Peaches Christ Superstar is back at it again!

The Almighty Queen of Electro-Trash has returned (and not a moment too soon!), wrapping her legs around sexy ass “Ice Cream Truck” rapper Cazwell for a reliably filthy new collaboration: “Unzip Me.”

Armed with relentlessly pounding synthesizers and searing beats (a little reminiscent of Martin Solveig‘s worldwide smash, “Hello”), both Cazwell and Peaches are right at home unleashing their freak and playfully taunting their prey: “Drop it, grab it, jerk it, unzip me,” the two take turns chanting during the chorus. It’s like my new life mantra!

OOF: And the way Peaches comes in with that big beat throbbing behind her? Mmm…that’s diddling my skittle just right! New ringtone, methinks.

You know, with all these commands being fired out, “Unzip Me” is a little like playing Bop-It! Well, okay. Scratch that: “Unzip Me” is like playing Bop-It…in the basement of a German S&M pony-play club. Not that I’ve ever been to one. STOP LOOKING AT ME WITH YOUR EYES LIKE THAT.

The video for the song will be coming shortly (check out some behind-the-scenes snaps for now). Until then, you’re just going to have to grab your Flip Cam, a couple close–um, friends, and make your own clip to this killer club cut!

“Unzip Me” will be released in November. (iTunes)

It’s been a while, but this one’s a rull good one.

Lollygagging ’round the streets of Williamsburg, Brooklyn last weekend after seeing Stevie Nicks and Rod Stewart‘s Heart & Soul Tour (which was simultaneously fantastic and amazing, thank you for asking), my boyfriend and I happened across a series of vinyls against the wall of an apartment, lazily stacked next to a trashcan.

And while I’m not personally one for bed bugs, he had no problem diving in headfirst to see if there were any gems hidden in the mix. (I’ve trained him well.)

Cue the find: Freestyle pop artist Alisha‘s self-titled 1985 debut album off of Vanguard Records.

Immediately struck by the incredible cover art featuring an ’80′s-tastic Alisha chilling in bed, hanging on the telephone and rocking a double-length pearl necklace, I knew I had to have it. So I snatched and ran, knowing full well there was no way the owner could have possibly meant to toss away such a classic.

G-l-a-m-o-r-o-u-s.

Alisha, as I soon learned, is a Freestyle pop artist from the ’80′s. She actually had an incredible run on the charts with her debut album, selling over 2 million copies and charting three singles in the Top 10 of the US Hot Dance Billboard Charts.

She would go on to release two more albums (1987′s Nightwalkin’ and 1990′s Bounce Back) and chart a few more singles, including 1999′s “You Wanna Be A Star (Superstar)” for the Molly Shannon classic, Superstar.

As for the tunes featured on Alisha, let’s be honest here: Every song basically sounds like a canned cut from Madonna. Sure, it’s a back-handed compliment…but a damn fine compliment nonetheless! The album is a mix of fierce, cutting freestyle beats worthy of a seriously sweaty workout session on the dance floor.

Click above to watch Alisha–looking something like the love child between Peaches and Barbra Streisand (okay, so maybe just the nose) that’s been slapped across the face by Christina Aguilera‘s “Moulin Rouge” make-up palette–as she struts it out to “Baby Talk,” her first and only #1 on the US Hot Dance Chart (and the best song Love & Kisses-era Dannii Minogue never recorded.)

Yet of all the gems on the album, from “All Night Passion” to “Stargazing,” my hands-down favorite of the bunch is none other than “Too Turned On.” (Too obvious from the title alone?)

The dance floor filler finds Alisha telling her man to stand back and take cover–’cause she’s just too damn turned on! Between infectious hand claps, saxophone synthesizer solos, and even a dazzling xylophone rhythm break in between the chorus and verses–it’s an utterly delicious jam that must be experienced to be believed.

“‘Cause I’m too turned on, can’t hold back / All heated up and can’t cool down,” Alisha cries out. Calling all modern pop artistes: Care to give this one a polishing off please? Dannii, baby?

Whether it’s her homegrown NYC appeal, inimitable stage presence, or the fact that she actually took time to thank “the guys at the Shell station” in her own album credits, Alisha is one MuuMuse Approved mamacita.

I’M TOO TURNED ON!

I have no time for the MTV Movie Awards. Like the Oscars, the show is nothing more than an endless parade of self-congratulatory douches eagerly circle-jerking each other while promoting their latest projects. Except the MTV Movie Awards are for teens. And teens are totally cool. So the jokes are pop culture relevant and full of swear words and sex jokes. It’s totally even more awesome.

Nonetheless, I waited out this fuck-fest of nonsense for Christina Aguilera‘s performance.

Thank God I did.

First of all, she whipped out “Bionic” first. WHAT? Amazing. I love “Bionic.” Bitch looked fierce to death upon a throne, and she was all suited up with her “Not Myself Tonight”-esque leotard and her album cover hair and make-up and everything was flawless and fabulous, etc. etc. Also, those opera wails at the end. Lawwwd have mercy! Loved it.

Then came “Not Myself Tonight” which was basically a rehash of the video’s best choreography and was therefore quite good indeed. Also, she sang very well and did some signature Aguilera vocal noodling while tapping the microphone quickly with her fingers because THAT’S WHAT CHRISTINA AGUILERA DOES WHEN SHE SINGS LIVE.

Then came “Woohoo,” which was a bit of a surprise because “Woohoo” is still not very single-worthy and she got bleeped for no real reason in the beginning but luckily she performed a very abbreviated portion of the song, so that went well.

AND THEN XTINA SAID “LET THERE BE LIGHT,” AND THERE WAS A VADGEHEART. XTINA SAW THAT THE VADGEHEART WAS GOOD; AND XTINA SEPARATED THE VADGEHEART FROM THE GLITTERY LEOTARD. SO SAYETH THE LORD, AMEN.

(Side note: Peaches had a blinking light above her vagina when I caught her in NYC last year, so perhaps she passed on the idea to Xtina in the recording studio when they worked on “My Girls” together.)

In all seriousness, this performance kind of ties together all of the loose ends of the Bionic campaign and makes sense of an otherwise jumbled, somewhat iffy album.

YOU KILLED IT, BITCH.

Rounding out the last of her 2009 release, I Feel Cream, Peaches has just unveiled the latest video treatment for each one of the album’s tracks with “Billionaire,” featuring Shunda K.

Inspired by The Wizard of Oz, the Trash Queen goes on a booze-and-blunts Rated X rampage with her friends in tow to take over the town.

God, way to jack Ke$ha‘s swagga, amirite?

KIDDING. KIDDING. SO MUCH KIDDING. Fuck that talentless ho.

Killed it as per usual, Peaches!

“When I woke up, I was like what did I do last night? Like what did I do? I fucked up… story of my life.”
Nicole “Snookums” Polizzi, Jersey Shore

Congratulations…it’s 2010! Who’s ready to drink?

That’s the lasting, ever-present theme of Animal, the long-awaited debut album from Ke$ha. (That’s kesh-uh, like ketchup, not key-shuh, like what I’ve been calling her for almost a year now.)

With a voice that can only be described as belonging to the bratty, rebellious step-sister of Katy Perry and a wardrobe identical to your annoyingly hip cousin who’s ‘over’ consumer culture and shops exclusively at American Apparel, Ke$ha has been toted for some time now as a kind of drunk electro-crap pop protege in the making.

But before we get ahead of ourselves and start praising her as the mainstream answer to Peaches or Uffie, let the record show: Ke$ha is just too squeaky-clean to be anything even close to dirrty pop. Sure, she’ll wear ripped leggings out on the town, hobble ’round drunk on stage with glitter smeared on her face and shout into a megaphone like an ass-backwards loon, but at the end of the day, she’s still a pretty face (with an interest in collaborating with Taylor Swift, as evidenced in this fairly annoying mini-interview).

However, even if she isn’t really spewing blood or punching dudes for sticking their fingers up her hoo-hah while crowd surfing, Ke$ha’s still here for the party on Animal.

With “Your Love Is My Drug” and “Tik Tok,” the “Poker Face” and “Just Dance” of the album respectively, K$ revels in the excesses of pop at its finest. Exuberant, punchy, irreverent–the two songs are the quintessential ‘dancing the night away’ moments of the album, complete with fist-pump worthy choruses and glitchy, gleeful synthesizers that merge fun, kid-friendly beats with the all-important album theme of substance abuse. (The result of which lends itself to literally dozens and dozens of uncomfortable tweenage video reinterpretations, complete with water bottle sippin’ and faux-drunk gyrating.)

Later on, with songs like “Take it Off” and “Kiss N Tell,” Ke$ha keeps the Katy Perry pronunciation guide close at hand for another round of drink-inspired jubilee. If you close your eyes and ignore the awful, skin-crawling over-enunciation of each syllable (“we’re duh-lee-ree-uss-suh, ’til the sun comes back uh-rah-ow-und”), the song’s are almost as fun as the two lead tracks, though inconsistently so: Some days they’re amazing, others simply unlistenable. It all depends on how loud and where you’re playing them.

It’s too bad that the plug gets pulled so soon.

Just as the party’s getting started, K$ takes it back to the schoolyard with a few truly dire attempts including  “Stephen,” a sloppy ode to a boy performed with an irritating, giggly schoolgirl sweetness. “I saw you in your tight ass rocker pants / You saw me too / I laughed ’cause I was completely trashed.” If the tuneless chorus isn’t enough to kill your buzz, the embarrassing ‘this is meant to be ironically immature’ lyricism will finish the job.

Later on, Ke$ha’s childish side is only further exploited with the likes of “Dinosaur,” which doubles as the worst song of 2010 thus far. The wimpy spell-out assault, meant to put the old men creeping around clubs on blast (“D-I-N-O-S-A, U-R a dinosaur!”), is so obnoxious, so incomprehensibly basic that it makes Gwen Stefani‘s “Hollaback Girl” (“This shit is bananas! B-A-N-A-N-A-S”) sound refined.

As songs like “Dinosaur” come to show, one of the biggest drawbacks of Animal is its snotty Kidz Bop-friendly attitude. Back during the summer, when a slew of demos from the singer first leaked, standout tracks including “Disgusting,” “Fuck Him (He’s A DJ)” and “V.I.P.,” (which has mercifully been tacked on as a bonus track overseas) provided a glimmer of hope that Ke$ha was to become our new rude-pop savior. The songs were much grimier, complete with naughty come-on’s and more genuinely clever lyrics (“He’s a stereo type / He’s got the baseball cap and he’s building the hype, as he’s feeding me this hot track / You see, we share the same God, we’ve got the same love / I never want to stop, I don’t want to give him up.”) Now? We’ve got trash like “Blah Blah Blah.”

Not all of the girly girl tracks are worth the hate, though: The strut-worthy prowl of “Boots and Boys” and the deliciously bitchy “Backstabber” are both redeemable bouts of escapist delight.

The time when Ke$ha truly, legitimately shines best is when she drops the baby routine and acts her own age: “Hungover,” “Dancing With Tears in My Eyes,” and “Animal” are all miles ahead of the pack, featuring anthemic pop hooks and devastating choruses. The most successful of all of the grown-up numbers is “Blind,” which ties a minimal, plodding synthesized beat together with one hell of a Clarkson-worthy chorus: “I’m sick and tired of the mess you made me / Never gonna catch me cry / You must be blind if you can’t see / You’ll miss me ’til the day you die.”

The bleary-eyed, post-party numbers are much smarter than the surrounding material, and far more representative of Ke$ha’s ability to be more than just a one bottle wonder–which makes duds like “Party at a Rich Dude’s House” all the more difficult to swallow.

Lots of juicy tidbits in my inbox today!

Vice Magazine, in partnership with Vodafone, has undertaken a new video interview series called Heroes, which spotlights several recording artists from around the world.

Here’s what they have to say about it:

Lily Allen is nothing if not honest in her lyrics and her commendable quest for “fuckloads of diamonds”, and that’s probably why most people on the planet, including us, love her. As part of our ongoing Heroes project with Vodafone, we sat down with Lils, who’s been touring for a year, to talk about her plans to move to the countryside and have babies as she got ready for her first ever gig in Liverpool. You can watch the full series here.

If you head over to the site, you’ll be able to watch all the video segments, featuring some rather stunning visuals displayed in massive full screen–not to mention the high quality recordings of some of Lily’s performances live in Liverpool.

And it doesn’t stop with L’Allen: Peaches, Santigold, VV Brown and La Roux are ALL featured as well in the Heroes campaign. (Click and flick the mouse downward on the screen to cycle through all the names!)

The site is oriented around the Vodafone 360, pitting all the artists as “Contacts” on the phone. If you peruse the site a little more, you’ll find a lot of silly little features including videos, pictures, map details, and status updates.

It’s actually a lot of fun…so poke around!

Oh, 2009. What music to my ears! It was the best of times, it was the worst of times…and one of the greatest years in Pop music since–well, since 2007.

Sorting out this list was truly difficult. All I want to do is reach out my arms and squeeze all of these little albums together for one, snugly show of musical appreciation. Honestly, fabulous year in music. It’s totally not fair to list you all in descending order based on quality, but hey…people love that shit. Just remember: You’re all winners in my book!

Well, except for you in the back there. You’re ugly.

Without further ado…

—-

40. Leona Lewis – Echo
39. Electrik Red – How To Be A Lady Vol. 1
38. Rupaul – Champion
37. Esser – Braveface
36. David Guetta – One Love

35. The XX – XX
34. Kelly Clarkson – All I Ever Wanted
33. Amerie – In Love & War
32. Mariah Carey – Memoirs of an Imperfect Angel
31. Blake Lewis – Heartbreak on Vinyl

30. Ciara – Fantasy Ride
29. Yeah Yeah Yeahs – It’s Blitz!
28. Imogen Heap – Ellipse
27. The Gossip – Music For Men
26. Junior Boys – Begone Dull Care

25 .Cheryl Cole – 3 Words
24. Y.A.S. – Arabology
23. Amanda Blank – I Love You
22. Frankmusik – Complete Me
21. Annie – Don’t Stop

20. The Saturdays – Wordshaker
19. Little Boots – Hands
18. Pet Shop Boys – Yes
17. Shakira – She Wolf
16. La Roux – S/T

15. Nadia Ali – Embers
14. Utada – This Is The One
13. Lily Allen – It’s Not Me, It’s You
12. Sally Shapiro – My Guilty Pleasure
11. Fever Ray – S/T

10. Polly Scattergood – S/T

Painfully under-reported here at MuuMuse, Polly Scattergood’s debut is a weird, warbling pop triumph, complete with broken vocals and quivering falsetto. The album, which brings to mind a cross between Fiona Apple, Regina Spektor, and Kate Bush, takes a neurotic, autobiographical dive into the perils of pills and psychosis.

Just please…don’t touch her.

9. Miike Snow:  Miike Snow

MuuMuse Review

Looking back, the surprise wasn’t that the Swedish hit-making duo Bloodshy & Avant would come up with some brilliant tunes on their own venture into the music scene, but that the sound they would produce would be like nothing we’d ever heard before. Rock, folk, glittering electronica…throw it all in a blender, and there you have it: The debut album from Miike Snow.

8. Noisettes – Wild Young Hearts

MuuMuse Review

Trading in the screaming, carnal stomps of their debut LP, What’s the Time, Mr. Wolf?, the Noisettes have returned–and this time, they’re feeling nostalgic.

Keeping the best hooks from the doo-wop era in mind, Shingai Shoniwa and the rest of her UK troupe have produced some of the best feeling, best sounding tunes of the new century with their second LP. Combining classic melodies (“Wild Young Hearts”) with contemporary production (“Don’t Upset the Rhythm”), the band has once again proven themselves as one of the most innovative, musically intriguing acts of the new century.

7. Bat For Lashes – Two Suns

Bat For Lashes’ second LP Two Suns, is a mysterious, ethereal creature.

Inspired by landscapes and created in isolation, the album is as mysterious as it is compelling, providing enough distant howls (“Glass”) and spooky echoes (“The Last Sound”) to make the casual listener want to flick the lights on while listening at night. At the same time, warm, enveloping numbers, including one of the year’s best songs, “Daniel,” keep the album burning bright long after the final embers flicker down.

6. Peaches – I Feel Cream

MuuMuse Review

What else is in the teaches of Peaches? Apparently, a whole lot more than you’d ever expect.

Hitting harder than ever, Peaches’ went for the jugular on her raucous fifth LP, I Feel Cream. While songs like the Donna Summer-esque “I Feel Cream” and “Lose You” hinted toward a next-level variety of disco inspired music-making, the remainder of the album’s punchier numbers, including “Serpentine” and “Trick or Treat,” have since become instant Peaches classics, reminding us that the real Miss Nisker still knows how to hit it hard.

5. Tiësto: Kaleidoscope

In five words…Indie Takes to the Dancefloor.
MuuMuse Review

It’s one of the few albums that ended up sounding as good on the speakers as it does on paper: The King of Trance meets the voices of the independent music scene, from Tegan & Sara, to Metric‘s Emily Haines, to Tilly and the Wall‘s Kianna Alarid, as well as a few familiar faces (Calvin Harris, Sneaky Sound System).

A stunning, slamming body of work (and a whole fuck-load of fun), Kaleidoscope may not have appealed to Tiësto’s trance purist fans, but it sure made music sound better in 2009.

4. Röyksopp: Junior

In four words…Swedish and Nordic Delight.
MuuMuse Review

Röyksopp is probably one of my favorite electronic acts of all time, and with the release of their March effort Junior, it’s becoming easier and easier to explain why.

Perhaps the greatest definition of “smart pop” of the year, the Nordic duo have combined just the right amount of trickling, fluid electronica, heavenly strings, and pounding bass to create some of most savory pop confections of the year. Couple the beats with vocal contributions from some of pop music’s most accomplished Swedish songstresses, including Robyn, Lykke Li, and The Knife‘s Karin Dreijer, and you’ve got a nearly unstoppable collection of intelligent, dancefloor-ready musique.

3. Florence + The Machine: Lungs

In three words…The Beast Within.
MuuMuse Review

Certainly the most impressive artist debut in recent history, Florence + The Machine’s Lungs is an immense collection of macabre, magical music that transcends the limited confines of genre. Not pop, not rock….just a body of music surging with carnal energy and an insatiable rhythm, all thanks to fiery lead singer Florence Welch.

From the stampeding chaos of “Dog Days are Over” to the roar of “Howl,” all the way into the last, glittering notes of “You’ve Got the Love,” Lungs is as close to flawless as a debut could ever sound. Though the word is often overused in modern society (which is a shame), there’s nothing else that can quite describe what comes out from this album aside from “Epic.”

As time goes on, the music grows even sweeter. Just remember to play it louder, louder each time…

2. Rihanna – Rated R

In two words…Radio Killer.
MuuMuse Review

It’s tanking on the charts, it’s only bubbling under on the radio, and it’s her least hit-heavy album ever. But I’ll be damned if, two months after it’s initial leak, it’s not my most played album of the year.

This is 2009′s greatest “album” album; a cohesive product of media frenzy and pent-up emotion. The odds that this album would even be created are shocking as it is. I mean, here’s one of pop’s most commercially viable, radio-friendly artists, who’s decided to turn full circle and send a big middle finger to the label that created her by making a daring, haunted album full of anger and anguish without a trace of that Good Girl Gone Bad formula. Want to hear another “Umbrella”? Well, fuck off. You’re not finding it here.

Killer, damning cuts such as “Hard,” “Wait Your Turn,” and “G4L,” all take Riri to a darker, confident place than ever before, leading to one of the greatest surprises of the year.

It’s Rihanna’s first artistic statement, and for that, she’s earned my full attention.

One more time for the year: VIVA LA RIHANNOIR!

1. Lady Gaga: The Fame Monster

In one word…Monster.
MuuMuse Review

With the release of a certain single back in October, Gaga managed to turn my hatred on its head, cause me to issue a public apology, and quickly morph me into a full-fledged, unapologetic fan.

While I’ve already gone through it in my review of the album, it bears repeating: The Fame Monster is indeed a monster. Eight perfect slices of hook-laden pop, all wrapped in a delicious ’50′s-horror inspired visual campaign. Murderous live performances, a stellar accompanying national Monster Ball tour…it’s a beast with such bite that Alejandro’s still weeping himself to sleep at night. The Fame Monster is a stunning addition to the growing back catalog of the 21st century’s most important and influential entertainer.

In a sea of gangsters, liars and thieves, of false prophets and seedy politicians, Lady Gaga is the only public figure I can truly hold accountable for having followed through on her campaign promise: She is saving the world, one sequin at a time.

As if there were any question, 2009 shall heretofore be known as the Year of the Gaga.

Even the Queen of Electrocrap needs to get her glam on from time to time!

Please enjoy the brand new video for “I Feel Cream,” the title track of Peaches‘ 2009 album released earlier this year.

“Cream” has always been one of my favorites from the bunch, due in large part to the song’s lush synthesizers and pulsating disco energy. Appropriately, the video takes a hint from the track, featuring a rather subdued Ms. Nisker voguing against an array of bright lights and neon colors like no other anti-disco diva before her.

And as for the couture featured throughout the clip? Let’s just say that if it wasn’t already established, this is totally the year that shoulder pads made a comeback. Whether or not that’s a good thing remains to be seen.

Thanks to Tastes Like Caramel for the find!

Purchase “I Feel Cream” on iTunes | MySpace | Official Website