Single Reviews 13/03/06

If we were able to do a decent impression of David Attenborough, we’d say “the Radio 2 playlist morphs into a living thing and deposits its eggs on the shelves of HMV this week. All it can do now is wait for the unsuspecting human to come along and fertilise those eggs with its money.” But sadly, we can only do a half-convincing Nadine Coyle, which takes us seamlessly onto this week’s new releases...

Girls Aloud attempt to flog their dying wildebeest of a third album with a nicely mellow mid-tempo jobby, Whole Lotta History. Not bad, but not un-Atomic Kitten either. The sooner Xenomania get the feck off their laurels and conjure up Sound of the Underground Pt 2, the further we’ll delay the backlash.

Despite his busy efforts wooing silly American ladies with his simpleton’s rhymelets, James Blunt finds the time to nip to the toilet of pop and squeeze out yet another blood-speckled stool into the nation’s ears.

Similarly moronic ballads come from future Tampax ad soundtracks, Alexis Strum and KT Tunstall. While the latter may grab a place higher than deserved due to contemptible Brit wins, Strum is just about worthy to be the bog brush to the aforementioned khazi.

Toilet references firmly behind us, Beverley Knight caps a criminally-underrated career thus far with Piece Of My Heart from her forthcoming Best Of, showcasing Britain’s greatest soul voice in a justified cover of Janis Joplin’s finest moment.

Finally, Bell X1 claim our Single Of The Week with Flame, softly stomping accidental funk slipping into a subdued terrace chant – and A FUCKING KEY CHANGE, PEOPLE!!! Oh yes. This is the stuff.

Oh, and grim, overplayed, dumpy, frumpy Marbella hotel warbler Kelly Clarkson releases something else this week. Don’t buy it.