Head-to-head: Take That and Britney
| By Mark Savage Entertainment reporter, BBC News |
It's either a huge mistake or a brilliantly contrived piece of PR, but Britney Spears and Take That are both releasing an album called Circus (or The Circus) on the same day.
There won't be a Blur vs Oasis-style chart battle - Take That's album has already broken pre-order records, ensuring that it will go to number one by the end of the week.
But, as any chart historian knows, securing the top spot is no guarantee of quality - just ask Elvis, whose Suspicious Minds was robbed of chart glory by Rolf Harris's Two Little Boys.
So, who has constructed a better big top - Take That or Britney Spears?
| The UK's most popular boy band present the second album since their hugely successful reunion.
| Britney's sixth studio record follows a tempestuous year for the former mouseketeer.
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| Take That's last album, Beautiful World, sold 2.5 million in the UK.
| Britney Spears' last album, Blackout, sold 250,000 in the UK.
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| Nine
| 37 (yes, 37)
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| Eight out of 13 tracks - 62%
| Three out of 14 tracks - 21%
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| The Garden: A typically rousing Take That ballad, set against the unlikely backdrop of a major ecological disaster ("the scent of burning oil was in the air")
| Womanizer: Britney's latest hit single is a flawless piece of 21st Century robo-pop with a tongue-twister chorus. Also contains sirens.
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| Yes. It's practically a Gary Barlow solo track, with a sparse piano-vocal arrangement. Lyrically, it's the tale of a lover spurned, with Gary cast as the circus clown for loving a lady who has abandoned him. A thousand hearts will break.
| Yes. In it, Britney claims to be the "ringleader" (we think she means ringmaster) of a circus which may or may not be a metaphor for the music industry. Key lyric: "When I crack that whip, everybody's gonna trip, just like a circus"
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Yes
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Yes
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| Throwaway bonus track She Said is a delightful hula shuffle which promises to be a highlight of the group's sold out stadium tour.
| Nothing quite matches the magnificent Womanizer, but the stuttering groove of Mannequin and the flirty Radar come close.
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| Mark Owen's tale of domestic bliss, Hello. Set to a rolling music hall piano, it aims to match the towering grandeur of Shine, but ends up sounding a little bit like When I'm Cleaning Windows.
| Every Britney album has a tedious song about getting naked or being a "freak" in the bedroom. Here it is the slap bass-powered Lace And Leather. Even Britney sounds bored.
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| "I met this girl last night and she said 'why won't you marry me?' Well, I'm too young for that, too dumb for that, too broke for that, too tired for that... But would you like to come back to my flat?" (Up All Night)
| "Can't remember what I did last night. Everything is still a blur. Can you calmly hand me all my things? I think I need an aspirin." (Blur)
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| "Just the other day somebody said to me, 'hey maybe you're oh-so-slightly OCD'... I said, 'yes, that's partly true but it's just my way of compartmentalising all the things I see.'" (How Did It Come To This)
| "Say what you want about me, but all of the boys and all of the girls are begging to If You Seek Amy." (If You Seek Amy)
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| "Looks like the cost of houses are falling, but I don't notice." (Hello)
| "All we had is shattered like broken glass" (Shattered Glass) | ||
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| 50mins 58secs
| 50mins 10secs
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| A cozy sixty minutes reading the Sunday papers beside a roaring fire with a stack of hot, buttered toast and a mug of cocoa.
| Half-an-hour of wild abandon in a sweaty nightclub, followed by three days reflecting on your inexcusable behaviour.
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Gary Barlow looks terribly uncomfortable swinging on a trapeze. |
While dressed as Heidi, Britney is served a cake by a circus performer.
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| "Take That performed all their own stunts throughout the making of The Circus."
| "Thank you, Brett Miller AKA Snowflake - for getting my ass out of bed."
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| Myspace: 56,947 Facebook: 58,228 Bebo: 34,456
| Myspace: 462,732 Facebook: 356,956 Bebo: 2,117
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| Fans have been invited to wave the group off as they catch the Eurostar to Paris on Monday. Four of them will win tickets to join them on the train. If they've remembered their passports.
| MTV and Sky One will broadcast a warts-and-all documentary, Britney: For The Record, detailing the troubled last 12 months in the singer's life. Contains such insights as "I'm a smart person".
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| "Gary Barlow can't spot a cliche like without stepping eagerly into it."
| "Spears, never the most emotive vocalist, frequently sounds disconnected, even a bit bored"
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| A confident, accomplished record that's precision-targeted at their fanbase. The lush orchestration gives a cinematic sweep to ballads like Greatest Day and The Garden, but it also disguises the occasional weak vocal.
| There are some classic Britney tracks here but sonically and lyrically she is treading water. It's a shame that the Princess of Pop hasn't been able to channel the turmoil of the last 12 months into her music.
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| "I like the single. It's very sing-along-ish. I'm looking forward to seeing them in June."
| "She looks really well compared to what she looked like last year. Do you think that's her real hair?"
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| 7.5/10 | 6/10 | ||
Source: BBC NEWS
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