Chase & Status Feat Tinie Tempah
Hitz (Mercury)
If, like me, you view Tinie Tempah with maternal regard, and his adorable pop-rap exploits provoke a strong desire to pinch his cheeks and wobble them hard, then Hitz may come as something of a shock, since he appears to have got together with the bigger boys and gone all Hollyoaks Later. He is swearing about Robert Pattinson and Mary Poppins, though. Which proves that he is still a very nice boy. The Chase And Status parts are a bit EastEnders E20, though.
Bowling For Soup
Turbulence (Que-So/Brando)
A song that is notable for being utterly dreadful, Turbulence is a turgid ode to, like, life and stuff. It was written, says singer Jaret Reddick, after he asked a pilot whether he found turbulence frightening. The answer he got from the man who flies planes for a living was a shocking "no". It is unsurprising, then, that the exchange led to this, a bloated tear-stick of a song that desperately wrings emotion from the blandest of platitudes. In a masterstroke of literalism, the video features some people on a plane. Not a turbulent plane, however. So all in all, a waste of everyone's time.
Lady Gaga
Edge Of Glory (Interscope)
This is one of those rare Lady Gaga songs that is more pleasant when she takes the donk off it, stripping it back during live performances to a Speechless-style piano ballad that requires her to sit down and sing rather than prance around in a wig gnashing her teeth. Not that there is anything wrong with Lady Gaga prancing around in a wig gnashing her teeth. And you have to admire anyone who writes a tribute to the death of their grandfather that sounds like being off one's face in the sort of nightclub that could only exist if you shoved Pacha into the Delorean and sent it back to 1986.
Tennis
Take Me Somewhere (Carmen San Diego)
A pleasant amble through sepia-tinged, Hipstamatic indie rock that happily twinkles and plods along. It may not come as a devastating reveal for you to learn that it is accompanied by a sun-drenched soft-focus video. Nice and all that, but perhaps someone could take the donk previously removed from Edge Of Glory and add it on to this in order to get things going a bit.
Snoop Dogg Feat T-Pain
Boom (Capitol)
In what could be Snoop's finest hour since his guest rap on Katy Perry's California Gurls saw him promising "bikinis, tankinis, martinis" but "no weenies" (phew), Boom is another no-nonsense guide to loving the ladies: "I gets to the finish, no chit-chat", he promises. Sadly, he spends so much time laboriously rhyming words like purple, turtle and herbal to a Yazoo sample somehow turned ultra-dull that when T-Pain finally, inevitably starts shouting "boom" repeatedly, it's a blessed relief.
