Girls Aloud - 'Sexy! No No No...'
Frankly if we were grading on punctuation alone, I wouldn't know what to give this song. On the one hand, the exclamation mark and ellipsis show an encouraging sense of invention that deserves rewarding. On the other hand, the fact that the punctuation as listed in the song title bears little resemblance to how the lyrics are used in the song itself suggests a somewhat slapdash approach, which quite possibly ought to be nipped in the bud. Oh fiddlesticks! I'm just going to have to judge this on the strength of the song itself, aren't I?
Hooray, it's a corker! Phew! Arguably the first proper Girls Aloud song since 'Biology'. 'Something Kinda Ooooh' was good, but might as well have been a Stonebridge track for all of the idiosyncratic Aloudness it possessed, and it had many fretting that they were heading down a generic dance track from which there might be no return.
Fortunately 'Sexy! No No No...' marks their welcome return to the 'edgy pop' category: the first 35 seconds are probably the most exciting 35 seconds of pop I've heard so far this year, with Cheryl's voice being fed through the Distortotron and leaving us with a ringing, brittle sense of hollowness. Angst! In a Girls Aloud song! Can you imagine?
Actually, it's a shame that at the 35" marker it blows out into an electropop extravaganza, because I'd love for them to have explored that slow, reflective yet spunky beginning more deeply (in the same way that I don't really like David Guetta vs The Egg's 'Love Don't Let Me Go' after the first 40 seconds), but at the same time you've got to appreciate the fact that they experimented with that idea, gave us just enough for effect and moved on to something else, rather than potentially creating a 3:30 electremo wallowfest that could possibly have sent us all screaming and running back to 'Love Machine'. Moderation. It's an underrated quality.
The rest of the song is classic Aloud: cheeky, knowing, energetic and catchy, and opting for a selection of choruses instead of a second verse (seldom a bad idea). Highpoints include the repetition of "my d-d-dirty mind" in the verses, and the robotic "Hell no!" in the chorus. It perhaps doesn't move pop on much from 'Biology', but they're so ridiculously ahead of most of their contemporaries right now (not being a hater, but the new Sugababes song is embarrassingly poor) that even staying still is progress.
It all comes as a welcome relief when so many of us were predicting a dissolution of the band following the Greatest Hits and the celebrity romances, but it seems like the Girls girls aren't planning to hang up the towel just yet. Which is good, because frankly at this stage if they didn't exist we'd have to invent them, and I'm not sure you can luck into a pop group this good twice in a decade.
Download: Out now
CD Released: September 3rd
(Steve Perkins)
Comments
this song is just absolutely brilliant! since the first time i've heard it i couldn't get it out oof my mind.
Truly one of their best songs to date ...Though I think biology is still my fave ga track..
anyway...i think it deserves 5 stars...
:)
Odd? As the "world's biggest Girls Aloud fan" - fishul - at least according to Nicolas restraining order, I was (and am) hugely disappointed by this.
Whilst I appreciate that bleeps, swooshes and vocal hoohahs that would have embarrassed Peter Frampton (ask grandpa), are what passes for cutting edge these days, this song is singularly lacking in one very imprtant aspect.
A song.
I'll still buy it, just to make sure that they keep on truckin' a wee while longer, but they really need to find a killer tune sometime soon.
I quite like the fact this song rather shows all those nu-ravers how to do it by basically sounding like something of 'Fat Of The Land,' only in the 21st Century and by Girls Aloud. Oh and having better make up than the Klaxons, obviously.
Incidentally, absolutely agree about the electro-atmospheric bit at the beginning, was kind of hoping they'd reprise it at the end but still, stonking battlecry of pop is probably as good as we can hope for innit.
I like the beginning bit, in a strange kind of way, but the rest...I don't know. and the video is ever-so-slightly creepy :S
...what a crap song >:-((
i dont like this song, it repeats its words way too much and i find the video a bit creey! i love girls aloud but i dont like this one has to be one of the worse songs they hav released! sorry girls aloud fans!
girls aloud are auful. biology was theyre best song and video , i agree.. but this is nearly as bad as love machine
omg the arctic monkeys sang love machine on the radio.. it was awesome.. better than girls aloud version anyways
the video is really weird and creapy and i also agree that the begining is good but thats bout it
it was bril
i love u girlsaloud i love all of ur songs
i dont really no y anybody likes this song! it just sounds like a pathetic atemp at a dance track!
im sorry, but this is a crap song-the beeping and chanting is all wrong and cheryl is as falt as a pancake-as per usual
hey got a nice song
In stitches