UGH! I’m just so bored with the Sugababes nowadays. I just don’t know what happened…
Wait a minute. Yes I do. Keisha Buchanan left the group.
Ever since that fateful day, my love affair with the Sugababes has spiraled into blase indifference. Whether I would have liked the girls’ seventh studio album, Sweet 7 with Buchanan’s name and voice still attached…I’ll never know. What I do know is Sweet 7 was a big fat dud. The album was a complete unoriginal mix and match of pop garbage that almost any group could have put out (and has). Let the record show, I harbor no ill feelings towards newbie, Jade Ewen, Heidi Range or Amelle (and wish them all the best on their solo careers)…I just wish things had turned out differently for the girl group that first caught my attention all those years ago for their original sound and fresh take on girl group pop music. Now that Keisha is gone, there really is nothing left of the original lineup, is there? What the hell is the point then? I’m all for reinvention and lineup changes but the Sugababes just aren’t the Sugababes anymore and their new single, “Freedom” isn’t going to change any one’s mind.
“Freedom” is the official first single for the Sugababes since leaving Island Records, the band’s home for 10 years, and joining RCA. Due for UK release on September 25th, the single was produced by The Invisible Men and Parker & James and co-written by (*BIG BREATH*) Jason Pebworth, Jon Shave, George Astasio, Kyle Abrahams, Peter Ighile, Mariah Young-Jones & Rowan Martin. PHEW! Exhausting, typing out all of those names. I’d love to know which one of those people were responsible for the bit in the chorus that goes…”Dumb Dumb Dumb Dumb…” because that basically sums up everything I’m feeling about the song right now. The issue I have with the song (SURPRISINGLY) isn’t the lyrics…it’s the beat. It’s a generic pop song, nothing more. There’s really very few redeeming qualities about the song. If this is what we have to look forward to off the new album then I think the Sugababes might be in trouble. At least we have the music video to look forward to…oh wait. That’s a bore as well. Directed by Sean De Sparengo, the “Freedom” video is essentially a re-hash of the video for their 2008 single, “Girls,” you’re average club scene video featuring the girls dancing up on some gentlemen and shaking their bodies. At least deliver a sick video if the song is this boring. Come on Sugababes! Get it together! My patience is wearing thin.
Download the single (currently being used in an advertisement for Nokia at home in England) September 25th if you like what you hear and look out for remixes from 7th Heaven, Kris De Angelis, Benny Page, Friends Electric, Johnson Somerset, Thundercatz and Tom Dick & Harry. The single also features a B-Side, a cover of “Standing In The Way of Control” by Gossip.