Tina Parol's Got Your Money

As I mentioned last Monday, Universal Motown's answer to the void left by Ashlee Simpson's departure to acting -- Tina Parol -- is finally starting to catch some steam with her debut single "Who's Got Your Money" building up spins on Top 40 radio. I give the Ashlee comparison with a tongue-in-cheek smirk hardly a fan of Ms. Simpson-Wentz, but even I can admit that a catchy pop song is a catchy pop song (case in point: that "L.O.-L.O.-L.O.V.E." hook...ugh...brain earworm). Tina, on the other hand, has serious potential in my eyes.

The song itself sounds to me like a 2009 pop version of Blu Cantrell's "Hit 'Em Up (Oops!)" mixed with P!NK's current Funhouse kind of sound, combined with vintage The Veronicas and Skye Sweetnam. In fact, what I find so fascinating about Tina is its hard to put her in a genre box, which in itself is something very refershing. While "Money" is undeniable radio friendly pop, the rest of her repetoire that I've heard draws heavily on her more pop-rock influences. More modern day Pat Benatar than Avril Lavigne, if you catch my drift...

I've been waiting on writing a full feature on Tina until video for "Money" was released because it was the video itself that brought my awareness to this new artist. My former roommate at my orginal dorm here in NYC was/is a professional dancer, and was chosen as a background actor in Tina's video. When she came back from the shoot, she told me all about it, and we listened to the song together. Ever since, the song was spun very loud in our room via Tina's MySpace, complete with the two of us screaming "He took my heart so I took his mon-ayyyy!" at the top of our lungs with as much fierceness as possible.

The song may be kitsch to the enth degree, but considering the US doesn't have any requisite fierce solo chick (Pixie Lott, VV Brown, etc.), I definitely think she could easily fall in to that category. While Lott is the pure pop and VV is the R&B, Tina is more of the pop-rock persuasian, and cites Queen, The Police and Blondie as her main influences. You may not be able to hear it on "Money" (I don't), but even Christina Aguilera had to comprimise with the ear-hooker that is "Genie In A Bottle" back in the day...

Tina will soon be jumping on the touring train with indie/emo rock-set The Cab, and will be swinging through her hometown of NYC mid-July...I'm hoping I can score some tix to that one...Check out the video here, due to UMG's YouTube restraints (rolls eyes). I'm interested to hear what ya'll think. Also -- be sure to check out the fly chick in the the black, with the hat at the right of your screen, pointing at Tina around the :08 mark. Blink and you might miss my former roommate.