Rating: ***
Oh, how the retro pop girls have stepped up in the nick of time to save 2020 – and Nicki French’s new EP, A Touch More Glitter, is a welcome addition to the mix.
The seven-track collection, featuring new mixes of tracks from her brilliant 2018 album, Glitter to the Neon Lights, brings together highlights from the album in remixed and extended versions – including the brilliant Stop Before You Get Me Started and Suzanna Dee collaboration, Wanted.
The former, one of Nicki’s best dancefloor fillers, is even more glorious in its longer form, while the drama of Wanted takes its time to unfold over its new seven-minute duration. Both are reworked by the fabulous Matt Pop.
Also onboard is Mr Root, with amped-up versions of Teardrops on the Disco Floor and the Alice Cooper cover Poison – which is even more gloriously camp in its new version.
The inclusion of Our Last Night On Earth is a moment’s breath, if a clunky addition to the set that feels like it doesn’t quite belong among the club-friendly edits the comprise the rest of the record.
And with two tracks appearing twice, we’d have much rather welcomed two new tracks to the mix – Steal The Crown and I Don’t Wanna Talk About Love would fit perfectly.
Remix albums are always tough to get right and, with originals as polished as the tracks on Glitter to the Neon Lights, repackaging them as even more club friendly was never going to be easy. But where A Touch More Glitter gets it right – with the Matt Pop and Mr Root tracks especially – it triumphs.
A Touch More Glitter is by no means essential listening, but it makes for a nice companion to the original album with a few moments of brilliance.
