(I had meant to post this a few days ago on the one year anniversary of Tension but could not find the Tension thread. Alas, it seems to have been locked so this could be created in its stead, despite similar projects being tidily continued in existing threads. But what is the near death Popjustice forum experience if not fractured by arbitrary and inconsistent complications that defy user instinct?)
A year later and I'm genuinely surprised to find myself saying that Tension has become one of my favorite Kylie albums (Sort of, we'll get to that). She is, doubtlessly, always going to be my #1, and when she's at her best, there's simply no one that compares. A good Kylie album has always felt like an exercise in curation and excellent taste, so it's been a bummer that the last decade of albums have been decidedly not that. At best, they have landed with a limp and resounding "meh"; at worst, they raise questions about the taste levels of the parties involved.
I don't want to deride the last 3 albums from an artist who's been doing this for almost 4 decades. A dip in quality is, essentially, a given; even Bowie has plural duds. But I think it's part of the context that makes Tension feel so exciting and special. Like yes, Padam, but after having year to live with it, it's decidedly an album with multiple career highs, which is especially thrilling after a decade-long drought in that regard. (Admittedly, Shelby '68 is a strange and unexpected gem. Miss A Thing is a wonderful "Kylie Minogue song that sounds like a Kylie Minogue song" in all of its, affectionately, Fever b-side glory. Those last 30 seconds? Completely irresistible. It remains a personal favorite.)
Obviously, the title track is a triumph--after 20 years of ignoring the popup alert, someone finally ran a firmware update on the Kyborg!--as is its video, which is hands down one of the very best she's ever done. A high camp Lynchian Bladerunner fantasy? It's for the pretties, it's for the intellectuals, and if you can't appreciate it, I hope you find some better lighting in your life!
Story might be the most interesting track we've heard in a long while. I've seen plenty of lamentations on Kylie not tapping into more personal material, which--while understandable--I've always found to be a bit odd. I can understand the longing, but when we consider the Kylie Minogue story, there's... a lot of darkness there. From the death of Michael Hutchence to her cancer diagnosis and its repercussions, there have been profound heartbreaks in her life. Any single one of them would be enough to shatter someone, let alone multiple. There are glimpses into it to be caught in songs like Drunk and Flower, and though I understand the desire to delve deeper and find the art in her hardships, exploring that amount of darkness is rather at odds with Kylie Minogue the artist. Plainly, I don't think these explorations of heartbreak are the--no pun intended--story she wants to tell. (And outside of these hardships, what are we expecting an exploration in? The plights of selling bedazzled duvets?) Perhaps the revelation we consistently see from her is that of her persistence.
Hers is an unrelenting light in torrid darkness. It's triumphantly--joyously--overcoming adversity and heartbreak in similar means to the disco divas of her generation prior; to the house performances she emerged alongside. It's not a context we see often in her peers--in this regard, it's kind of just her and Madonna--and, like those disco and house divas of yore, this shining in the face of tragedy speaks to the uniquely queer appeal of Kylie Minogue. It's not simply the beckoning to the dancefloor, it's the thriving through the heartbreak that leads to finding solace on the dancefloor in the first place.
That maybe feels like a bit of a non-sequitur, but bear with me just a moment more. To this end, it's intriguing to hear Story acknowledge this sort of darkness in a way that feels true to her form, which is to say stoically and with reserve. We know she isn't going to spill her heart, but even still, the rather enigmatic nature leaves room for the listener to share and join her solace, much in that tradition of the dancefloor diva. (And as a matter of fact, I do have a bone to pick with how a term as historically valuable and authoritative as diva has somehow degraded into something as lame and infantilizing as "pop girl", but that's an incoherent rambling for another day. Ow, my back.) This sort of insight is not the exhausting "Me me me"-isms of self-centered Swiftian songwriting, but the more selfless sort--Jepsen-esque, perhaps--that taps into a personal truth to evoke a universal experience.
But then, this is a Kylie Minogue record; maybe it's not that deep. Let's move on before I discover just how much further my head can delve into my own ass.
There's so much goodness to come back to in the Tension album tracks. Are they perfect pop songs? Not exactly, but they're delightfully catchy, highly replayable and, for the most part, the production sounds like it will age with the somewhat unplaceable timelessness that's long been the quiet strength of Kylie's best work. (Tell me In Your Eyes doesn't sound like it could have been released during the 2020 disco revival, I dare you.)
Green Light is a breezy little number that I keep coming back to. It's Kylie Minogue doing her lovely brand of white disco, but now with more saxophone! It's not groundbreaking, but it's not trying to be; it's just good, easy fun. It's like macaroni and cheese at a gourmet buffet. Sure, it's not the most innovative thing on offer, but nobody's going to say no to mac and cheese--it's comforting, it's nostalgic, it makes me smile. (Lactose intolerants, hold your tongues.) Things We Do For Love just makes sense. It's an oddly fresh sound for someone who has actual 80's pop records, and it manages to build upon the soundscape from the back half of Aphrodite, namely Can't Beat The Feeling. It's quintessential Kylie without feeling like a retread.
Even the less standout tracks are still well-crafted pop songs. One More Time is a perfectly serviceable bop and a bit of mindless fun. There's something about her cadence that reminds me of a band that I can't quite put my finger on. Joywave, maybe? (And given her affection for 'indie' rock, I would not be surprised to discover that she's been bopping to Buy American.) You Still Get Me High would likely be a highlight if it weren't overshadowed and made a bit redundant by Things We Do.
Hold On To Now is a fine pop song that goes for the "emotopop" sound in ways that we've heard in the past and sometimes grow to love. (Admittedly, neither All The Lovers nor I Believe In You have ever been particular favorites of mine; I yield to the fact that I'm simply not the target audience here.) I understand the sentimentality of it and its placement in the Kylie canon as an "important" song--I appreciate it in the same way that I appreciate Dancing--it's just not my favorite. That's not a slight, more a comment on the quality of the rest of the album. Oh how we love a Kylie album where a damn fine pop song is outshined by damn finer pop songs.
On the other hand, Somebody To Love goes for the "emotopop" sound in a way that we haven't heard before. Exciting! There's a warm, analogue-ish fuzziness in the production that works so well with the timbre of her voice. I can't think of an equivalent sound in her discography, and I would love to hear this palette get explored more. It's such a solid album track and handily fits into the hazy, hypnotic electronic (Don't.) vibe set by Padam and the title track. It fleshes out the 'world' of the album; it makes it feel fuller and more complete, and... It's a bonus track.
Yes, a great Kylie Minogue album can't truly be a great Kylie Minogue album unless some of its best tracks are relegated to b-sides, bonus tracks and--oh what's that? She's pioneering into new territory here--digital deluxe tracks available to purchase for only one (1) week. But good goddamn, they are some tunes.
Drum sounds like a bizarre hybrid of Sparks and Waiting For The Sun--it's a sound that makes good on the unfulfilled promises of Kiss Me Once--and it's Kylie doing that ever so slightly left turn that she does so, so well. And though nobody should come to Kylie Minogue albums seeking deeply personal revelations, it feels like she's tapping into something true on this one that makes it all the more intriguing.
And then, there's 'The One'; that song you hope for from an artist in spite of disappointments, the passage of time, and all else. You keep coming back with nothing but blind hope defined only by the high standards they've set for themselves in the past, even if it feels more and more like a pipedream. You just know it's there in the cosmos somewhere, and maybe, just maybe, the stars might align one more time.
Heavenly Body has absolutely no place outside a list of Kylie Minogue's 10 best songs. It's evocative, it's romantic, it's trippy, it's cosmic, and it's gay as hell. It is Kylie Minogue. I have waited 15 years for This Song. I thought that with time that I might be able to put my thoughts on it into words but... what's the point? Just press play.
It's incredible, stellar, and one of her very, very best. It fits so comfortably alongside long adored deep cuts like Love Affair, Cupid Boy, and Cherry Bomb, and it's one of the most wonderful surprises I've experienced in my please don't make me say how many years of being a devout Minoguian. I completely adore this song, can never seem to listen to it only once, and absolutely cannot get it out of my head. (Let me have that one just this once. Please.)
But because I'm commenting on subjective matters online, I have to say hateful things.
The track list on the back half of the record is just not right. Not when the material for a great album is literally right there. Let's complain.
Hands is kind of corny, it's a bit Say So-redux from an artist who doesn't need to chase sounds from half a decade ago, and I personally just can't get past the fact that it's, by definition, unfinished. The hook in the chorus just isn't strong enough to justify not leaving it on the cutting room floor, and it's redundant next to Green Light, especially when the latter is the objectively better song.
Vegas High is lame as hell and that's a cold, hard fact. It's a straight up dud that sounds cynically born to serve no other purpose than to advertise to people that she spent a couple of weeks in Vegas in a brief residency since past. It goes for a 'harder' dance sound that she's done in the past, but doesn't clear the bar set by those past successes and instead leaves me spending the run time wondering why I'm not listening to different, better Kylie Minogue songs. "You're wrong, it must be a great track because she almost named the album after it!" cry some from the back--likely the same sorts who find themselves defending Kiss Me Once and saying that Let's Get To It is a misunderstood gem, mistaking their own deliberate obtuseness for individuality, ceaselessly driven by an immutable force to proclaim progressively worsening cold takes--to which I offer this counterpoint: But she didn't. Moving on.
All of this rambling serves to get to the crux of my point. There is an incredible Kylie Minogue album here, and one that deserves a place among some of her best work. I'm not typically a fan of 'fixed' versions of albums. Generally, the only thing to glean from them is that the original track listings get it right about 95% of the time. (Beyoncé's 4 is most certainly an outlier here.) But since this is Popjustice, and because I've already gone on this long, I would be remiss not to post my 'fixed' version of Tension with even more color commentary.
I strongly feel that you should listen to the above tracks in the above order at least once. I promise you you'll walk away knowing that you've just listened to the best Kylie Minogue album since Aphrodite, possibly even better still. And then you'll probably listen again.
A year later and I'm genuinely surprised to find myself saying that Tension has become one of my favorite Kylie albums (Sort of, we'll get to that). She is, doubtlessly, always going to be my #1, and when she's at her best, there's simply no one that compares. A good Kylie album has always felt like an exercise in curation and excellent taste, so it's been a bummer that the last decade of albums have been decidedly not that. At best, they have landed with a limp and resounding "meh"; at worst, they raise questions about the taste levels of the parties involved.
I don't want to deride the last 3 albums from an artist who's been doing this for almost 4 decades. A dip in quality is, essentially, a given; even Bowie has plural duds. But I think it's part of the context that makes Tension feel so exciting and special. Like yes, Padam, but after having year to live with it, it's decidedly an album with multiple career highs, which is especially thrilling after a decade-long drought in that regard. (Admittedly, Shelby '68 is a strange and unexpected gem. Miss A Thing is a wonderful "Kylie Minogue song that sounds like a Kylie Minogue song" in all of its, affectionately, Fever b-side glory. Those last 30 seconds? Completely irresistible. It remains a personal favorite.)
Obviously, the title track is a triumph--after 20 years of ignoring the popup alert, someone finally ran a firmware update on the Kyborg!--as is its video, which is hands down one of the very best she's ever done. A high camp Lynchian Bladerunner fantasy? It's for the pretties, it's for the intellectuals, and if you can't appreciate it, I hope you find some better lighting in your life!
Story might be the most interesting track we've heard in a long while. I've seen plenty of lamentations on Kylie not tapping into more personal material, which--while understandable--I've always found to be a bit odd. I can understand the longing, but when we consider the Kylie Minogue story, there's... a lot of darkness there. From the death of Michael Hutchence to her cancer diagnosis and its repercussions, there have been profound heartbreaks in her life. Any single one of them would be enough to shatter someone, let alone multiple. There are glimpses into it to be caught in songs like Drunk and Flower, and though I understand the desire to delve deeper and find the art in her hardships, exploring that amount of darkness is rather at odds with Kylie Minogue the artist. Plainly, I don't think these explorations of heartbreak are the--no pun intended--story she wants to tell. (And outside of these hardships, what are we expecting an exploration in? The plights of selling bedazzled duvets?) Perhaps the revelation we consistently see from her is that of her persistence.
Hers is an unrelenting light in torrid darkness. It's triumphantly--joyously--overcoming adversity and heartbreak in similar means to the disco divas of her generation prior; to the house performances she emerged alongside. It's not a context we see often in her peers--in this regard, it's kind of just her and Madonna--and, like those disco and house divas of yore, this shining in the face of tragedy speaks to the uniquely queer appeal of Kylie Minogue. It's not simply the beckoning to the dancefloor, it's the thriving through the heartbreak that leads to finding solace on the dancefloor in the first place.
That maybe feels like a bit of a non-sequitur, but bear with me just a moment more. To this end, it's intriguing to hear Story acknowledge this sort of darkness in a way that feels true to her form, which is to say stoically and with reserve. We know she isn't going to spill her heart, but even still, the rather enigmatic nature leaves room for the listener to share and join her solace, much in that tradition of the dancefloor diva. (And as a matter of fact, I do have a bone to pick with how a term as historically valuable and authoritative as diva has somehow degraded into something as lame and infantilizing as "pop girl", but that's an incoherent rambling for another day. Ow, my back.) This sort of insight is not the exhausting "Me me me"-isms of self-centered Swiftian songwriting, but the more selfless sort--Jepsen-esque, perhaps--that taps into a personal truth to evoke a universal experience.
But then, this is a Kylie Minogue record; maybe it's not that deep. Let's move on before I discover just how much further my head can delve into my own ass.
There's so much goodness to come back to in the Tension album tracks. Are they perfect pop songs? Not exactly, but they're delightfully catchy, highly replayable and, for the most part, the production sounds like it will age with the somewhat unplaceable timelessness that's long been the quiet strength of Kylie's best work. (Tell me In Your Eyes doesn't sound like it could have been released during the 2020 disco revival, I dare you.)
Green Light is a breezy little number that I keep coming back to. It's Kylie Minogue doing her lovely brand of white disco, but now with more saxophone! It's not groundbreaking, but it's not trying to be; it's just good, easy fun. It's like macaroni and cheese at a gourmet buffet. Sure, it's not the most innovative thing on offer, but nobody's going to say no to mac and cheese--it's comforting, it's nostalgic, it makes me smile. (Lactose intolerants, hold your tongues.) Things We Do For Love just makes sense. It's an oddly fresh sound for someone who has actual 80's pop records, and it manages to build upon the soundscape from the back half of Aphrodite, namely Can't Beat The Feeling. It's quintessential Kylie without feeling like a retread.
Even the less standout tracks are still well-crafted pop songs. One More Time is a perfectly serviceable bop and a bit of mindless fun. There's something about her cadence that reminds me of a band that I can't quite put my finger on. Joywave, maybe? (And given her affection for 'indie' rock, I would not be surprised to discover that she's been bopping to Buy American.) You Still Get Me High would likely be a highlight if it weren't overshadowed and made a bit redundant by Things We Do.
Hold On To Now is a fine pop song that goes for the "emotopop" sound in ways that we've heard in the past and sometimes grow to love. (Admittedly, neither All The Lovers nor I Believe In You have ever been particular favorites of mine; I yield to the fact that I'm simply not the target audience here.) I understand the sentimentality of it and its placement in the Kylie canon as an "important" song--I appreciate it in the same way that I appreciate Dancing--it's just not my favorite. That's not a slight, more a comment on the quality of the rest of the album. Oh how we love a Kylie album where a damn fine pop song is outshined by damn finer pop songs.
On the other hand, Somebody To Love goes for the "emotopop" sound in a way that we haven't heard before. Exciting! There's a warm, analogue-ish fuzziness in the production that works so well with the timbre of her voice. I can't think of an equivalent sound in her discography, and I would love to hear this palette get explored more. It's such a solid album track and handily fits into the hazy, hypnotic electronic (Don't.) vibe set by Padam and the title track. It fleshes out the 'world' of the album; it makes it feel fuller and more complete, and... It's a bonus track.
Yes, a great Kylie Minogue album can't truly be a great Kylie Minogue album unless some of its best tracks are relegated to b-sides, bonus tracks and--oh what's that? She's pioneering into new territory here--digital deluxe tracks available to purchase for only one (1) week. But good goddamn, they are some tunes.
Drum sounds like a bizarre hybrid of Sparks and Waiting For The Sun--it's a sound that makes good on the unfulfilled promises of Kiss Me Once--and it's Kylie doing that ever so slightly left turn that she does so, so well. And though nobody should come to Kylie Minogue albums seeking deeply personal revelations, it feels like she's tapping into something true on this one that makes it all the more intriguing.
And then, there's 'The One'; that song you hope for from an artist in spite of disappointments, the passage of time, and all else. You keep coming back with nothing but blind hope defined only by the high standards they've set for themselves in the past, even if it feels more and more like a pipedream. You just know it's there in the cosmos somewhere, and maybe, just maybe, the stars might align one more time.
Heavenly Body has absolutely no place outside a list of Kylie Minogue's 10 best songs. It's evocative, it's romantic, it's trippy, it's cosmic, and it's gay as hell. It is Kylie Minogue. I have waited 15 years for This Song. I thought that with time that I might be able to put my thoughts on it into words but... what's the point? Just press play.
It's incredible, stellar, and one of her very, very best. It fits so comfortably alongside long adored deep cuts like Love Affair, Cupid Boy, and Cherry Bomb, and it's one of the most wonderful surprises I've experienced in my please don't make me say how many years of being a devout Minoguian. I completely adore this song, can never seem to listen to it only once, and absolutely cannot get it out of my head. (Let me have that one just this once. Please.)
But because I'm commenting on subjective matters online, I have to say hateful things.
The track list on the back half of the record is just not right. Not when the material for a great album is literally right there. Let's complain.
Hands is kind of corny, it's a bit Say So-redux from an artist who doesn't need to chase sounds from half a decade ago, and I personally just can't get past the fact that it's, by definition, unfinished. The hook in the chorus just isn't strong enough to justify not leaving it on the cutting room floor, and it's redundant next to Green Light, especially when the latter is the objectively better song.
Vegas High is lame as hell and that's a cold, hard fact. It's a straight up dud that sounds cynically born to serve no other purpose than to advertise to people that she spent a couple of weeks in Vegas in a brief residency since past. It goes for a 'harder' dance sound that she's done in the past, but doesn't clear the bar set by those past successes and instead leaves me spending the run time wondering why I'm not listening to different, better Kylie Minogue songs. "You're wrong, it must be a great track because she almost named the album after it!" cry some from the back--likely the same sorts who find themselves defending Kiss Me Once and saying that Let's Get To It is a misunderstood gem, mistaking their own deliberate obtuseness for individuality, ceaselessly driven by an immutable force to proclaim progressively worsening cold takes--to which I offer this counterpoint: But she didn't. Moving on.
All of this rambling serves to get to the crux of my point. There is an incredible Kylie Minogue album here, and one that deserves a place among some of her best work. I'm not typically a fan of 'fixed' versions of albums. Generally, the only thing to glean from them is that the original track listings get it right about 95% of the time. (Beyoncé's 4 is most certainly an outlier here.) But since this is Popjustice, and because I've already gone on this long, I would be remiss not to post my 'fixed' version of Tension with even more color commentary.
1. Padam Padam
2. Hold On To Now
3. Things We Do For Love
4. Tension
5. One More Time
6. You Still Get Me High
7. Somebody To Love (This song belongs exactly here as the heart of the record and that's that. I mentioned before how this works into and builds the soundscape of the album, but even lyrically, this one's got some of the most Tension. And after 6 relatively high tempo tracks, a breather feels really good here. The comedown from You Still Get Me High fading into the opening synths for this one just sounds right, intentional even, and the fade out into the filtered vocal opening of Green Light is almost just as satisfying a transition back into the dance-y stuff. Just try it, you'll love it.)
8. Green Light
9. Heavenly Body (There's a deep house-y bass running under the end of Green Light that kinda ties into the bassline here, and I think that makes the transition work. The abrupt ending of the former into the "ahh"s works as a head turn moment. It's a bit jarring in an attention grabbing sort of way, like you know something's about to pop off.)
10. Just Imagine (This sounds like a penultimate track; an electronic 11 o'clock number. It evokes those same feelings of tension as Somebody To Love and fleshes out the album's thematic a bit more. Sonically, it starts to wrap things up and makes this feel like a realized Album; the proverbial 'album track.' It's no standout, but the narrative doesn't feel complete without it.)
11. Story
Bonus Tracks:
12. Love Train (This song is silly and dumb and I adore it. It's plain goofy, and as a two-time psych ward inpatient I have clearance to say that it takes an especially miserable sort of person to be unphased by the sheer amount of jubilant stupidity here. If you're struggling to appreciate the joy in Kylie Minogue's Love Train, talk to your doctor about bupropion today!)
13. Drum (A very good song that simply doesn't fit in the context of the album.)
14. 10 Out Of 10 (Did you know that this song sounds so much better when it's a frivolous bonus addition and not an album track proper? It's almost fun now, even if it's just a vehicle to recycle the bassline from Helden's In The Dark remix.)
And while you're at it, you might as well use the superior cover variant. I find the blurred neon haze better captures the overall mood here, even with the free-to-use font selection.
2. Hold On To Now
3. Things We Do For Love
4. Tension
5. One More Time
6. You Still Get Me High
7. Somebody To Love (This song belongs exactly here as the heart of the record and that's that. I mentioned before how this works into and builds the soundscape of the album, but even lyrically, this one's got some of the most Tension. And after 6 relatively high tempo tracks, a breather feels really good here. The comedown from You Still Get Me High fading into the opening synths for this one just sounds right, intentional even, and the fade out into the filtered vocal opening of Green Light is almost just as satisfying a transition back into the dance-y stuff. Just try it, you'll love it.)
8. Green Light
9. Heavenly Body (There's a deep house-y bass running under the end of Green Light that kinda ties into the bassline here, and I think that makes the transition work. The abrupt ending of the former into the "ahh"s works as a head turn moment. It's a bit jarring in an attention grabbing sort of way, like you know something's about to pop off.)
10. Just Imagine (This sounds like a penultimate track; an electronic 11 o'clock number. It evokes those same feelings of tension as Somebody To Love and fleshes out the album's thematic a bit more. Sonically, it starts to wrap things up and makes this feel like a realized Album; the proverbial 'album track.' It's no standout, but the narrative doesn't feel complete without it.)
11. Story
Bonus Tracks:
12. Love Train (This song is silly and dumb and I adore it. It's plain goofy, and as a two-time psych ward inpatient I have clearance to say that it takes an especially miserable sort of person to be unphased by the sheer amount of jubilant stupidity here. If you're struggling to appreciate the joy in Kylie Minogue's Love Train, talk to your doctor about bupropion today!)
13. Drum (A very good song that simply doesn't fit in the context of the album.)
14. 10 Out Of 10 (Did you know that this song sounds so much better when it's a frivolous bonus addition and not an album track proper? It's almost fun now, even if it's just a vehicle to recycle the bassline from Helden's In The Dark remix.)
And while you're at it, you might as well use the superior cover variant. I find the blurred neon haze better captures the overall mood here, even with the free-to-use font selection.
I strongly feel that you should listen to the above tracks in the above order at least once. I promise you you'll walk away knowing that you've just listened to the best Kylie Minogue album since Aphrodite, possibly even better still. And then you'll probably listen again.
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