I was rocked to my very foundations

Continuing my trip back through the 1990 album charts.

25/11/90 : Rhythm Of Love - Kylie Minogue 

This really wasn't peak Kylie time, was it?  Or maybe it was, but it was peak SAW Kylie - either way my expectations are not high and we definitely never owned it (3/6). 

Well, we started with "Better The Devil You Know" and "Step Back In Time" and it was pretty much downhill from there (except for "Shocked" which I must admit to having a soft spot for) - and that probably tells you as much as you need to know.  There are many things to admire Kylie for over the years, but this album is not one of them.  To be fair to her, it's not really her fault - it's the dreadful backing tracks that grate (and no, they're not even close to the worst thing SAW did).  One thing that I do blame her for is the quality of the "rapping" on "One Boy Girl" - it's really not good.

We're continuing our slide down the chart to #16 this week on her second week of a nineteen week run, with it having peaked at #9 in its debut week.  The top five this week were the usual suspects of Madonna, Elton John, Phil Collins, The Three Tenors and Cliff Richard and there are no new entries in the top ten - the highest is a somewhat unexpected Righteous Brothers best-of (#11).

Wikipedia has masses on the album (330 milliPeppers) and it tells us it is her third album and she was trying to get taken seriously.  It reminded me it was about this time she took her bad girl role in The Delinquents and she got together with Michael Hutchence.  Bad, bad Kylie!  It also tells me this a dance-pop album as opposed to a bubblegum-pop album - I'm not sure I could tell the difference.  It then has a massive section on all the influences on every track and most of it is utter bollocks, I can assure you.  The critics were actually pretty nice about it, but there's a distinct whiff of "well, this isn't nearly as shit as I was expecting".  However, the public didn't quite see it the same way with it not doing as well as her previous albums - #2 in Ireland was its high point anywhere.

"Customers also listened to" Dannii Minogue, Sonia (I'm going to get to see her at some point, aren't I?), Lonnie Gordon (no idea!) and Big Fun (really?).  There's no-one really like Kylie though, is there?  This album isn't great but in comparison with a lot of the SAW shite that was coming out at the time, it's perfectly listenable and has some decent enough tracks on it.  But no, I'm never going to listen to it again...

18/11/90 - Pretty enjoyable
02/12/90 - Fine, if not great

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