Martina Topley-Bird - Baby Blue Single Review

A single review for The Music Magazine.

I really didn't get this song as a single. It is a pleasant enough sound but her voice is thin and nothing happens. Such a shame.

The review:

Martina Topley-Bird will forever be known as the female singer on Tricky's debut album Maxinquaye, most notably for her performance on the cover of the Public Enemy masterpiece 'Black Steel'. After her disappointing solo debut Quixotic, 'Baby Blue' is the third single from her second album 'The Blue God'.

Like previous single 'Poison', and unlike the engaging and slightly creepy 'Carnies', this is a steamy sultry three and a bit minutes of empty pseudo-jazz soul. The opening thirteen seconds of vocals is the best part of the song but it is all false promises. From here, the music is swamped by soft drums, plinky-plonky keys with the odd guitar chord thrown in. The atmosphere is there and the whole effect is pleasant enough but it goes absolutely nowhere. Even after a couple of minutes of watery vocals and a few very weak choruses, the short guitar break sounds laboured and very out of place. Then it just repeats and fades away into a thin vocal outro.

What is difficult to understand about 'Baby Blue' is the total lack of imagination and ideas. The persistently bad disjointed drum track sounds like it was added in post-production as an afterthought. This song may work well on the album but it does not work as a single. And with the shadow of 'Black Steel' still looming it was, and will remain, her finest hour.

-- CS (for The Music Magazine)