KATY PERRY: Smile (EMI)
Verdict: Katy’s bubbly new arrival
The last time we heard from Katy Perry was when she brought her Witness tour to the UK two summers ago.
With the Californian singer standing centre stage in a flashing LED bra, surrounded by Day-Glo dancers and giant flamingos, it was a dazzling spectacle — but one that felt disjointed and forced.
The tour came after two albums, Prism and Witness, that had seen Perry edge away from bubblegum hits such as 2008’s I Kissed A Girl and 2010’s Firework.
On Prism, she wanted to be taken seriously as a songwriter; on Witness, she said she was making ‘purposeful pop’.
Katy Perry has come through several high-profile romances and break-ups, including a whirlwind 14-month marriage to comedian Russell Brand, as well as an undignified spat with Taylor Swift. Now she seems genuinely happy
Seeing her return to candy-coated froth the minute she went on tour was confusing.
There’s no such uncertainty on Smile, her first LP in three years and her most coherent in a decade.
In a happy coincidence, the album (out today) arrives just two days after Perry announced the safe arrival of her first child, a daughter called Daisy Dove, with her fiance, English actor Orlando Bloom.
The sleeve depicts Katy as a crestfallen circus clown, but the songs — celebrations of strength in adversity — are sprinkled with big, bold hooks. Most of them sound decent enough on first hearing, but they’re real growers, and you’ll be humming along by the second play.
Perry has made no secret of her battles with depression, which she has treated with therapy, medication and meditation.
She’s come through several high-profile romances and break-ups, including a whirlwind 14-month marriage to comedian Russell Brand, as well as an undignified spat with Taylor Swift. Now she seems genuinely happy.
Those expecting any great insight from Smile should look away now. Like last week’s new album by The Killers, it isn’t big on subtlety.
But while many singers would find themselves intimidated by the sprawling cast of co-writers and producers, Katy’s personality is strong enough to carry her new tunes.
A theme of overcoming the bad times is clear from the off. Never Really Over finds Perry trying to forget an old flame, even though she admits she ‘can’t even go on the internet without even checking your name’.
On Cry About It Later, packed with pulsating dancefloor electronics, she looks forward to being ‘someone’s new muse’, and making a fresh start by getting a new tattoo.
When we get to Daisies, helmed by Miami production team The Monsters & Strangerz, she insists she’ll be biting back at her detractors until she’s pushing up daisies.
And the catchy title track finds her expressing gratitude for hard-won, grown-up wisdom: ‘Every tear has been a lesson.’
Less impressive is the Stargate-produced Resilient. A slower song, with Eleanor Rigby-like strings, it lets Katy display her versatility as a singer but also labours under some well-worn platitudes.
‘There’s got to be rain if I want the rainbows,’ she sings, before informing us that the stars are brightest on the darkest nights.
She fares better on Harleys In Hawaii, a holiday love song inspired by renting a motorcycle, and Only Love, a gospel ballad that harks back to her roots in Christian rock.
The daughter of two Christian preachers, Perry even uses the track to apologise for never phoning her mother back.
She addresses motherhood on the final track What Makes A Woman, a short acoustic ballad with a hint of auto-tune.
The singer announced she was having a baby girl in April and she dedicates the song to her daughter, making it even more personal by signing herself off as ‘Katheryn’.
If Witness was a coming of age, Smile sugarcoats its bruises by returning tunefully to former glories.
DUA LIPA & THE BLESSED MADONNA: Club Future Nostalgia (Warner)
Verdict: Dance spin on a pop classic
Rating: 
Dua Lipa’s Future Nostalgia is already one of the albums of 2020.
Released at the start of lockdown, its mixture of classic disco and modern dance made it a soundtrack to kitchen parties everywhere.
The London singer has now remixed the whole LP in an even more club‑friendly style.
Lipa’s attitude seems to be: why have just one Madonna, when you can have two?
She has teamed up with American DJ Marea Stamper — aka The Blessed Madonna — for the project.
Stamper shouldn’t be confused with the queen of pop famous for her conical bras and hits such as Ray Of Light… although the other Madonna does put in a cameo.
Lipa’s attitude seems to be: why have just one Madonna, when you can have two?
Stamper, who now lives in London, does an excellent job. She reworks some tracks herself, but also turns to outside guests to add fresh layers to Lipa’s tunes.
The DJ also uses samples from old hits such as Neneh Cherry’s Buffalo Stance to stitch the album together.
Whether such a superb LP actually needs so many extra bells and whistles is another matter.
Taken individually, many of the revamps work a treat. Mark Ronson ropes in Gwen Stefani to give Physical a late-night soul feel, and The Killers producer Stuart Price brings a Pet Shop Boys groove to That Kind Of Woman.
He samples Stevie Nicks’s solo number Stand Back in the process.
Madonna (the original one) makes her appearance alongside rapper Missy Elliott on a new version of Levitating.
Pretty Please, meanwhile, is granted a nimble, UK garage-flavoured mix by London DJ Midland and another, more U.S.-orientated one by the New York production duo Masters At Work.
The enterprise descends into fussiness at times. Break My Heart already recycled the nagging guitar riff from Need You Tonight by INXS.
Throwing in a sample from Jamiroquai’s jazz-funk hit Cosmic Girl feels excessive.
To her credit, The Blessed Madonna maintains the feel-good spirit of an original album that’s hard to improve on.
But this mix-tape will only come into its own once our nightclubs reopen — and that day is still some way off.
LADY ELLA’S BACK WITH MACK
A ‘lost’ Ella Fitzgerald recording of the Brecht-Weill standard Mack The Knife has been unearthed
Clean Bandit have been unusually quiet since 2018’s What Is Love?, an album boosted by three No. 1 hits.
But the trio are back, and sticking to a familiar approach with new dance single Tick Tock.
Like their Christmas hit Rockabye with Anne-Marie and Sean Paul, the radio-friendly track features a female guest vocalist, Mabel, and a rapper, 24kGoldn.
Glasgow band Travis also seek outside assistance on melancholy country song The Only Thing, with singer Fran Healy teaming up with Susanna Hoffs of The Bangles.
Recorded partly in Hoffs’ LA living room, it recalls the classic duets of Nancy Sinatra and Lee Hazlewood.
Nottingham trio London Grammar, meanwhile, have released their first track in three years.
Baby It’s You was made with electronic producer George FitzGerald, and its interwoven synth lines are a graceful backdrop to Hannah Reid’s folkish voice.
And finally, a ‘lost’ Ella Fitzgerald recording of the Brecht-Weill standard Mack The Knife has been unearthed.
Ella (pictured) won a Grammy for a live version of the song in 1960, partly because she improvised so well after forgetting the words.
A more polished live take, cut with a jazz trio in Berlin two years later, is now out for the first time.