Don't ask me how or why but I've just watched the video to the new Nicola Roberts single 'Beat of My Drum'. I'm very evangelical about music and, hand on heart, I don't try to get precious about it. I love a great 3 minute pop song as much as the next man but this particular tune is a complete mess.
Taking the song first, it's produced by Diplo so should, by rights be a really catchy, up-to-the-minute dance track. It starts off well with a great hook and it's always nice to hear an English singer sing with an English accent but as if to warn us of the impending horrors of the chorus there is a refrain that sounds like the middle of a nondescript track from her Girls Aloud days that ruins the whole thing in an instant. Not content with trashing what could have been a cool tune the chorus hits you in the face like a wet and smelly flannel. It's meant to be a 'shouty' cheerleader chorus that the likes of the Go! Team do so well but it just doesn't work at all. The keyboard playing over the girly shouting has surely been lifted from a CBBC programme from the 90s and the cherry on the icing of this particular cake is the drum machine paradiddle followed by a classic hip-hop "Yeah Yeah". Repeat this formula until sick.
Oh, and did I mention the bit 2/3rds of the way in where Diplo's just shamelessly lifted about 5 seconds from one of his own Major Lazer tunes? For goodness sake, was that necessary?
...and then there's the video. Why is she wearing her Grandad's underpants? Can Nicole look any more awkward trying to dance with hip urban types? Too many questions, too little time in my life. Apparently the album is supposed to be pretty good but on the basis of the first single from it, I'm not holding out a lot of hope.
