It’s been quite a while since I ran this section, so for the benefit of those who have not seen it before or are coming new to my journal let me explain. This is a feature where I look at the musical career of someone who has been originally involved in another aspect of media --- movies, TV --- or something totally else, and who has later made the switch to become, or try to become, a musician or at least a singer. I’m asking the question: did this person really and deeply harbour a desire to be a musician, either from the start or later in life, or were they simply moving into music in an attempt to squeeze as much cash as they could out of their perhaps fading celebrity? Were they serious about music or was it a one-time thing they tried, either failed at or found they had an aptitude for, or that at least their fans responded to it? Were they pushed by their management team into crossing over? Did they, in effect, see a bandwagon roll by and, with dollar or Euro signs in their eyes, hitch a ride, screaming “Me too! Me too!”?
The last --- and indeed, first --- artiste we looked at, all that time ago, was TV’s David Soul, best known of course for his role in the seventies cop show “Starsky and Hutch”, and who later had some hit singles and a few albums. After examining his career, his life and his influences, I came to the rather interesting and unexpected conclusion that Soul was not a bandwagon-jumper. He had been a singer before finding fame on the TV and when he made the switch he wrote his own music, mostly, and seemed to straddle a few different genres, rather than just peddle empty but ultimately lucrative pop or soft rock, which would have been a much easier option, and is in fact what gave him his hits. But within the albums I listened to I was surprised to find there was some depth. They weren’t classics by any means and I won’t be listening to them again any time soon, but they weren’t the dross you would expect, with the singles surrounded by fluff and filler. The guy had something to say, and seemed reasonably honest and passionate about his interest in music.
Ah, but will we be able to say that about our second subject?
On the face of it, Miley Cyrus would appear to be a shoe-in for the bandwagon brigade. Starting her career in TV playing a schoolgirl whose “secret identity” is the pop star sensation Hannah Banana, sorry Montana, she later broke out and sort of made the fantasy flesh as it were, bringing fact to fiction as she became a real, honest-to-Mickey-Mouse pop singer. But was this her idea, or her agent’s? Did she want to be a singer? Did she even sing in the show? What is, or was, her interest in music and what was her incentive for moving from one medium to another, apart from the obvious?
The thing is, as everybody knows, Miley is the daughter of Billy Ray Cyrus, the country singer who traumatised us all with “Achy breaky heart” back in the early nineties, and who, perhaps unfairly, will always be inextricably linked with that most heinous crime, line dancing. Billy Ray is a successful recording artiste, having sold millions of records, recorded over a dozen albums and won a fistful of awards. So you would have to think that at least some of his talent and his passion for music would have rubbed off onto his little girl. It did, though it was the acting bug that bit her moreso than the music one. She began to study music and drama, and when the call came to audition for the Disney TV show “Hannah Montana” she landed the title role, something that was to propel her to superstar status.
It would appear that her godmother, Dolly Parton no less, had a hand in Miley moving into the music business and in 2007 she released her first of (so far) four albums, three of which would be recorded while she was still working on the “Hannah Montana” show. Rather weirdly, the debut album, a double, has its first disc credited to Hannah Montana, the character, and is basically the soundtrack to her show, while the second disc is I guess her “breakout” from the character and is credited to her under her own name.
Hannah Montana 2/Meet Miley Cyrus --- Miley Cyrus/Hannah Montana --- 2007 (Walt Disney)
Meh, I’m not expecting much from this, particularly the first disc as it’s basically the soundtrack to the show, which I’ve never seen, but let’s have a listen anyway. Hmm. A nice Cars-like guitar and to be honest I hear this as a serious rip off of Kim Wilde’s “Kids in America”, but it’s far from the crappy pop bubblegum I expected, especially with a title like “We got the party”. Could this be more interesting than I expected? Well looking at the credits I see that Kara Dioguardia co-wrote the opener and Robbie Nevil the second, which is more like the trance/disco/pop I would have expected. Yet even so, I must say the guitar is a lot more involved than I would have imagined it would be.
The same writing team of Matthew Gerard and Robbie Nevil write the sixth track too, and I won’t even hold it against Cyrus that she doesn’t have any writing input into any of the songs on the first disc, as I’m sure Disney’s viselike grip on the show would have precluded her being involved, but it will be in the second disc where I would expect to see her contribute more, which I hope will be the case. Ah damn it! I hate to admit it, but “Nobody’s perfect” evolved into a decent rockish song and I don’t hate it. Two out of two? Was not expecting that! Looks like a ballad up next as “Make some noise” betrays the influences of her father in a Country styled power ballad. Very empowering I guess with a sort of waltzy rhythm and some nice acoustic guitar. Crap! I don’t hate this either. Well, in fairness I’m not here to trash Cyrus, but to see if her music is good enough to refute the tag of being a bandwagon-jumper, and again, this is not really her music so with big writers all over the place I guess you can expect decent songs. Again, we’ll uncover the real Miley Cyrus on the second disc I would think.
She’s a good singer, of that there is no doubt. I think Disney may have used autotune on the second track but I don’t feel she needs it. Her voice is certainly good enough to stand on its own without any digital processing. I’d like to hear her do a completely acoustic or even acapella song. Perhaps she will. We’ve five albums to get through here, spanning a period of six years. And so it goes: “Rock star” is another uptempo, well, rocker, with a great guitar solo, while “Old blue jeans” sounds a little sort of industrial with slabs of new-wave thrown in, big throaty synth I think unless it’s a talkbox on a guitar. Bit lighter than the other tracks I’ve heard so far but no, I still don’t hate it. “Life’s what you make it” is another song by Nevil and Gerrard, and another empowering, you-can-do-it song, which is a bit barf-making but in keeping with the spirit of the show, so I can’t really criticise.
I thought “One in a million” would be a ballad, with a tinkly piano opening, but it turned into something else, then “Bigger than us” is another decent uptempo song with a very upbeat message; a lot of fun I must say. The rest of it is kind of generic and I lost a little interest but there was nothing that made me stop and think how bad that was. Overall a pleasant surprise but of course being Disneyfied I guess there are certain things you have to expect. The presence of a lot of guitar and the absence of too much kid pop was refreshing though.
And so we move onto disc two, where we hear from the real Miley. This is, essentially, her debut album as it’s put out under her own name, and I’m heartened to see she has a songwriting credit for about 85% of the album, even if she wrote nothing solo. This is, after all, her first effort. The first track is credited partially to Destiny Hope Cyrus, which is her original name, while the rest are just shown as Cyrus, so whether she was writing as Destiny Hope or Miley I don’t know for sure, but given the title of the second disc I think I can assume the latter.
“See you again” opens the album and it’s a nice uptempo song with dirty bass and a good sense of rocking about it; the chorus needs work though, Still not bad for a first attempt at songwriting, though in truth how much input she had into the song I don’t know. It was also her first single and seems to have done very well, getting to number four in the charts. “East Northumberland High” is okay but nothing terribly special (remember who this is, Troll… yeah yeah…) then “Let’s dance” is a very poppy song with sort of Spanish or latin overtones, but again it’s inoffensive fun. More rocky is “G.N.O (Girls’ Night Out) with a real sense of Blondie in it, or even (gulp!) Girls Aloud. Nice AOR type chorus, very catchy. “Right here” sounds like it may be a ballad, and … it’s not. Nice curve ball there. Starts slow but ramps up into a decent rocker.
More uptempo with “As I am” then it sounds like she’s ripping off the Cars on “Heartbeat City” for the opening of “Start all over”, though to be fair it’s not written by her. Good heavy rockish song with some fine keyboard work, and it was the second single released from the album, doing particularly badly. Sad to say she then attempts reggae (why does everyone do that?) with her next penned song, “Clear”. Sigh. Much better is “Good and broken”, with a lot of passion in the lyric and again some great guitar work. I’d credit musicians but as in so many pop albums there are several guitarists, a bunch of keyboardists and many drummers, and I have no way of knowing who plays on what, so they’ll have to remain anonymous, which is a pity as they do deserve proper credit.
I don’t mind that the album ends on a ballad. With a title like “I miss you” it’s expected and to be fair there haven’t been the usual joblot of slushy slow songs on this debut; in fact, this is the only one, and even then it’s not the sort of piano ballad you would expect. It’s a little slower but it’s not a song to “lurch” to --- what do you mean, how old are you grandad? Nice sort of lounge piano line driving the song and again, credit where it’s due, it brings a satisfying ending to an album which has turned out to be a lot better than I had expected it to be.
TRACKLISTING
Disc One (Hannah Montana)
1. We got the party
2. Nobody’s perfect
3. Make some noise
4. Rock star
5. Old blue jeans
6. Life’s what you make it
7. One in a million
8. Bigger than us
9. You and me together
10. True friend
Disc Two (Miley Cyrus)
1. See you again
2. East Northumberland High
3. Let’s dance
4. GNO (Girls’ Night Out)
5. Right here
6. As I am
7. Start all over
8. Clear
9. Good and broken
10. I miss you
I must admit, before I move on, I’m a lot more impressed with this than I ever expected to be. To my eternal embarrassment, I’m actually more leaning towards the Hannah stuff than the Miley, but then maybe that’s just the giant corporate Disney machine catering to what it thinks we want. Even so, I’m not a teenage girl (so far as I know) and I really enjoyed that music. But what will really be the test will be the next album, when Cyrus is released from the musical shackles of the show, although she at this point was still working on “Hannah Montana”. But I would expect her second, perhaps first real, album to show some of the fire and spark that was possibly held back on her shared debut.
Breakout --- Miley Cyrus --- 2008 (Hollywood)
Well looking down the tracklist it’s heartening, but at this point not really surprising, to see that she has a hand in writing most of the songs. After all, having co-written most of her debut she was unlikely to just hand control over to some professional songwriters now was she? But it’s good to see she kept her integrity, insofar as that applies, on this album. This is not in any way affiliated with the show (the other one wasn’t really either but having to share it with her alter-ego must have linked the two despite her efforts) and so this is her chance to stand up on her own and show the world what she can do.
The title track opens the album and retains that sort of teen-girl.new-wave pop/rock that proliferated on her debut, and which reminds me of the Runaways or Blondie. Again the guitar is to the fore, which is good to hear and it’s an uptempo song, another of those empowering ones, very catchy and singable. This is in fact one of only three songs on the album not written with her input, not including a cover version. The next one up is “7 things”, which has again that slight Country feel she must have inherited from her dad, with a kind of acoustic intro but it soon jumps up several gears and becomes almost punk in speed if not style. Hey, it’s a fun song, you know? Followed by “The driveway”, which has to me a very Bon Jovi or Bryan Adams feel, sort of intense with a passionate message, midpaced but powerful. Some really nice piano here.
There’s a cover of “Girls just wanna have fun”, which was of course made famous, but not written by, Cyndi Lauper. She does a more sort of almost rock version of it, not as light or poppy as Lauper’s and it’s a decent song though I never really liked it, or any of Lauper's material if I’m honest. It’s a real party anthem of course and kind of looks back to I guess “GNO” from the debut. Nice violin work adds to the song, but I’m never that mad about cover versions and on we go to “Full circle”, which starts out like a ballad but soon becomes more of a rocker really with some hard guitar and thumping drums. “Fly on the wall” is a bit dancy but still with a lot of teeth with a sort of new-wave chorus thing going and the guitar growling away, which can never be bad.
And so we get a proper ballad, the first real one from Miley as “Bottom of the ocean” has a really nice moody synth and handclaps that actually don’t make me want to vomit blood. Nicely done, and well sung, like just about everything I’ve heard from her so far. Yeah, I didn’t think I’d be saying that either.
Miley then goes political as she sings “Wake up America”, which I must admit for the first time annoys me. This is a teenage girl who portrays a popstar on TV telling everyone to pay attention to the environment? Still, it’s better than Britney’s “He’s our president so he must be right” bull
shit I guess. Decent song, can’t be denied, but is it just there to court a little controversy or does she believe what she’s singing? Well in fairness she just addressed that in the line
” know that you don’t want to hear it/ Especially coming from someone so young.” Touche, young lady. Touche. I doff my cap to you. Everything I hear is just impressing me more about this woman.
And “These four walls” continues that trend, although it’s not one of her songs. It’s a nice acoustic/Country style and really showcases her voice; there’s real passion there. This could count I guess as the second ballad, though it’s quite different to “Bottom of the ocean”. Whether she uses her father’s contacts in the world of Country music or not I don’t know, but “Simple song” is written by two of that genre’s stars, Jesse Littleton and Jeffrey Steele, and it’s another pretty damn good song with real heart, almost bringing the album to a close. The perhaps appropriately-titled “Goodbye” brings down the curtain in fine style with a beautiful acoustically-leaning ballad. Technically, it doesn’t: there’s a remix of “See you again” from her debut, but I’ve heard that and I’m not interested in hearing any remixes so for me the album ends here.
TRACKLISTING
1. Breakout
2. 7 things
3. The driveway
4. Girls just wanna have fun
5. Full circle
6. Fly on the wall
7. Bottom of the ocean
8. Wake up America
9. These four walls
10. Simple song
11. Goodbye
12. See you again (Rock Mafia remix)
If this was her first real attempt at stepping away from the persona of, and connotations to, Hannah Montana, Cyrus succeeded in the main, though a lot of the “girl power” songs here still hark back to that mindset and you can’t help but be reminded of the character and where Miley came from. Still, if you view this as her debut as an artiste in her own right it’s a pretty fine album and shows a talent that would only blossom and grow as the years went on.
When you consider she was only sixteen when she recorded that album it’s pretty damn impressive and shows a maturity seldom seen in a girl of that age. In this era of X-Factor and American Idol of course you have younger and younger stars coming through but a talent like this is fairly rare. A pity she seems to have gone on and become something of a figure of ridicule in recent years, but it’s more her music we’re concerned with here, not her celebrity image. Her next album would not be released for two more years, at which time she would have reached the ripe old age of eighteen.