KYLIE MINOGUE – "Slow"

It’s a well-kept secret that many famous “Australian” things and people actually aren’t.

The pavlova cake is from New Zealand. The dingo was probably descended from Indonesian wild dogs. Mel Gibson was born in New York to an Irish mother and an American father. The last lineup of AC/DC to tour was Angus & Stevie Young (Scotland), Chris Slade (Wales), Cliff Williams (England), and Axl Rose (United States of America.) Kylie Minogue is 50% Australian, which is probably the best we can ask for in a national icon. It’s either her or Rupert Murdoch.

“Slow” is a catchy and well-constructed together song. It’s hard to say what’s missing. You know that feeling you get after listening to a beloved song 20 times in a short space of time? “I like this, but I’m also bored”? Most Minogue songs produce that feeling after my 2nd listen.

You heard her everywhere when I was growing up, but a lot of it seemed like residual momentum from “Can’t Get You Out of My Head”. Her albums tended to produce one hit single each with the others stalling out (as if the public was saying “okay, we put you on the ARIA charts ONCE, don’t overstay your welcome.”) Even in Australia, she couldn’t replicate the broadside volley of hits from the average Madonna album.

But I like the vocals, which are vaporous yet carry the track. Minogue was influenced by Adam Ant, who was similar to her in some ways (a limited vocalist who relied on enunciation and rhythmic/tonal tricks as much as actual singing, per se).

Speaking in Popular terms, if Loneliness marked one path out of Flat Beat (harsh electro house) then this marks another. The crisp roll of the Four Tet-ish beat, the clear glass synthline, how nimbly the song proceeds through its climax (if you can call it that, the whole song is an upwards slither) while clearly in no hurry (“Don’t wanna rush it, let the rhythm pull you in”), how undecorated the arrangement is (ultimately this probably isn’t much more minimal than CGYOOMH, but the gradual build-up of sounds spotlights how little there is in the mix). The Kompakt influence is very apparent but I’d describe it as highlighting common ground between Les Rhythm Digitales at his most melodic (cf. his starkly clean proto-80s revivalism on songs like Sometimes) and Loco Dice at his most sparse and rhythmic (the Minimal Explosion mix et al).

I recall the caption during an old digital TV ‘Every No 1 of the 2000s’ thing doing the rare thing of offering an opinion by saying something along the lines of “of course, this wasn’t the comeback record any of us truly wanted,” but I’ve never sensed that as the consensus and indeed Kylie considers it her best song, which I guess is because it really does play to her strengths, the enjoyment in her voice as she explores the streamlined disco she herself is inspiring to butterfly in real time – the minimalism even spreads to the incomplete-seeming chorus (“yeah….slow”, not even ‘slowly’ but you’d never question why). 8

The Body Language album I like a lot – it unites Mantronix and Green Gartside and regardless of her bijou voice she still finds a way to make something relatively hard-edged like Red Blooded Woman work.

At #2 was Blazin’ Squad’s Flip Reverse, notable solely for being performed on the first edition of the final Top of the Pops revamp – with episodes broadcast live again, the show relished in its fatal “All New” banner by doing things they hadn’t done before, like get a horde of the Squad’s friends in matching hoodies (bearing both the Squad and TOTP logos) to dance around the Television Centre courtyard before being entering the studio onto some sort of elaborate B-stage; the once cheap and cheerful show was now happy to let a ten-piece act perform with a hundred dancers all in the name of desperate Spectacle.

Not much else new in the Top 40, but Matt Goss’ second stalled attempt at a solo career began (and practically ended) with I’m Comin with Ya at #22.

2: Identity is a tricky thing – the idea that AC/DC are somehow not Australian, when the band was formed in Australia and came up through the Australian touring scene, simply because of where they were born, is somewhat reductive. It follows the same argument as people claiming that England cricketer Jofra Archer isn’t English because he was born and grew up in Barbados, even though his dad is English and he’s thus a British citizen. Better to say, they’re this and more. Inclusivity rather than exclusivity.

Slow is fine – Kylie might think it’s her best song but, you know, death to the author and all that, so I reckon her best is probably something off Fever or maybe Confide In Me – fine is not a pejorative. This is certainly more to my taste than a number of other number 1s happening in this specific era.

@6 Absolutely! There’s more to nationality than where you drop out of a uterus. I only mention it because it amuses me.

#9 Agree 100%. The One is absolutely fantastic!

(not sure I get the distinction of Minogue only being “50% Australian” — because her records have all been co-written or produced by people from other countries [bar Where The Wild Roses Grow]?)

Sorry, but “everything about Kylie turned up to 11” is surely “Your Disco Needs You”

15- My main memory of Chocolate is that the review on (I think) Teletext was incensed about it including a Spanish Guitar which (I guess?) they thought had no place in a pop song. Was such a baffling and specific complaint that it’s always stuck in my mind. I also remember the NME review where they implied they were bravely subverting an “Everybody Loves Kylie” hegemony by panning it. Slow did seem to start a bit of a backlash.