Fittingly for one in all 2023’s hottest releases, the majority of Kylie Minogue’s Pressure was recorded throughout a thermometer-melting, record-breaking summer season. We meet two of the LP’s key collaborators, Richard ‘Biff’ Stannard and Duck Blackwell, to listen to how they stored their cool through the making of a outstanding genre-spanning document.
Dispensing with the themes which have knowledgeable Kylie Minogue’s earlier two information – 2018’s country-tinged Golden and 2020’s retro-leaning Disco – the no holds barred liberation of latest album Pressure goals squarely for the dancefloor.
Described by Kylie as “a mix of non-public reflection, membership abandon and melancholic excessive,” Pressure boasts a panoply of gems encompassing euphoric electro, traditional 90s home and exhilarating 80s power-pop – with Minogue on the centre of all of it sounding sexier and extra assured than she has in years.
Its first two singles, 10 Out Of 10 and Padam Padam, have seen the pop icon workforce up with DJ Oliver Heldens and producer Lostboy respectively, introducing her to a brand new viewers thanks largely to TikTok. The excellent news for followers outdated and new, is that the most effective remains to be but to return from Pressure.
Crafted over the previous 18 months, Kylie has predominantly labored with long-time collaborator Richard ‘Biff’ Stannard and Disco’s Duck Blackwell, who’ve co-written and produced eight of the album’s tracks together with her.
“We’re simply so excited that everybody is lastly getting to listen to it,” says Blackwell. “We knew that we’d made a great document and had been actually happy with it ourselves, however we nonetheless weren’t anticipating it to be getting as a lot love as it’s.”
“We’ve had a lot optimistic suggestions already, from the label, from folks within the music business and, most significantly, Kylie may be very pleased with it,” provides Stannard.
“Basically, that’s crucial factor. If the artist is blissful and the label is blissful, it’s just about job executed. All the pieces else is subjective. We’ve had some actual moments making this album and we’re all extraordinarily pleased with it.”
The foundations of what would turn out to be Pressure had been laid in early 2022 because the logistical nightmare of the still-recovering dwell music scene, to not point out an overcrowded roster of postponed excursions from different artists, noticed Kylie shelve plans to take Disco out on the highway.
As a substitute, throughout a interval of downtime, whereas visiting Biff at dwelling, they started experimenting within the studio.
“We had no concept that we had been even making an album at first,” he remembers. “We had been simply in my dwelling studio enjoying round with a couple of concepts, and I known as Duck and stated, ‘Do you need to come over and work on some music?’ It was that straightforward.
“We did that a couple of instances and one of many first issues we got here up with was Maintain On To Now. All of us simply thought, ‘This is basically good – we have now to do one thing with it.’ That’s just about the start of the album. We’d usually work intensively, then wouldn’t see one another for a bit after which get again collectively. That continued for about 18 months.”
In addition to being the impetus for the album, the monitor, which Stannard describes as “Cry-Dance”– a mix of melancholia and euphoria – is a agency favorite.
“That music makes me cry as a result of it’s very private for me,” he reveals. “Padam Padam has executed nice issues so far as a brand new, youthful viewers goes, however for Kylie’s core fanbase, I believe Maintain On To Now may be very particular and encapsulates every thing in a single music.
“She and I’ve labored collectively so lengthy, 24 years, that it turns into very emotional. I believe our friendship comes throughout within the music. There are particular issues she’ll solely write about with me, and it comes right down to belief. It’s a really particular music.”
Its creation additionally set a precedent so far as the core working relationship of Biff, Kylie, Jon Inexperienced and Duck was involved, giving them licence to be open and weak.
“I’m pretty new to the group – Biff introduced me in to work with Kylie in 2019, and it was like being allowed into an interior circle,” says Duck. ”As quickly as I used to be in a room with him and Kylie, I used to be conscious that there was such a powerful bond there and felt honoured to be allowed in as they had been speaking about such private issues.
“They had been very welcoming and I instantly felt comfy sharing my very own private tales and contributing to that. Maintain On To Now was born out of that.”
Artistic spark totally ignited, one of the fruitful intervals got here in summer season 2021 – the most well liked on document, once they all decamped to an expensive Airbnb in Surrey.
“Kylie didn’t need to be in a studio atmosphere as we each write higher in a extra relaxed area, so the document firm booked an unimaginable Airbnb for us all,” says Stannard. “It was the most well liked week of the 12 months.
“We had been in a tremendous place with a swimming pool and every thing – it sounds rock’n’roll however we by no means truly used any of it. We did 16 songs in 5 days. In truth, we wrote the title monitor on the most well liked day within the UK ever!”
When CP mentions that a number of the songs have a powerful summery vibe, Biff credit the atmosphere through which they had been created. “I’m certain it was existential and the music was influenced by the warmth,” he says. “I believe that in all probability comes throughout as a result of we felt like we had been on vacation.”
“That place was superb,” Blackwell agrees. “It was three barn conversions that had been renovated by a producer. The one factor it didn’t have was air con, so it was boiling! On a whim as I used to be leaving to drive up there, I’d taken a transportable air-conditioning unit and that turned out to be a lifesaver.
“We had been frantically looking for out the good areas of the home to document in. There was a nook of the kitchen that was barely cooler so we’d arrange in there for a number of the extra severe stuff.
“Issues We Do For Love was recorded within the pool home with the French doorways open and my air-conditioner on between takes!”
The truth that these 5 days produced a number of the strongest tracks on the album show what a inventive hotbed the Surrey classes had been – actually and figuratively.
Pressure’s title monitor is one in all Kylie’s most fascinating and addictive songs in years, each sonically and structurally, seamlessly switching from Chicago home to flirty falsetto to digital domination and again once more in three minutes.
“It jogs my memory of one thing Ladies Aloud would have executed,” Stannard admits. “It’s indirect and awkward, like two or three totally different music concepts in one which shouldn’t actually work collectively however by some means does.”
The exhilarating power-pop of Issues We Do For Love sounds just like the theme to a traditional 80s John Hughes film, a comparability which makes good sense when Duck and Biff reveal that Pat Benatar’s Love Is A Battlefield and Michael Sembello’s Maniac had been reference factors.
One Extra Time’s Daft Punk affect will not be solely titular but in addition within the sense that it updates the sound of early 2000s French nu-house with a slight nod to Kylie’s personal Love At First Sight, one in all many sonic signatures discerning followers may hear sprinkled all through the album.
Once we increase the topic with Stannard to query whether or not Pressure is an aural Easter Egg hunt of buried Kylie references for followers he says it’s purely coincidental and a results of their enduring musical synergy.
BACK WITH A BANG
If the thrill across the album feels paying homage to Kylie’s profession rebirth in 2000, it’s down to a different partnership elementary to her resurgence over the previous 5 years.
Jamie Nelson, A&R at BMG, labored intently with Minogue at Parlophone and orchestrated her comeback with Spinning Round and collaborated together with her intently by Mild Years and Fever, guiding her again to world success.
He started working at BMG in 2015 and his acquisition was a significant factor for Kylie signing with them in 2017. He despatched the singer to Nashville to hone her songwriting abilities for Golden, was the mastermind behind Disco and was accountable for Padam Padam.
“Jamie Nelson doesn’t get sufficient credit score for the position he’s performed,” Biff enthuses. “He’s so intertwined with the success, most not too long ago with Padam Padam, it’s genius. Not many individuals know, however that monitor has been round for some time, and it was Jamie that heard it and noticed its potential and stated, ‘That’s the music for Kylie’.
“Again at Parlophone he discovered Spinning Round and all these nice songs. Not many individuals are in a position to try this and Kylie trusts him implicitly and she or he’ll sing them.”
Whereas some producers are protecting over artists and object to them working with different writers and producers, Stannard and Blackwell have had no such qualms about Kylie collaborating with others on Pressure – in reality, they inspired it.
“I’ve by no means understood that mindset,” Biff says. “While you actually put money into an artist they turn out to be your pal and also you simply need the most effective for them and for the album. There’s some actually fascinating folks on this document and one in all Kylie’s strengths is that she’s open to work with anybody, simply to see what the end result shall be – she’s actually experimental that approach.
“As quickly as I heard Padam Padam I believed it was an excellent music and I believe Lostboy is an excellent producer. After all, a part of you needs you’d executed it however I in all probability assume that a few hundred songs. In respect of what the music has executed for Kylie when it comes to increasing her viewers, it’s been unimaginable to witness.”
With all this discuss of nice producers, Biff and Duck are eager to emphasize how adept Kylie has turn out to be when it comes to producing her personal vocals, a skillset she acquired when she was pressured to earn a living from home through the 2020 lockdown. Halfway by her Disco album and with a looming deadline, she needed to study on the job.
“Kylie received’t thoughts me saying this however when she began it throughout Disco it was with essentially the most primary GarageBand set-up and we needed to discuss her by it,” Stannard remembers. “Subsequent factor we all know, she’s mastered it and is producing high-quality vocals!
“She’s higher than me now at producing her vocals. On the finish of the day, no-one is aware of her voice higher than she does.”
Duck concurs. “She’s the Queen of the distant vocals!” he laughs. “Lots of her vocals had been recorded in lodge rooms. As a result of she’s travelling a lot it’s been very easy to make modifications from wherever she is on the planet.
“I’ll get messages saying, ‘Oh, I believe we’d like a backing vocal on that center eight’ or ‘I believe the second take was higher on that line’ or in some circumstances even rewrite a verse and ping it over and we will simply drop it in.
“5 years in the past, she’d have needed to journey again, get right into a studio or no matter and re-record it. That is such an thrilling and simpler approach of working.”
With a looming deadline, this flexibility proved invaluable when recording the ultimate tracks for the album. Vegas Excessive, is a euphoric slice of Balearic bliss destined to turn out to be a favorite in her again catalogue and Story, brings this chapter to a detailed.
“Story was the one time Kylie had a set concept of what sort of music she wished to write,” Biff remembers. “Nearly every thing else was spontaneous. She knew what it was about and what she wished it to sound like, that’s a particular one for her. We truly recorded it in her workplace!”
To at the present time, Duck and Biff quantity themselves among the many most ardent admirers.
“We had been followers earlier than we labored together with her and we’re nonetheless followers now,” Biff laughs. “Though we labored on the songs, we don’t know how she’s going to current them with movies and dwell performances and we will’t wait both – it’s simply as thrilling for us.”
