean teen-pop ballad that is dripping with that
cheerful Minogue persona.
1991_ LET’S
GET TO IT
The early 90’s sound was
on-trend, the songs were
dramatically lower in quality than
the Rhythm of Love singles, and
Kylie, for maybe the only time
in her career, sounds audibly
disinterested (and on some
tracks you might even wonder if
she is singing at all, her voice is so low in the mix). ‘Finer
Feelings’ is the lone gem here, and what a gem it is. This
mature ballad, and its stunning video literally tower
over every other song here. Even still, the single mix by
Brothers in Rhythm, is the only essential version. Kylie is
quite clearly ready to move on. So should we. RARITY:
‘Closer’ is the b-side to ‘Finer Feelings’ and is a bit of a
banger, especially in the form of The Pleasure Mix. Far
better than anything on the album proper, and a bit of a
glimpse into the experimental direction she would veer
towards in the future.
1997_ IMPOSSIBLE
PRINCESS
One of the silliest, and
unfortunately most common,
criticisms of Kylie is that her
music is frivolous, empty and
devoid of artistic merit. Leading
up to the release of Impossible
Princess, Kylie, realizing this,
was very clearly grasping for
some respect, and making an attempt to distance herself
from the misconception that she was a puppet of the
SAW production empire. Teaming up with a few unlikely
collaborators , including the Manic Street Preachers,
Impossible Princess was a complete shift from everything
that she had done previously, including the sophisticated
pop of KM94. Kylie wrote most of the lyrics here, and it
reveals far more depth into her psyche than we had ever
seen previously. You can’t envy the job of those picking
singles. There is no ‘Confide In Me’ here, and, that being
said, the record stands stronger as an entire work rather
than any individual song. Worth repeated listens start to
finish. ‘Too Far’, ‘Did It Again’, ‘I Don’t Need Anyone’ and
the title track (retitled ‘Dreams’) are obvious highlights,
but ‘Limbo’ is one of the strangest, rowdiest, and ballsiest
songs she has put to record. HIDDEN GEMS: ’Jump’ and
‘Say Hey’ find Kylie channeling her inner Debut-era Björk,
and she does a pretty damn good job of it. RARITIES: The
b-sides here are some of the best songs of the era, with
‘Love Takes Over Me’ and ‘Tears ‘as strong as anything on
the proper album. Kylie was on fire here.
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