I wanna live, wanna give something back

Continuing my trip back through the 2010 album charts.

14/03/10 : A Curious Thing - Amy McDonald

Amy's another one of those random female single/songwriters that popped up a lot around this time (see also Eliza Doolittle, Pixie Lott, Diana Vickers) - I don't think she's an X Factor escapee, but couldn't be sure.  Additionally, I don't think I minded her, but my complete lack of memory of any of her songs suggests I could be wrong.

I can't say any of it jogged my memory - but I didn't mind it at all.  It's a bit like a cross between KT Tunstall and later era Big Country - Del Amitri also sprung to mind in places or Thea Gilmore if you are aware her.  It's kinda bouncy singalong pop-rock and she's got a nice voice - the lovely Mrs Reed may well like it.  However, absolutely none of it stuck in my brain - but I'd be quite happy to listen to it again.

We're at #4 with a new entry this week on the start of a fifteen week run - it then took three weeks off and came back for another seventeen week run.  A decent enough effort, but not the #1 and 77 weeks on the chart that her debut album managed.  The rest of the top five are Boyzone, (a new entry), Gorillaz (ditto), Alicia and Gaga and we have one more new entry in the top ten with the Love Never Dies OST (#10).

Wikipedia doesn't have an awful lot on the album - it goes into some detail on what the songs were about, but there's nothing particularly interesting there.  It does tell me she's not an X Factor escapee though - aged 12, she saw Travis at T In The Park and decided that's what she wanted to do.  And so she did.  The critics were a bit mixed on the album - some liked that it was pretty similar to her debut, whereas some didn't like that it was pretty similar to her debut.  And one thought it was too "Scottish" - ohhh-kaaay.  It also told me there's an orchestral version - I think I'd quite like that.  It did very well commercially in a certain section of Europe getting to #2 in Belgium & The Netherlands and #1 in Germany, Austria & Switzerland (it was #2 in the year-end chart in Switzerland) - it sold a million copies across the continent.

"Customers also listened to" Thea Gilmore (go me!), Tanita Tikaram, Kirsty MacColl (yeah, this is a good shout) and John Grant (I've no idea what he's doing here!).  I liked this, but am somewhat intrigued by the fact that I remember none of it - hopefully I remember she exists and check it out again at some point.

07/03/10 - Not a bad album at all
21/03/10 - A fine album indeed

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