Kylie to X (Kylie Minogue Albums in general)

Member Name: bilbob20

Product:	Kylie Minogue Albums in general
Date:	10/11/08 (94 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: A brilliant pop career

Disadvantages: A couple of albums that feature too much filler

Kylie Minogue recently cemented her comeback from illness by releasing her tenth studio album, aptly titled X. In a career that has spanned twenty years, and given the lady 44 Top 40 hits, she is also infamous for releasing Greatests Hits collections. A bit more about them later though. Firstly I'm going to rate her ten studio albums in order from worst to best.

10. Enjoy Yourself

Kylie's second album was a bit of a dismal affair. Stock Aitken Waterman attempted to show an early growth and maturity in Kylie, but the ten track album ended up being a bit of of a wet weekend. Five of the tracks were ballads, but they completely midjudged her kiddie audience, and failed to ignite any spark in most of the tracks. Highlights are the classic number 1 Hand On Your Heart, I'm Over Dreaming Over You, and the title track Enjoy Yourself. Despite its obvious lack of merit in every way possible, this is her 3rd biggest selling album, and sold over 1.5 million in the UK alone in 1989.

9. Fever

This album oozes pop exuberence, but lacks any kind of artistic growth. It has Kylie's biggest selling record Cant Get You Out Of My Head, as well as the excellent subsequent singles, and a handful of instantly upbeat dance songs. Its perfect for a Saturday night before you go out, and has withstood time fairly well, but it just doesn't go anywhere. After the disco ball charm of Light Years and the subsequent low key and subtle Body Language, this album just fails to excite anything more than my feet.

8. Lets Get To It

An under-rated album from Kylie that allowed her to exercise a small amount of writing skills in the early days. The album was a difficult time for Kylie in her recording career, due to the atmosphere between her and her producers. Its a decent album though that didn't do as well as it should have, and shows that Kylie was ready to move to the next stop in her recording career. The stand out track is the brilliant Live And Learn.

7. Kylie

A nice start to her career. Featuring all of those early singles that you'll know from I Should Be So Lucky to Je Ne Sais Pas Pourquio, this is one of the most successful debut albums from a female artist. Whilst it'll never win any artistic awards, its a nice little album that highlights why we fell in love with Kylie back in the late 80s. If nothing else, its certainly amusing to see the now always glam lady with a bubble perm stuck through a topless hat. Best song on here is Look My Way.

6. Kylie Minogue

The overblown and overproduced self titled 1994 album boasts the best vocal we've ever heard from Kylie. Its stylish and impressive, but lacks any great substance. Despite Kylie's insistence at the time about writing, only one of her own compositions ended up on the album. Ironically, Automatic Love is indeed the best track on display. Brilliance also comes in the form of the 7 minute long epic Confide In Me.

5. X

The recent tenth album came into a lot of critisism due to its business as usual nature. Kylie took the high ground, as she often does, and released an album of pop gems. Her recent tour had more personal songs that she chose to perform, but to her credit, none of them made the album. The best song is The One which really is the best single she has never released. A recent remix released only on download format charted at number 36. The album is a bit incoherent, but its a minor quibble when she is having this much fun.

4. Body Language

Her most critically acclaimed album is a hot bed of subtle sexuality that drifts around urban and low key sounds. Her voice is odd on most of it, but the album is as experimental as it is surprising. There are other surprises including an appearance by reclusive 80s singer Gart Greenside, and Kylie doing a far better impression of a rap than Madonna could ever hope to do. She is at her most Kylie-esque on the fabulous Chocolate, and on unusual electro-hit Slow.

3. Impossible Princess

A completely unique album from Kylie that lets her play to her strengths. Vocally its a belter, lyrically it lets you see a darker side to pop's brightest star, and presents such a visual side to her that we wonder why she allows others to write her songs. Musically, its wonderous, taking us through a universe of sounds and letting us know that Kylie suffers from the same anxiety's as the rest of us. The gorgeous Through The Years and weirdly addictive Too Far are just two of the tracks of excellence on display.

2. Light Years

By fans, this is considered the light side of Impossible Princess' dark side. A bubble of disco pop that rides the rollercoaster of sounds that call to mind Village People, Diana Ross when she was good, Pulp when they were pop, and boasting writing credits from Guy Chambers and Robbie Williams. Williams appears on the anthem Kids, but its hard to pick out a favourite track, as only one of them isn't any good. I love Disco Down and Your Disco Needs You. There is also a secret track before the first track called Password, you need to rewind to hear it. Even thats a belter.

1. Rhythm Of Love

I cant think of a more fitting album for Kylie. Clashing her brand of high energy pop with more subtle urban sounds to give us an early glimpse of a pop idol in the making. This was her third album, and allowed her to go to America to write her own music. Thank goodness, because the four tracks she penned compliment Waterman's other excellent 7 tracks. The World Still Turns proves that she is an accomplished singer, even if her voice isn't the best, whilst Better The Devil You Know will always be her finest hour. Other classics in the making included a fantastic alternative version of Shocked, and Things Can Only Get Better.

Kylie has also released 2 Official Greatest Hits albums;

Kylie's Greatest Hits
Ultimate Kylie

Other releases include

Kylie's Remixes Vol 1 & 2
Greatest Remix Hits Vol 1 - 4
Mixes
Impossible Remixes
Kylie 50+1
Hits+
Confide In Me
Confide In Me (2 disc album)
Intimate And Live
Showgirl: Homecoming (Live In Melbourne)

Summary: From Kylie to X, she continues to entertain with perfect pop