


Lily Allen – URL Badman
Lily Allen - the pop star so amazing we'd have had to invent her if she didn't already exist. Here's Joe Anderton on the frankly brilliant "URL Badman".

Bleachers – Rollercoaster
Jack Antonoff, putting the fun. into the pop side project.

Ace Wilder – Busy Doin’ Nothin’
Updating the sentiment of "Wham! Rap" for Melodifestivalen 2014, it's Sweden's Ace Wilder - she takes pleasure in leisure and believes in joy...

Kylie Minogue – Kiss Me Once
U OK HUN? Is the pop star Christmas album really a cry for help?

Chromeo – Lost On the Way Home (feat. Solange)
A (chart) countdown conundrum for the ages: why isn't Solange a superstar?

La Roux – Let Me Down Gently
Pop abhors a vacuum, so it's a brave person who takes five years to follow up their debut album. Stewart on the bulletproof (but not time-proof) La Roux.

BANKS – Waiting Game
Derek makes the (upper) case for BANKS: purveyor of intense dark pop.

Becky Hill – Losing
We exist in an odd time in the pop industry. In a post-recession world, money talks. Decisions at [insert record company here] are made with one eye on the bottom line rather than […]

Betty Who – Somebody Loves You
This week, a good friend pointed out that I may just be the only person in the UK who even knows that Glee is currently playing out its final few episodes […]

Dami Im – Super Love
Unless you’re an ardent fan of The X Factor’s international franchises – and let’s face it, who is? – you won’t have heard of Dami Im, a Korean immigrant from […]

Cher Lloyd – Sirens
Remember Cher Lloyd? She’s that annoying bubblegum brat from the estate with the hi-tops and tracksuit who thought she was going to waltz her way to the X Factor title […]

Tinashe feat. ScHoolboy Q – 2 On
Thanks to the wonderful gift of hindsight, we can now see that the turn of the century was an extraordinarily fertile time for American R&B. Acts such as Aaliyah, […]

Madeon ft Kyan – You’re On
Before the days of ‘Little Monsters’, HypeMachine, and VEVOLift (an impressive rebranding of the term ‘advertising’,) if you wanted to be a popstar you had to pay your dues as […]

Lea Michele – Cannonball
When I first heard Cannonball I rushed giddily onto Facebook, pronouncing how I loved witnessing the moment when a superstar was born, and then sat back waiting for it to […]

Prides – Messiah
As a card-carrying Scottish person (the card donates my organs to Greggs the Bakers) I’m ashamed to admit that I hadn’t actually heard of Prides until they popped up at the […]

Ruth Lorenzo – Dancing in the Rain
This may be an unpopular viewpoint, but something went terribly, terribly wrong at last year’s Eurovision Song Contest. While it was amazing in all kinds of ways that Conchita Wurst triumphed on […]