This don’t impress me much, Shania
The queen of country pop’s return after years of turmoil is rocky — but not always in a good way
As lengthy sabbaticals go, shania twain’s is right up there. the 15- year gap between her last album, Up!, and today’s return might pale alongside the 25 years it took Roger Waters to deliver this summer’s Is this the life We Really Want?
But it pips tlC’s recent self-titled comeback (14 years) and knocks Blur’s the Magic Whip (12) into a cocked hat.
the Canadian had signed off on a high in 2002. singles such as that Don’t Impress Me Much and Man! I Feel like A Woman! were impossible to avoid in the late nineties and early noughties, and twain’s catchy blend of country, pop and rock had made her one of the best-selling female singers ever.
the intervening years have certainly not been dull. In 2004, she contracted lyme disease and suffered nerve damage to her vocal cords. six years later, her marriage to south African producer Mutt lange ended in divorce after he had an affair with her best friend.
In a storyline worthy of one of those old nashville standards that inspired her to take up singing in the first place, shania sought solace in the arms of her former friend’s estranged husband (are you keeping up?), and the two of them married in 2011.
With so many twists and turns, Ottowa-born twain, 52, shouldn’t be short of inspiration, and she duly tackles her emotional turmoil here. ‘I wasn’t just broken, I was shattered,’ she admits on life’s About to get good, while Poor Me finds her reflecting: ‘still can’t believe he’d leave me to love her.’ she also embraces her new-found happiness, although her candid outpourings tend to scratch the surface where they could have dug deeper.
With her former studio collaborator lange now persona non grata, she also vacillates wildly musically. she juggles four producers here, with surrey-born ed sheeran sidekick Jake gosling, American keyboardist Ron Aniello, grammy- winning pop songwriter Matthew Koma and roots rocker Jacquire King all taking turns.
As a result, now is a muddled album. After opening with the tepid reggae of swingin’ With My eyes Closed, twain reasserts her credentials as the queen of country pop on home now, her singing augmented with banjo and fiddle.
TheRe’sa country-rock feel to We got something they Don’t, too, though the most interesting track lifts shania out of her nashville bubble. With piano, strings and subtle synths to the fore, Who’s gonna Be your girl makes the most of her creamy voice and is the best song here.
the big ear-worms arrive towards the end of the album, with you Can’t Buy love, a sixties soul pastiche, and life’s About to get good, a honky- tonk hoedown that looks exuberantly forward.
It’s typical of twain that, even in her darkest hour, she just can’t quell those high spirits.
lIKe shania, Miley Cyrus has roots in country — her dad is singer Billy Ray Cyrus (he of the achy breaky heart) — but her current fame owes as much to her provocative stage show and eye-popping outfits as it does her upbeat pop songs.
Miley has toned down her look ahead of this sixth album. Without returning to the clean- cut style of hannah Montana, the character she played as a Disney child star, her outfits are now almost demure.
But, beneath the more conservative image, she is making some intriguing musical moves.
Writing with lA hip-hop keyboardist Oren yoel, but penning all the lyrics herself, she trusts her own instincts on an album that edges her away from the synth-pop of 2013’s Bangerz by using real instruments instead of electronics.
As she sings on the title track, with an attractive catch in her voice, ‘change is a thing you can count on’, and the sense of a young artist moving forwards is inescapable.
Her godmother Dolly Parton duets on bluegrass tune Rainbowland, while the title track is underpinned by twangy country guitars.
Recent single Malibu is a potent statement of intent, with Yoel’s production neither overstated or too stripped-back.
‘I’d never have believed you if, three years ago, you’d told me I’d be writing this song,’ sings Miley on a contemplative number that evokes walks on Californian beaches in much the same way as Lana Del Rey’s more sullen West Coast.
She attempts to shake off a wayward lover on Week Without You before showcasing her impressive voice on Inspired, the McCartneyesque ballad she sang at the One Love Manchester concert.
At 24, pop’s enfant terrible is coming of age.