t.A.T.u: 200 KM/H In the Wrong Lane (GayToday.Com)Time of publication: 16.04.2003 |
CD Review by John Demetry
200 KM/H In the Wrong Lane sends out an alert to Gay Dance Club DJ's: t.A.T.u.'s brand of girl power rocks the house. t.A.T.u. is a Russian teen Europop girl duo with Lesbian overtones. There's nothing subtle in such lyrics as: "I long for you to hold me / Like your boyfriend . . . does" on the track "Malchik Gay." The girls, sure to be household names as the album only now begins cutting high into American radio charts, are blonde Lena Katina and short-cropped, dark-haired Yulia Volkova.
Their 'tude might be pretentious -- being deliberately, yet pleasurably, produced and pre-packaged by Martin Kierszenbaum, Robert Orton, and former Pet Shop Boys and Frankie Goes to Hollywood collaborator Trevor Horn. However, the Queer core of the teen angst in their slammin' ("Not Gonna Get Us") to sappy ("30 Minutes") songs rings truer than the "It sucks to be a pop star, so adore me" whininess of Britney, Pink, and hate-monger Eminem.
But can t.A.T.u. handle the epochal gay angst of "How Soon Is Now?" - everybody's favorite song by The Smiths? I couldn't believe my ears either! But, sure enough, t.A.T.u charms its way through the album's cover of the song.
The original Smiths track featured Morrissey on vocals detailing, with exquisite anguish and sustaining wit, the often painful dating rites of the gay club scene. Backed up by the monumental guitar of Johnny Marr and a momentous orchestration, the original "How Soon Is Now?" gave grand, enveloping, imminence to gay experience.
At half the length (but with the exact same lyrics), t.A.T.u.'s poppy cover can't do that. Katina and Volkova, singing together, don't suffer Morrissey's loneliness. Their teenybopper chirps can't carry the weight of such lyrics:
"When you say it's gonna happen now / What exactly do you mean? / See I've already waited too long / And all my hope is gone"
But who in their teenage years didn't feel this way? The pop pleasure of t.A.T.u.'s "How Is Now?" recognizes a shared gay history and culture to help get you through - whether it be teen frustration or adult torment. The song still addresses this pop right: "I am human and I need to be loved / Just like everybody else does." Cover of 200 KM/H in the Wrong Lane
As with "How Soon Is Now?", t.A.T.u. pull off a neat bit of pop star self-consciousness in the song "Clowns." It's repeated call - "Can you see me now?" - inspires a dance response in the affirmative: "Don't you hide your eyes from me / Open them and see me now." The title - "Clowns" - might be in reference to the innuendo and masking through which closeted pop engages gay-cult audiences.
Although hardly groundbreaking, t.A.T.u.'s openness is welcome. When t.A.T.u. puts lesbianism in perspective to pop culture - "Clowns all around you / It's a cross I need to bear" - the cross need not be endured alone.
That's also the message of the expansive "Stars." "Are we in space? Do we belong? / Someplace where no one calls it wrong," sing t.A.T.u. while the music transforms from a slow-groove to a Russian folk sound leading into a Russian-language sorta-rap. Playing on the double-meaning of "stars" - galactic and celebrity - t.A.T.u. also doubles pop emotion in the "crying"/"flying" refrain: "And for the first time in my life / I'm crying / . / I'm flying." Not up to the standards of genius gay pop like The Smiths, The Pets, or Erasure, t.A.T.u. still celebrate pop's complex simplicity.
On the track "Show Me Love", t.A.T.u. simultaneously admits and honors what is probably the genesis of the group's novelty: the Swedish mega-blockbuster "Show Me Love" (a.k.a. "Fucking Amal"), a teen lesbian romance. To this day, I've never seen a movie elicit such rambunctious responses from its audience as the three times I saw it in theatres - a sure sign of both the need for pop that addresses gay audiences and the universal appeal of gay pop.
Fans will catch the references to the movie: the tentative telephone conversation that opens the song; and lyrics like "Show me love / 'Til you open the door." The entirety of 200 KM/H In the Wrong Lane catches up to that movie's infectious charm.
The quintessential t.A.T.u. track is the first single off the album: the Horner-produced "All the Things She Said." It's a blast: rocking through sexual confusion and first crushes, shame and joy. The video, available for viewing on the computer on the CD, takes it a step further by being overtly political. Through the ominous image of a barbed-wire fence, it links world-wide homophobia to a national legacy of oppression. It gives new weight to t.A.T.u.'s repeated: "This is not enough!" Amidst the homogenous pop of our current culture, t.A.T.u. is enough. 200 KM/H makes you want to dance again.
Thanks to xena225.
Source: GayToday.Com |
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