Alesha Is the Queen

Alesha Is the Queen is the fourth studio album by British recording artist Alesha, released on 5 February, 2007 by Ensemble Entertainment. Opting to re-establish her music career instead of focusing on other endeavors as originally planned, Cyrus began planning the project in 2006.

As well as Alesha producing the album she worked with a variety of producers such as Buffi, Kati, Neyssa and Othello. The album featured collaborations with Josie Matthews and Neyssa on the singles “Just for the Thrills” and “Those Who Love Me Can Take the Train” respectively. Alesha Is the Queen is a pop record with hip hop, indie rock and synth pop influences. It lyrically explores themes of fame, fashion, partying, and wealth, as well as heartbreak and love.

Alesha Is the Queen debuted to generally favorable reviews from contemporary music critics. The album yielded six singles and had high sales, becoming Alesha’s first album to receive a diamond certification and selling seven million copies worldwide. It ranked in the top ten best-selling albums of all-time for a number of years. Alesha Is the Queen won Best Album at the 14th Urapopstar Awards and earned Alesha five other nominations.

The lead single “Fashion Kills,” penned by Buffi, transformed Alesha into a global pop sensation, becoming her third number one. “Just for the Thrills,” a duet with Matthews, and third single “London Brat” continued the album’s success. In July 2007, Alesha released the controversial “Power Power” EP with Buffi, Shell Ruin and Taylor Brookes alongside a re-release of the album. “The OH in Ohio”/“Candy Cigarettes” became Alesha’s most successful single at that time, while “Those Who Love Me Can Take the Train” closed off the era. Alesha began her first international tour The Queen Tour on May 1, 2007.

Development
Alesha began working on her fourth studio album in 2006 after the release of her first greatest hits collection ‘’Chic/Freak’’. Although Alesha had found great commercial success with her 2005 album Buried Underneath and its singles, the greatest hits and its singles were released to lukewarm reception. Feeling pressure to perform well from both herself and her record label, Alesha scrapped an entire album’s worth of material.

Upon hearing “Fashion Kills,” a disco-inspired track written by rock singer-songwriter Buffi, Alesha desperately wanted the track for her fourth studio album. Alesha described the song as a turning point and a catalyst in the album’s creation. Buffi also wrote “Delicious,” as well as coming up with the album’s title. London Brat Pack star Kati contributed “Stopping Time” to the album, while Othello penned “Career Suicide.”

“Those Who Love Me Can Take the Train” was originally an unfinished track written and performed by Alesha’s wife Neyssa, appearing on 2006’s The Beat That My Heart Skipped in its demo form. Alesha found the track so beautiful that she completed it as a duet between her and Neyssa. Alesha approached Josie Matthews to appear on the song “Just for the Thrills;” Alesha later wrote and produced Matthews’ second studio album Resurrection in its entirety.

Music and lyrics
Alesha Is the Queen is primary a pop album, which also integrates elements of hip hop, indie rock and synthpop music. Alesha was primary influenced by pop record producers Richard X, particularly his work with M.I.A. on 2004’s Arular, and Xenomania. Main themes of the album include fame, fashion and wealth, as evident on tracks like “Fashion Kills,” “London Brat,” and “The OH in Ohio.”

A fifteen-track set, the album opens with the “full-on-dance” track “Fashion Kills,” which was inspired by legendary disco and synthpop producer Giorgio Moroder. The first song written for Alesha Is the Queen, “Fashion Kills” was chosen as the lead single as an “explanation for the record.” An ode to fashion, the song references designers Alexander McQueen, Gucci, Minolo Blahnik and Vivienne Westwood with a middle-8 that echoes Madonna’s “Material Girl.” Second single “Just for the Thrills” features vocals from protégé Josie Matthews; Alesha worked closely with the star on her second studio album Resurrection, writing and producing it in its entirety. Centred around sleeping with rich men for money, “Just for the Thrills” was described as “deliciously slutty.” It was called a "well-produced, upbeat pop tune, with a great hook in the chorus" by The Sunday Times.

“London Brat,” the album’s third single, is “a dark, squiggly synthpop epic” with “a collision of warp-speed funk guitar riffs and distorted Giorgio Moroder-style techno-disco.” “Lucky Draw,” which was called "the album's hidden highlight", was labelled "weighty, sultry electro-pop [...] layered with beautifully enticing synth melodies." The song is about spontaneity and jumping into a new relationship. “A Hole in My Heart” is an electro-bossanova track that reminisces a summer fling, while “When the Glitter Fades” is a synthpop song.

“Delicious,” the second song written by Buffi on the album, has more indie rock influences indicative of Buffi’s usual musical style. Penned by Othello, “Career Suicide” is a darker, mid-tempo song with electronica influences that details an aging popstar with a penchant for drugs (Alesha joked the song was about Buffi). “This Is Not a Peepshow” is an electroclash song about turning down suitors on a night out. “Like Freddy” references iconic ‘’A Nightmare on Elm Street’’ slasher Freddy Kreuger with its title and the lyric, “I’m gonna turn you indie out like Freddy.” Another electroclash-inspired track, “Like Freddy” was written using a Roland MC-505 sequencer/drum machine.

“The OH in Ohio,” released as a single in September 2007, was inspired by hip hop and R&B subgenre crunk. Alesha received criticism for the song’s allegedly classist lyrics. “Candy Cigarettes” is an electropop ballad comparing a relationship to a nicotine addiction. “May”, an acoustic indie rock song, and “Stopping Time,” a Kati-penned pop-rock power ballad, are both reminiscent of Alesha’s previous studio album ‘’Buried Underneath’’ (2005). “Those Who Love Me Can Take the Train,” a duet with Neyssa, is an indie-folk “suicide note.”

The album’s deluxe edition includes songs from the “Power Power” EP; the titular track is a dancehall-inspired electropop song with “gangster rap swagger.” “Cherry Bomb,” was written by Buffi, is a darker, indie rock song. Both songs are collaborations with Buffi, Shell Ruin and Taylor Brookes. Other songs on the deluxe edition include “Kill from the Rear,” a duet with Putanovska from her album ‘’I, Whore,’’ the 80’s-inspired “The Teachings of Alesha,” the Othello-penned “A Fire Died Inside My Heart,” and the “Candy Cigarettes” sequel “Burns.”

Critical reception
Alesha Is the Queen received generally positive reviews from contemporary pop music critics. At Metacritic, which assigns a rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream critics, the album received an average score of 71, based on 32 reviews. Stephen Thomas Erlewine of AllMusic called the album "intermittently exciting and embarrassing,” and Kelefa Sanneh of The New York Times described it as "clever and sometimes enticing" but stated that it "doesn't quite add up.” Jennifer Nine of Yahoo! Music praised the album as "the hottest, coolest, best-dressed pop album of the year" and found it to be "sleek, shimmery, and dripping with all-killer-no-filler musical bling.” In a review for About.com, Jason Shawhan noted that the album "manages a near-impossible feat—it spans almost every genre of fun party and dance music you can name, yet remains a cohesive whole." Lisa Haines of BBC Music stated that Alesha rivaled Lucreacia and Emma Brown. Rolling Stone's Rob Sheffield viewed it as "an irresistible party: trashy, hedonistic and deeply weird." The magazine later placed the album at number thirty-nine on its list of the top fifty albums of 2007.

The album was generally criticized for its large number of collaborations and producers. The Guardian’s Caroline Sullivan argued that although "others lend a hand [...] it's very much Alesha’s show"; however, most others disagreed. Anthony Carew of Neumu expressed that the album's fragmentation kept it from being "a bright-and-shiny pop-music tour-de-force.” Eric Greenwood wrote for Drawer B that "Stefani tries to be all things to all people here", but that the result "comes off as manipulative and contrived.” Entertainment Weekly's David Browne shared this opinion, stating that the album "is like one of those au courant retail magazines that resembles a catalog more than an old-fashioned collection of, say, articles." Many reviewers focused on the album's light lyrical themes, but Sal Cinquemani of Slant Magazine commented that the album's "fashion fetish [...] gives the album a sense of thematic cohesiveness.”

At the 14th Urapopstar Awards, Alesha Is the Queen won Best Album. Alesha also earned nominations for Best Collaboration (“Just for the Thrills”), Best Female, Best Live (The Queen Tour), Best Single/Album Art (“The OH in Ohio”/“Candy Cigarettes” and Best Songwriter. At the 15th Urapopstar Awards, Alesha won Best Female and received nominations for Best Collaboration (“Those Who Love Me Can Take the Train”) and Best Promotion.

Commercial response
Alesha Is the Queen debuted at number one on the albums chart, becoming Alesha’s second number one album. The album was re-issued in July 2007 to include a bonus disc of additional tracks, including those from the “Power Power” EP. It was repackaged again in December 2007 with a bonus disc of Christmas songs. The record became Alesha’s first to receive a diamond certification, indicating one million copies sold. It sold a total of 1,792,817 copies after 54 weeks on the chart, remaining Alesha’s best-selling album and ranking in the top ten best-selling albums of all-time for many years.

Promotion
Alesha Is the Queen was additionally promoted through the documentary of the same name, which premiered through MTV on October 2; it covered the production of the project and the lead-up to its release Alesha appeared on the cover of NYLON and Rolling Stone magazines in January 2007.

Singles
The album was launched with “Fashion Kills,” becoming Alesha’s third number one single after an extensive promotional campaign. The music video was inspired by the 2006 film The Devil Wears Prada. Alesha performed the song at the 13th Urapopstar Awards. A transformative single in Alesha’s career, it has been said that it "heralded a new era of success" for Alesha by The Guardian.

“Just for The Thrills” with Josie Matthews was released as the album’s second single in April 2007. Alesha and Matthews visited Africa for Comic Relief; scenes from their visit were televised during the live telethon. They appeared on special Comic Relief celebrity editions of Countdown and Ready Steady Cook. The song’s b-side, “Primark Honey,” is an infamous parody of Melissa Moore’s “Gucci Baby”. The single charted at number two.

Alesha teamed up with her close friends and recurring collaborators Buffi, Shell Ruin and Taylor Brookes in July 2007 to release “Power Power”, which they described as an "epic tour-de-force". The EP consisted of two brand new tracks, the titular song and "Cherry Bomb", in addition to collaborative versions of songs taken from their respective albums. Adverts ran on Channel 4 throughout the campaign and both songs were A-listed by BBC Radio 1 within the first week of their initial release. The released experienced extreme setback during early stages of promotion when all four musicians were arrested. It emerged soon after that the police had unearthed plans for the women to copycat the Moors murders of the 1960s. The girls adopted Myra Hindley's appearance — mirroring her eye makeup, hair style and sardonic attitude. However, their stint behind bars was short-lived and they were soon released and given a timely amount of community service, which included cleaning the doorstep of Jill Dando. The video, which showed the girls hellbent on world domination, also proved controversial. Despite the highly publicised promotional campaign and hype, the song failed to set the charts alight - it didn't even enter the top ten. "Power Power" has become famed as a trainwreck and one of the most shocking singles of Urapopstar. While fans and some fellow celebrities felt that the low charting was undeserved, a large number of people thought it was justified. All four parties received criticism for their controversial antics. The song was voted the Worst Single of the Year, Worst Collaboration, and Most Deserved Flop at the 2007 Shit Awards. Alesha maintains that the single is one of her favourite memories.

In an attempt to appeal to regain the public's support, Alesha targeted a new audience with the fifth single from Alesha Is the Queen. “The OH in Ohio” and “Candy Cigarettes were chosen. Promotion was launched at the 14th Urapopstar Awards, as Alesha put on a mind-blowing performance of "Ohio" with Twist which poked fun at Camilla Holmes, Dalisay, Ellen Fitzpatrick, Lady Lou, and Lavina. She also created a clothing line for high street chain River Island, furthering her appeal to the chav youth of Britain. "The OH in Ohio"/"Candy Cigarettes" proved Alesha's career was still thriving when it peaked at number two in September 2007. The album's final single, the Neyssa duet “Those Who Love Me Can Take the Train”, also peaked at number two.

Tour
Alesha embarked on her first world tour The Queen Tour in 2007, performing in arenas in Europe, Asia and North America. Jamie King directed, while John Galliano designed costumes. Alfie Outcast and Lola Elle were chosen as opening acts. The tour was televised in September 2007 and received a CD+DVD release in December 2007.