Music In Motion - Gold Edition

Album Review

Amy Diamond's third album in just over three years isn't dramatically different from her first two, but as its title suggests — in direct distinction to its place-holding predecessor — it does show definite signs of forward momentum. Still barely into her teens (15 to be precise), she's already beginning to drop the kiddie trappings that have marked her work to date — nobody's going to mistake her for an "adult" artist just yet, but as she starts to make that always awkward transition (which she'll probably complete in about another year, the way pop works these days) she's already a force to be reckoned with. Growing pains are already evident in the album's musical lopsidedness, stretched as it is between sleekly modern dance/R&B ("Domino," "Speed of Light," the cheekily Cyndi Lauper-ish "So 16"), and dimpled schmaltz like "We Could Learn a Lot" (which is about aliens), "Sleepy Sunday" (unusually peppy for a song about laziness), and the over-orchestrated playground retort "Takes One to Know One." Both tendencies have always been present in Diamond's music, but they seem especially polarized and disparate here, though her always-potent pipes and general perkiness keep things from feeling too incongruous. The by-now obligatory light ska grooves turn up on the impressively slinky "Looks Like We Made It" — which slathers on the reverb and actual horns before changing gears mid-course with a double-time pep-pop chorus — as well as the enjoyably frothy lead single "Is It Love?," a slight slice of blippy electro-pop. Better is second single "Stay My Baby," a chunky, funky collaboration with Max Martin that sounds nostalgic for the sort of teen-pop he pioneered ten years earlier with Britney and the Backstreet Boys; better still is "Thank You," Diamond's entry in the 2008 Melodifestivalen contest (it won her 8th place), which cribs the electro schaffel glide most often associated with Goldfrapp. Added to the album upon its early 2008 re-release, "Thank You" is classic Diamond in the over-the-top giddiness and subtle snarkiness of its lyrical kiss-off ("Thank you for all that you've done for me/Now I know what real love is supposed to be" — too bad she doesn't sing "done to me" like it says on the lyric sheet) — and arguably her finest single to date. And pretty soon it will even be age-appropriate! [The Gold Edition, issued four months after the original version, switches the cover from white with rainbows to black with shiny gold, appends the very necessary "Thank You," three karaoke versions, the video for "Stay My Baby," and entirely reshuffles the track sequencing, with unclear logic but satisfactory results.] ~ K. Ross Hoffman, Rovi