Cheryl Fights...But She Might Be Losing...

Cheryl Cole, best known as 1/5 of UK's pop super-girl group Girls Aloud, officially became the first of the fab five to delve into solo waters with the leak of her debut solo single a few days back, thanks to its early airplay on a UK radio station. In its wake, she has created a flurry of reaction amongst bloggers. The song, "Fight For This Love", is a strange yet generic mixture of pop and "R&B" (mark the quotes, please). I suppose if this is what Cheryl meant by going in a "more R&B direction," true blue electro Girls Aloud fans need not be too worried.

I may be a ride-or-die Girls Aloud fan (and that much will not change), but I'm just not into this. When word first spread of the girls going on a break to pursue solo projects, I was cool so long as all five weren't totally quitting their day job, and now that the song has made its debut, I'm glad that is still the case. Cheryl is hardly the vocal workhorse of GA, and it shows on this very, very auto-tuned track.

It sounds cliche (and very Paula Abdul of me) but she is a very pretty girl, and makes for the perfect popstar -- hence her often being in the middle of all of the Girls Aloud promo pictures, despite the vocal prowless of bandmates of Nicola Roberts or Sarah Harding often gets overlooked. I don't see this flying at all on the American charts, although I don't think that is the target audience for Ms. Cole at this point. Nadine Coyle's solo effort is already getting buzz at a potential US release (despite the fact that GA never got any promotion or release here in the US that I know of -- and if she does become a star here for her own music, I will be a bit teed off).

With that said -- the song isn't terrible. That is to say, it could be a million, billion times worse. But it's just nothing special. When you think of Girls Aloud (especially lead singles from all of their albums), you think of epic and fantastic. This just leaves us waiting on a very large cliff. It's even sadder when you hear it was co-written by Steve Kipner, who brought us "Genie In A Bottle" and "He Luvs U Not", amongst many other modern pop classics. Also, I can't help but think about her much publicized relationship issues with her cheating husband, Ashley Cole. I wonder if the album dares to cover any ground regarding that scandelous topic...I somehow doubt it.

Her solo album, Three Words, is due for release at the end of October over in the UK and boasts production by Soulshock and Karlin, Bloodshy and Avant, Taio Cruz and longtime GA collaborator Xenomania. Why she didn't go with a Xeno track is kind of obvious because she probably wanted to seperate her work from Girls Aloud (at least a little bit), but after hearing "Fight", I kind of hoping the rest of the album is more exciting. But if not, I suppose 2010 (and the new Girls Aloud album...and the potential solo effort from Nadine Coyle) isn't too far away...