Noise Next Door - She Might
This is the boys who ruin Henley-on-Thames' nice reputation's first single on a major label (Warner Bros) and also marks the ditching of their bright red hair colour. Obviously it is irredeemably terrible, although perhaps a little more bearable than Calendar Girl and Lock Up Ya Daughters. They are, according to The Box's voice-over man, aiming for a Good Charlotte look and sound, although I can't hear anything more than a very dull copy of Busted's worst single (Sleeping With The Light On). They're all totally ugly, tuneless and pitifully uncool - how can they possibly succeed? They just better not.
0% Poptastic!

Ben Adams - Sorry
There is something about Ben that seems much older and more mature now. Not just cos he is older but also his facial expressions and mannerisms have changed so much. He appears to have much more self-control and a new-found serious side, and as much as I want fun pop stars, he was pretty annoying in the old days and now he seems quite charming. Anyway, the song and the video are what I am reviewing and I have to say, as much as I like both, it's not enough to change the world. He could probably just about manage a top 10 hit thanks to all the record company support he's getting and his new improved buffness, but I don't think this song is quite enough to get the success he could possibly have with a more original-sounding and generally better debut single.
86% Poptastic!

Timo Maas - The First Day
I thought Timo Maas was a 'proper' DJ doing the kind of dance music only dull 20 year old boys (and older men in a mid-life crisis) listen to, and I think he usually is, but this new one is really good! The buff hottie in the video helps quite a lot. Otherwise it's kind of repetitive but the bit they're repeating is ace so I don't mind. I thought the singer sounded a bit like Mr Placebo and it turns out he has worked with Timo on his new album so I guess this must be it - well spotted, me! It also features an unknown girl singer called Jo Kate.
75% poptastic!

This CD has been around a few years now but seeing as it's only £2.99 in Virgin at the moment, there's no better time to get your copy of what has, for me, been one of the nicest surprises I've had from an album. Here's my review of a very eclectic and interesting CD...



You can listen to all the tracks from the album here.

The lyrics on the whole album are amazing, if at times slightly surreal. He's nowhere near an amazing singer but there's something extremely lovely about his voice. He seems like a normal guy, yet the lyrics are quite poetic - he was often compared to Mike Skinner, but I think Just Jack (real name Jack Allsopp) is everything Mike is supposed to be, a hundred times better. He doesn't need a Dry Your Eyes - he's got a whole album of songs even more moving and certainly much cleverer. Jack may be from London but he's no cockney geezer.

The title of the first track, Let's Get Really Honest, is never sung - it's actually a spoken sample. Jack himself doesn't start singing til 52 seconds in. Before that the song builds up with extra layers and sound effects gradually added. He has nicked Dido's bongo sound from Thank You and I'm sure you will all recognise the backing track as that of 10CC's I'm Not In Love.

Paradise (Lost & Found) was the first song I ever heard by Just Jack, when he appeared on Popworld many years ago. It was a 'behind the scenes' on his video shoot in a car park, reflecting the general glamour of his career. I didn't hear of him again until his album was reviewed in Popworld magazine in 2003 (which told me that he had been heavily praised by the 'cool' media but had little public interest) but I hadn't yet heard enough of him to want to buy it. Buying this album is the first time I'd heard this song in full. It has a nice rhyme of "found" and "ground" in the catchy chorus, a walkie talkie bit and a female singer named Roz James.

The next time I heard of Just Jack was when I randomly came across the video for his next single, Snowflakes (also featuring Roz James), on UTV. Due to U presumably standing for Urban, I'm not a regular viewer so it was quite a shock to find something good on the channel. I certainly wouldn't say Jack was particularly urban - at least he doesn't sound tough or very chavvy. Snowflakes was the only song of his I could find to download and it has been on my 'to post' list on Into The Groove ever since the site began. The lyrics on this song are particularly great, it's extremely dramatic and emotional, and I'd definitely call it the strongest song of the CD overall. I especially love the line "instinctive spasm in the chasm". It's just nice to say, even if I'm not entirely sure what it means in it's context. If you ever need a song to be upset and frustrated to, there can't be one better than this. Violins, pianos, big crashing sound effects - Snowflakes has got it all!

Jack's London accent is more obvious than usual on the sombre track 4, Deep Thrills. There is a sample from a piece of music called Como Ruge La Candela by Calve y Guaganco. Heartburn is one of my favourite songs on the album. It's a much warmer sound after the dark songs before it, despite not actually being very cheery at all. It makes me feel quite warm and cosy, anyway, with a nice syrupy electro sound with a chorus making it verge on a regular love song. It could be a rather mellow electropop ballad. Eye To Eye features a singer called Sammy D, although I can't work out which bit he or she sings. Research suggests a house music DJ. The song is fairly poppy and the chorus could be from a particularly cool and, more notably, good Craig David song.

Contradictions is another good track, reminding me very, very much of one of my topsest bands, Contradictions. In fact, I tend to forget whilst listening to it that it's not them. It would also make a good theme tune for a kids' spy-themed cartoon. It also has trumpets! Yay! Snapshot Memories is a rather long track which actually sounds like several different songs in one. There are a few lines and sounds that link the different section, but otherwise they're all quite different. I suppose they must be representing different memories of Jack's.

Triple Tone Eyes is one of the more upbeat songs on the album, although the singing isn't fast, the music certainly is, especially at the chorus. It's almost techno at some points! The final track, Ain't Too Sad, is the antidote to Dry Your Eyes - Jack isn't going to sob about his lost love, he's moving on and knows it's for the best. A sensible man! That's rare. But then he starts going on about "crying all the time" so perhaps he's not quite as strong as he says. Oh well.

I've decided that I don't want my favourite European pop stars releasing over here anymore. This is because, as with Kim-Lian, they tend to arrive with completely the wrong song for the UK market, get compared to someone totally inappropriate (in this case Lolly), be ignored or laughed at by everyone who has any influence over the charts and then miss them completely. With Alcazar it worked OK - they did well enough for their video to appear on the music channels a fair amount and I got to see their faces on the singles rack in Woolies and was able to put them at the top of my top 100 singles of last year, yet they were not around so much that I ever got bored of the acetastic song. The next band to take the plunge are Swedish quirky pop-rockers Melody Club, who released their song Electric in the UK in 2004 with little effect and, after supporting Kylie on her tour all over Europe (they're in Manchester tonight and London this weekend - don't miss them if you're going cos I know from experience, they're totally ace live!), they're having another go with their very best single, Baby (watch the utterly fabulous video here). I posted the song on Into The Groove a while ago, so hopefully people will still go out and buy the single. In fact, I'm going to demand that you do! But if, as is very likely, they don't get the success they deserve (ie. 10 weeks at no.1), they'll still be releasing great pop in their homeland and I will never get bored of them.

I review videos from around the globe, and mark them with globes out of 5. Genius, if I do say so myself!

Representing the UK: Triple 8 - Good To Go
Wow! This is actually good! I was a fan of Triple 8 in their heyday (a short and quiet one as it was) but after the only 2 members with an ounce of star quality left (I know Sparx is attempting a solo career but has anyone heard from David?) I wasn't expecting much from their comeback single. Yet it is good! The dance routines in the video are OTT and all wrong, like a bad 'N Sync tribute, but they make up for it by having a female star who looks just like Summer off the OC!


Representing America: 4th Avenue Jones - Stereo
This band sound like the lovechild of Outkast and the Red Hot Chilli Peppers, yet a Google reveals them to be a strong force in Christian hip-hop. With the trend for rowdy band members to suddenly turn to Jesus recently, perhaps they would have been better keeping it under wraps a bit longer. The video for Stereo is Outkast's GhettoMusick mixed with Darren Hayes' video for Pop!ular (well, he carries a stereo around and I wanted to mention him cos I haven't for a while). The song is very good in places, but there aren't that many of them.


Representing Norway: Kristin Frogner - Stars Above My Head
I'd never heard of Kristin before but she turns out to be the Norwegian Amy Studt, excpet whatever it was that Amy lacked, allowing the public to somehow not take her to their hearts, Kristin has in abundance. The song is incredibly beautiful, as if the video, as is the girl. She is a mysterious little pixie with this gentle, folky (yet not alienatingly so) voice, combining to create something simply undeniable.


Representing Sweden: Chick Habit - Rule The World
Calling Flum! Calling Flum! Three of them look like Nicola Roberts! One even has a side-ponytail! Since there are five of them and they rock legwarmers and stilettos in a very 80s way, they are officially the Girls Aloud of rock. And Swedish! They also have a totally ace album cover and have named their album after a Rachel Stevens song (sort of). It's like every pop fan's birthday come at once!

I was all ready to pay out loads of kronas to import Robyn's new album, especially when I heard she'd been working with Teddybears Sthlm on it, but I just thought I'd check CD Wow in case by some miracle they had the CD and, amazingly, they did! For just £8.75! So any of you trying to interpret Swedish in order to get hold of a copy of the album, which includes a ballad called Robot Boy, stop now and get yourself to www.cd-wow.com! If you're unsure go first to www.robyn.com to listen to clips of the whole album and watch the acetastic video for Be Mine. CD Wow also have the excellent 2005 Melodifestivalen CD for a very reasonable (well, the cheapest you're gonna find it right now!) £12.99. Wow!

With all the 80s pop on TV at the moment with Hit Me Baby One More Time, endless Mania programmes, PWL Radio and all kinds of 80s-themed shows literally popping up on VH1 and Magic, I have been getting quite into the 80s sound recently. I may have only been 2 years and 10 days old at the start of the 90s, but so many of my favourite artists and styles are 80s influenced that I am quite a fan of 80s music. Then last week 2 new 80s compilation albums were released and I looked at the tracklistings and noticed how many good songs were on them, but they were both full of extended remixes rather than the originals. So, inspired by the idea of a poptastic 80s compilation, I found their section in HMV and after discarding several School Disco and Friends Reunited CDs I came across a 3 CD boxset named "I Love Music: 1980-1984: It's Electric" - it sounded like my kind of music already! I quickly scanned the tracks and saw that although I only recognised a few of the song titles, I loved almost all of them so I decided to give it a try.

When I got home and started listening to the CDs I soon found that I knew many more of the tracks than I had thought. In fact almost all of the songs I recognised from samples or cover versions or simply being that song you always hear on the background on TV and never consider who might be singing it and never realise that you actually rather love it! So I have decided to review every track on the 3 CDs so that everyone else whose too young to remember or has simply forgotten can go "so that's who sang it!" and "so that's where I'd heard it!" with me.

I'm going to start with CD 1 and CDs 2 & 3 will follow in further posts. You can buy the CD yourself for the extremely good price of £7.99 (much less than I paid for it, grr!) by clicking here.

CD 1:

1. Kim Wilde - Kids In America
A very well known track first and certainly a favourite of mine. Kim Wilde may be more into gardening these days, but she did release an ace single 2 years ago in Europe, a duet with German 80s pop girl Nena. This song has also been covered recently by Dutch pop starlet Kim-Lian and the American Juniors. Her sister Roxanne has also had a few cracks at the charts but no success. If only Avalon Heights had been set in 80s America, S Club 8 could have covered this as a single and would undoubtedly still be around today.

2. Duran Duran - Planet Earth
Duran Duran are still around of course, giving me nightmares (I can't be the only one with a Simon Le Bon Phobia, surely?). I don't really 'get' their appeal but I actually quite like this one. It sounds more modern than the music they're releasing now!

3. Ultravox - All Stood Still
Ultravox are simply rubbish and Midge Ure may well have helped raise millions of pounds for charity, but he is also to blame for the painful pink-haired thing out of the Faders. This one's far more upbeat than Vienna and a lot less depressing, but I won't be forgiving him quite yet.

4. The Stranglers - Golden Brown
Here's one I had no idea that I knew, but it turns out to be a lovely song. It's the one that goes "golden brown, something something something, lays me down, blah blah blah blah". The singer sounds quite old, as all singers seemed to in the olden-days. Apart from the Osmonds, obviously. I have heard of the Stranglers but I thought they were from the 70s so perhaps that's why Mr Strangler sounds old.

5. Generation X - Dancing With Myself
I think someone did this recently on a TV show - was it Adrian Edmondson? It's a great catchy song anyway. The "ohohoh"s in the background are very 90s.

6. Blondie - Call Me
We all know this one. And if you don't, big shame on you. Blondie are all kinds of ace and this is definitely my favourite of their singles. Why aren't Girls Aloud covering this instead of that awful Chris Isaak song?

7. Kajagoogoo - Too Shy
Limahl was of course last seen on last week's Hit Me Baby One More Time, proving that if you were useless in the 80s there is no way you're going to be good now. I hate Too Shy and I know I'm far from alone in the sentiment. This is not a song that will be covered any time soon, unless someone wants me to personally go to their house and beat them up!

8. Culture Club - Time (Clock Of The Heart)
This is one which I never knew was by Culture Club or that I love it until I heard it on this CD. The chorus is just brilliant and lovely. Who knew there was more to Culture Club than Karma Chameleon and Do You Really Want To Hurt Me?!

9. Heaven 17 - Temptation
As I was surprised to notice with many of these songs, this sounds very Motown-eqsue. It's quite dramatic with a worryingly high-pitched female singer on the chorus and a deep-voiced man on the verses/bridge. Quite a good song overall.

10. Spandau Ballet - To Cut A Long Story Short
I knew this one but for some reason thought it was Adam Ant! It's much better than True or Gold in my opinion and I don't (knowingly!) know any others of their songs. This could easily be the Bravery or Kaiser Chiefs or any of the current 80s-esque indie-poppers.

11. Tenpole Tudor - Swords Of A Thousand Men
This is one I definitely didn't know, it's quite catchy but a little too football chant-ish for me. Perhaps the medieval answer to football chants!

12. Kim Carnes - Bette Davis Eyes
As soon as I heard this I recognised it from it's repeated sample in Mylo's In My Arms. Kim has a very croaky voice but it doesn't stop this from being an unbelievably brilliant song. If there's one song on this CD that I would tell every one of you to hear, this is it. It's just SO good! The music, the lyrics, even her singing when you get used to it - amazing!

13. Dr Hook - Sharing The Night Together
Dr Hook may have indirectly provided 911 with their only no.1 single, but I have to cross with him for that reason - if they hadn't covered and had a hit with it they might sing Bodyshakin' (with the best rap ever!) on Hit Me Baby instead, but now the chance is basically non-existent (if they even turn up now that Lee has broken his leg!). This song is even more rubbish than A Little Bit More and very similar to it.

14. Julian Lennon - Too Late For Goodbyes
It only occured to me whilst listening to this song that Julian Lennon would be slightly Oriental looking, having Yoko Ono for a mum. I had always imagined him to look just like his dad, probably because he's called Julian. This is what he actually looks like. He sounds more like his dad and as the only thing the Beatles were good for in my view was songwriting, and this song is rubbish, it's no wonder Julian didn't get very far.

15. Pat Benatar - Love Is A Battlefield
Bizarrely, I only know this song because Fab (they of spare B*Witched sister non-fame) covered it in the late 90s. I can't remember their version but I highly doubt it was good. The original is fairly ace though. Edit: now Carrie has done it (very painfully) on American Idol, I like the original even more in comparison.

16. Billy Idol - Hot In The City
Apart from causing much surreal amusement in The Wedding Singer, Billy Idol seems pretty pointless to me. This is rubbish.

17. OMD - Locomotion
Well I was very disappointed that this was not the Kylie song. And I've just realised that OMD and Orchestral Manoevres In The Dark are one and the same, so I'm feeling quite silly right now. The song is sort of familiar sounding, but it's no Kylie. It gets quite good with claps at the end, though.

18. Leo Sayer - More Than I Can Say
Mr Sayer can of course be currently seen 'hilariously' not being recognised by anyone at all in the Hit Me Baby... sponsorship adverts. What he's advertising I haven't noticed, so it's clearly not too effective. This song however is really quite good! Very cheesy and soppy and I'm quite certain that no-one under 50 should like it, but I do. It's quite Fleetwood Mac-ish which is very good in my book (I was brought up on 'the Mac'!).

19. Juice Newton - Angel Of The Morning
This, to my surprise, is the original version of Shaggy's song Angel from a few years ago. I knew it was a cover but I had no idea what of. And now I know! It's quite dramatic but there's lots of similar songs which sound better, and it keeps making me burst into Everything I Own and You Win Again simultaneously, which isn't the most fun thing ever. Also, I'm sure it says "just brush my teeth before you leave" - what's that all about?!

20. KC & The Sunshine Band - Give It Up
You will definitely know this one, at least the "nanana"s which have been in an advert for something-or-other. It's utterly glorious and makes me want to dance in a very silly way!

The new videos by Bodies Without Organs and Robyn have both just been put online. Click on the pictures below to watch them!



Martin nearly naked!
Marina flying!
Alexander being really weird...oh, that's normal.



Robyn is officially the coolest and most talented girl in pop.

Missy Higgins - 10 Days
This is a great song from Missy 'Misdemeanor' Higgins, but I am quite surprised that she didn't release Scar, her first big hit in her home country of Australia. 10 Days is really nice too if a little less remarkable lyrics-wise. She comes across as really sweet and pixie-like in her videos, which makes her extremely likeable and her voice is lovely. She, her voice and her lyrics all have personality and that's definitely what we need in the charts.
87% Poptastic!

Cookie - Do It Again
The most interesting thing about Cookie is that one member is Nicola, the trashy blonde girl who made the Popstars: The Rivals final 10 but left before even taking the stage to be replaced by the fabulous Nicola Roberts. This makes it quite ironic that Cookie are a mixture of Girls Aloud and Clea. The song is a little catchier than Download It, although not necessarily better, and the video is (astonishingly) even worse. Their lip-syncing and dance routines are ridiculously out of time. Watch the arm crossing bit in the chorus - one of the girls is always a couple of seconds behind the others.
61% Poptastic!

Groove Coverage - Poison
A very odd thing happened today. I was browsing Clip Top 40 again and decided to watch this very video since I thought it had missed the UK charts completely and I was never going to see the video. Then I switched on the TV and guess what was on The Box? This very video! So it seems that they may be on their way to UK success after all, and I'm very pleased because this was one of the best Euro dance hits of last year and considering all the utterly rubbish dance that's done well in the UK recently, this definitely deserves some love from our dancefloors, to put it just as cheesily as I'm sure they would.
92% Poptastic!

Other video news:

Keisha White has made a good song at last with the VS-esque Don't Fool A Woman In Love.

I keep mistaking Oasis' new video for Mark Joseph - there's some deep irony in there somewhere!

The Futureheads are a bit rubbish when not covering Kate Bush.

It's Gavin Degraw!!!!!

Although I must inform anyone who still isn't a fan yet that he couldn't be further from Norah Jones. He's good for a start! Basically, ignore their going on about jazz, it's very wrong.

I have a new favourite web site - ClipTop40.nl, where you can watch in full all of the videos in the Dutch top 40 and many of the artists' past videos too! It's rare to find so many good quality current videos in one place on the Internet, so I thought I'd make use of the site and review their current top 10 videos:

1. Ali B - Leipe Mocro Flavour
This guy appears to be the Dutch Kenzie. He also looks a bit like It's typical European rap ie. sounds like American rap from 5 years ago (perhaps early Eminem) without even less comprehensible lyrics. It is quite bouncy though. The video concept appears to be dropping Ali and friends in the middle of a children's TV show and hoping for the best! 4/10

2. Artiesten Voor Azië - Als Je iets Kan Doen
This is the Dutch answer to Band Aid, raising money for the tsunami victims. I presume the title means All That We (or I?) Can Do. It's just a ballad sung in Dutch (obviously) with the now obligatory 'urban bit' near the end. The most exciting bit is when Sita is on. She is extremely ace, but doesn't get to sing anything on her own. Boo! It's also quite amazing that they managed to get all these people on stage at once - they'd never manage it with UK artists, all the big ones are too busy trying to break America all the time. 5/10

3. Joy Gruttman - Schnappi
This is not a song about the drink but in fact a crocodile called Schnappi - Snappy in English. It's the current craze that's sweeping Europe, starting in Germany and now most countries have several versions in their charts, as is customary with these novelty hits these days. It is basically a little girl singing about Snappy the little crocodile and it is sweet for the first listen but soon gets very annoying. The video is, unsurprisingly, a cartoon and a very basic one at that. I hope this doesn't come to the British charts next. 3/10

4. Anouk - Girl
Now this is why the Dutch are ace! Anouk is one of my favourite Dutch popstars (alongside Sita, Elize, Within Temptation...) and this may well be her best song yet. It's certainly her poppiest. She's usually the queen of angst, scaring all men in sight, and this is just as feisty as ever but you can sort of dance to it too (or at least bounce on your seat). The video is a little out of sync which is a shame but you can still see how brilliantly ace it is. How does someone so pretty and girly looking have such a strong deep voice? It's quite weird. Keep watching the video cos there's some great dancing near the end that's like evil version of Can't Get You Out Of My Head. 9/10

5. J-Lo - Get Right
You all know this one.

6. Douwe Egberts - Ik ben je bitch niet
This appears to be an advert so we will ignore it too.

7. Elize - Automatic
This is quite possibly the best pop single of the year so far. If it's not the biggest dance hit of the year I shall be not only shocked but horrified - it deserves nothing less. If Call On Me can get to no.1 for 7 weeks or however ridicuously long it was, then this should be no.1 for at least a year. It's a good video in that Elize looks good and it fits the song, but I would have preferred it to be more of a girls going out having fun video than this almost desperately sexy one. This should be a song for girls (and boys) to dance their socks off to, not just for pervy men to ogle. It's just too good to fall to that level. 10/10

8. Raffish - Plaything
This band should be the Dutch answer to Girls Aloud since they were the product of their Popstars The Rivals, and although they're nowhere near the dizzy hights of No Good Advice, this is a pretty good effort. They're all fairly stylish and good-looking (although one does look a little like Keisha Sugababe from some angles) and the song is catchy r'n'b pop - it's not amazing but it's definitely a grower. The video looks amusing like Hear'say's for Pure & Simple. It's nothing groundbreaking but better than most of the reality show winners' singles these days. 7/10

9. Eminem - Toy Soldiers
Boring! (except the Martika bit)

10. Linkin Park - Numb/Encore ft. Jay-Z
Boring!

And the winner...of Pope Idol...2005...is........

Madonna! Hurrah!

Here's what you should be looking at on the Internet if you have any sense at all:

The new Stylus UK Singles Jukebox is up and if you look closely you might even recognise one of the contributors!

Anyone who has seen the Conservative party election campaign currently appearing on seemingly every billboard in Britain, will not fail to recognise the brilliance of this.

And finally, this is a very ace new site by an equally ace Canadian who, for once, is not part of the Wainwright clan.

So it's week 2 and nowhere near as good as the first week but there were a couple of good ones. Here's my review:

Shakin' Stevens - When they showed him at the radio station I actually thought it was Mike Read. Then Mike himself was randomly on Ant & Dec an hour later which was very spooky! And annoying because I don't like either of them. However, the mums were out in force as expected and it was no suprise that he won given his lack of strong competition.

Jaki Graham - Her song was only no.7 in the charts so she had a setback already and from hearing her voice in the clips she seems to have lost whatever talent she had. Her singing was reasonable but not as amazing as the betting guy was proclaiming. Leave Your Game to Will, eh?

Belinda Carlisle - Very disappointing! Heaven Is A Place On Earth is obviously a fab song but her performance was not very good and her Coldplay cover was extremely boring. She was our only hope against 'Shaky' and his army of mums and she let us down. Go back to France!

Haddaway - Hurrah! Someone good! When Howard Jones announced last week he was going to sing What Is Love the only song I could think ofcalled that was this one. Then, 2nd spooky coincidence of the night, here is a Haddaway a week later singing this What Is Love! It is a top song and his version of Toxic was slightly scary but still better than any of the other covers. I love my 90s Eurodance so it would have been great if he'd won but it was never likely.

Dr & The Medics - How sad to still be dressing like that at their age. They're just like the Darkness well ahead of their time. Lets hope they are as unknown as Dr & the Medics in 20 years' time (or now would do fine!).

And next week it's Nick Heyward (Haircut 100) (my mum likes him), Carol Decker (yay!), Baccara (more yay!), Mica Paris (don't know her songs) and The Pasadenas (no idea!).

How ace was Hit Me Baby One More Time tonight? A quick rundown of my thoughts:

Gloria Gaynor - She still sounded great and that is obviously a total classic of a song, but it's been praised many a time and she is gettin gan a bit so it's time for someone else to take the glory, I think. Plus, she didn't do Dirrty - if she had I'd be backing her all the way! The discofied Beautiful was quite ace, though.

Howard Jones - I'd been trying all week to work out what he sang and now I can finally match the song to the man. I don't think he was particularly good though, and bizarrely small! I was interested to hear that he worked with the Sugababes though - apparently it was the album track Blue which he produced.

Honeyz - I was very disappointed with their singing, which was not very good at all. I quite liked Finally Found when it came out, even bought the single, but it sounded even worse than their cover version, which is pretty bad considering it was Nickelback! Strangely, I never knew until tonight that Heavenli was German.

Limahl - Yesterday I told my mum who was lined up for the show. Her reaction to Limahl's name was, "Lemar? He's only just come out!" I explained that this was not the Fame Academy graduate, but the 80s style disaster, Limahl. This evening when Limahl was announced my Grandma said, "Lemar's still going, isn't he?" I explained again. Then, half way through his song, my Grandad said, "I thought Lemar was black!" I couldn't be botherd to explain. Limahl was rubbish - they should have got Lemar instead.

Tiffany - Tiffany's was my favourite of the original songs, and she put in a great performance. She's still young enough to be a pop star. In fact, she reminded me of Lena Ph and for a minute I imagined I was watching Melodifestivalen. Ah, if only. I just wish Tiffany had done one of GA's more 80s songs as that would've been the height of irony. An 80s popstar covering a pretend 80s song, better than most songs actually from the 80s.

I'm excited about next week, but I don't think it'll be as good as the first show. The only people we could make out from the pictures at the end were Shakin' Stevens and Dr & The Medics, neither of which I'm a fan of, but maybe the others will be good. I'm sure it'll be another fun cheesy show anyway!

Sadly the pope has now gone up to the spirit in the sky, so the heat is on to find his successor. And why shouldn't it be a pop star? According to this web site, Jesus himself was the first pop star! The main criteria for being a pope must surely be that they are Catholic, so here are the 5 contestants and a bit about their Catholicism:

Contestant No. 1: Morrissey
Morrissey is famous for his Irish Catholic upbringing and recently took to dressing as a Catholic priest during concerts.

Contestant No. 2: Madonna
Madonna was Catholic until she reached high school and began to rebel. She and her husband recently attended a party dressed as a nun and the Pope, which of course upset the Catholics so perhaps now is her time to redeem herself?

Contestant No. 3: Stephen Gately
In an interview with NME (yes you read that right!) he said: "I've been brought up to be Catholic, but I don't know the last time I was in church! I believe in God in my own way and do my own things like meditation."

Contestant No. 4: Liz from Atomic Kitten
She told Newsround: "I'm from a Catholic background and I saw a nun when I was in a supermarket in London. I was laughing with my mate but, as soon as I saw the nun, I shut up and said: "Excuse me sister, can I help you?""

Contestant No. 5: Will Smith
He went to Catholic school for nine years. He wouldn't be the first black pope - that honour went to St Victor in the late 2nd century, so perhaps he should stick to running for president?

Vote now for the winner of Pope Idol!

Just like Busted, the media are looking for a replacement for the Pope before he's even dead. But surely in this day and age there is only one to find someone suitably for the job...a reality show! Visit Dirrrty Pop tomorrow for episode 1 of Pope Idol where we will introduce the contestants.

Candee Jay - Lose This Feeling
I was hoping this would be good because we need some good quality Europop in this country but sadly it is not. It's by the producers of Alice Deejay, but obviously Alice (if she really was called that - I was never quite sure) was the necessary ingredient for aceness cos Candee Jay is lacking in anything remotely pop starry.

Morcheeba - Wonders Never Cease
I know this band are generally considered to be at the heart of Dullsville, I actually quite like some of their songs. They have a new vocalist called daisy who is clearly just Swedish pop girl Pauline Kamusewu in disguise. Not only does she sound just like her in voice but this song could be off Pauline's own (very ace) album. It's a nice single but not as good as the Pauline songs (particularly Answer).

Weezer - Beverley Hills
What has happened to Weezer? They used to be quite good, for a rock band, but their new single is quite rubbish! It's nothing like what they usually release. The singer, whose name I forget, still looks geeky and adorable, but it's set in the Playboy Mansion, which is nowhere near twee enough for my liking.

Videos I'm loving this week:
Justin Timberlake (I'm ignoring his companions) - Signs
HAL - Play The Hits
The Killers - Smile Like You Mean It

And the ones I'm avoiding at all costs:
The Gaff - Weirdo
J-Lo & Fat Joe - Hold You Down
50 Cent - Candy Shop