RACHEL STEVENS – I Said Never Again (But Here We Are) (Polydor)
Posted: October 9th, 2005, by Marceline Smith1-2-3-4! I’m trying to remember the last time I bought a pop single. It’s probably not since they stopped releasing them on 7″ vinyl. CD singles have always seemed an enormous rip-off to me – horribly packaged and taking up way too much space in my collection for one song since the b-side is usually a dodgy remix or – woo – an instrumental version. However, the main reason for this purchase (well, apart from feelings of slsk guilt and some kind of wish to make Rachel Stevens not feel like a failure come Sunday evening) was the fact that the b-side is amazing and bizarrely has been left off the album. Waiting Game is co-written by Rachel Stevens herself and while it’s not the most innovative song ever recorded the “no, no, no-no-no-no” bit at least should win some kind of catchy pop award. With lyrics consisting of a stream of pop cliches and a bassline with the snap of elastic it harks back to those classic S/A/W album tracks, the ones maybe lacking that extra spark that makes a pop hit but still pressing all the right buttons. The a-side you must have heard, a drum-heavy Adam and the Ants style stomper glittered up and filled with enough gleeful energy, whoa-ohs and hey-eys to get anyone singing along. Just give in.
Marceline Smith
Marceline is the fierce, terrifying force behind diskant.net, laughing with disdain as she fires sharpened blades of sarcasm in all directions. Based in Scotland, her lexicon consists of words such as 'jings', 'aboot' and 'aye': our trained voice analysts are yet to decipher some of the relentless stream of genius uttered on a twenty-four hour basis. Marceline's hobbies include working too much and going out in bad weather.
http://www.marcelinesmith.com