Jamelia versus Americentrism

Only some five-odd miles up the road this very evening Mary J Blige is plying her best bootylicious nous over a huge production at Wembley Arena, while the great local talent has to entertain some 4 times smaller crowd… Well, globalisation has been increasingly Americentric… Also, female pop stars are generally more famous for the size of their silicone implants [rarely natural cleavages] than the size of their talent.

Jamelia is the local star that doesn’t get a fair look-in and sad are the times when songs and vocal prowess mean less than the enhanced physical attributes. Not that Jamelia is short on it [curves, not plastic - let‘s avoid a lawsuit], God forbid, the woman has it all. The slight delay in her being crowned the Queen of Urban Kingdom was due to having to take time out.

Jamelia disappeared four years ago and it seemed her coronation as Britain’s R&B Queen might be postponed for ever. Four hit singles, including the Top 5, anti-materialist ‘Money’, and a 2000 MOBO Award were a brilliant start for an 18-year-old girl from Birmingham. But an unexpected pregnancy enforced a two-year sabbatical, during which time Mis-Teeq, Ms Dynamite and others established British R&B as the mainstream contender.

On stage is easy to see how, when aged 15, she stood up in an EMI A&R man’s office and auditioned by belting out to an instant offer of a contract under a condition that she passed her exams, securing her future even if she failed to achieve stardom. Finally unveiled to the public when she was 18, after three years of grooming, ‘Drama’’s success seemed to herald a smooth ascent to stardom. It made her pregnancy more shocking.

A rare cloud on the Jamelia’s horizon is the curiously lacklustre reception of ‘Thank You’ that’s trailed in matching the sales of ‘Drama’. The selling-point of its recent re-launch is a collaboration with Chris Martin, from the label-mates Coldplay, on the future single ‘See It in a Boy’s Eyes’. This has re-confirmed the musical dexterity that makes Jamelia such an exciting artist.

The funkier end of ‘Off Da Endz’, ‘Dirty Dirty’ and ‘Club Hoppin’ are well balanced by more emotive tracks, such as ‘Thank You’, ‘Antidote’, ‘Taxi’… All mixed with tracks from her debut LP, such as the hits ‘Call Me’, ‘Money’, as well as ‘Bout’… Young Ms Davies certainly comes across as her own woman, co-writer of most of the songs on the sophomore disc. Handling Hip-hop, R&B and some Nu Soul with ease, she certainly is in the forefront of Urban music UK. The fact recognized by the Brit Nominations Committee that named her in two categories: British Female Solo Artist and Best British Single, for ‘Superstar’.

Alas, Dido was favoured over her but at Jamelia’s age, and with her talent, there will be plenty of other opportunities, one sincerely feels.

History teaches us that back in the 1970s there was a government drive to ‘Buy British’; it may not be PC now, but it is worth considering covertly.