Witness for the prosecution
Katy Perry’s collaborators are subsumed by the bland vibe of this polished collection
Katy Perry’s gleeful, satirical performance depicting Donald Trump and Theresa May as giant skeletal mannequins was a talking point of this year’s Brit Awards, confirming that underneath all the candy-coloured froth of Perry’s pop output, there is a shrewd operator at work. Sadly, she hasn’t followed through on Witness, her latest album by committee, which has been hailed by Perry with the kind of vacuous psychobabble you might expect from Beyoncé but is seriously suffering from a pop personality bypass. Fellow singer/songwriter Sia and producer Max Martin emerge honorably from her blizzard of co-writers with the brazenly catchy Chained to the
Rhythm but this sugary standout is a blip on a crowded dancefloor.
Much of Witness follows its clubfriendly pop template but with less to catch the ear nor to mark this out as the work of Perry over any of her pop peers. The likes of Roulette and
Déjà vu are aimed squarely at the dancefloor but not even the usually irresistible Hot Chip avoid the homogeneity on Into Me You See.
One-man-band Jack Garratt adds trebly sax and skittering syndrums to the processed R&B of Power, on which Perry contends, rather unconvincingly, that she is “a woman reborn”, while Hey Hey Hey offers a glossy distortion of female empowerment.
Swish Swish, livened by a Fatboy Slim sample and guest slot by Nicki Minaj, is said to be her retort to Taylor Swift’s Bad Blood while Bigger Than
Me is her banal post-mortem on the US presidential election, during which she was a vocal supporter of Hillary Clinton.
All of which leaves one overlooking the folksy wisdom to clutch at the power chords of Pendulum ,anairpunching 80s AOR production with a gospel backing chorus and Perry’s best vocal of the set.
Regrettably, it looks like Beth Ditto, the powerhouse former frontwoman of The Gossip, is sliding in the same direction on her debut solo outing. The indie garage firebrand responsible for the LGBT rallying cry Standing In The Way Of Control is somewhat tamed and chastened on the slickly produced Fake Sugar, which offers little to serve her ballsy, belting blues voice.
Instead, she inhabits blandly bombastic Adele territory on Lover, surrenders to unbridled power balladry on Love in Real Life and blends country roots with subtle synths on the understated title track. Ditto has a pleasing pop tone but is a punk rocker at heart. A little of that spiky attitude shines through on Ooh
La La, which is not to be confused with the superior Goldfrapp or Faces tracks of the same name.
Now that Fleet Foxes have returned from a six-year hiatus, we can thank/ blame them personally for paving the way for Mumford & Sons but also for spawning the raffish Father John Misty from their ranks. Fleet Foxes land somewhere in the middle, between the former’s bland quasifolk strummery and the latter’s acidtongued MOR pop.
The Seattle-bred five-piece literally pick up where they left off on the same notes which ended 2011’s
Helplessness Blues and there’s an instant frisson of recognition in the baroque folk pop, lush layers of 12-string guitar, symphonic strings, supple, silvery harmonies and Robin Pecknold’s clear voice cutting through on the soaring likes of Fool’s
Errand.
This current single is one of the more conventionally structured songs here but elsewhere they embark on little minor key meanders and epic multi-part adventures, channelling the melodic spirit and musical questing of David Crosby via elements of psychedelic pop, prog rock and fusion jazz on the undulating Odaigahara and minisymphony Cassius.
Witness follows its club-friendly pop template but with less tp mark this out as the work of Perry over any of her peers