Tulisa - When I Go Home

A few weeks ago we wrote a few musings on what Tulisa's solo material might be like and how excited we are for her debut album. At the moment, any details regarding the record are rather sketchy but there have been a couple of tantalising hints about who she's working with on the project, and we were very happy to hear one of them is Talay Riley.

Some might know him better for writing hits like Jessie J's Who's Laughing Now or featuring on Chipmunk's Look For Me, but we've been loving Talay's own material here on the blog for a while now, especially the ace Make You Mine.

Here's what Talay had to say about working with Tulisa:

"Tulisa and I recorded a song called When I Go Home before she got The X Factor job. I really hope it can be a single but I’m not sure what will happen because of her TV commitments. The song sounds like Chris Brown and Jordan Sparks’s No Air and has a Kings Of Leon-style *guitar breakdown. It’s something very different for Tulisa."

Now, I don't know about you, but that sounds all kind of epic. Another of other reports have suggested that Tulisa might disregard her urban roots for a more 'indie' influenced sound on her solo material, which only serves to whet our appetite more for the first snippets of actual songs that must surely emerge over the coming months.

In the meantime, Tulisa has been very forthcoming about how much she'd like to collaborate with her X Factor 'muffins' Little Mix - judging by the initial Twitter reactions after their Alicia Keys mash-up group performance, everyone seemed to be a loving a bit of the 'five-piece' Little Mix, though we imagine Tulisa wouldn't want her big solo statement to become too tied up with the band's own launch proper later in the year.

Finally, we rather enjoyed reading that Tulisa's dream duet would be with Sting - it's not too far of a long-shot either, with the Police frontman teaming up with Nicole Scherzinger for emo ballad Power's Out. Other potential collaborators for Tulisa's solo album include Labrinth, who revealed:

"It's to be confirmed. It might happen. We did have talks about walking on her record, and I would love to work with her so it might just happen anyway."

Little Mix - Cannonball

Sometimes, everything just clicks into place. This weekend, on the X Factor, this happened to Little Mix. Taking the winner's crown with their cover of Cannonball - the first time a girl group, let alone a group, had ever done so - they crystallised the hopes and dreams of pop lovers across the nation.

Here, at last, there is the potential for a truly incredible X Factor winner, for Little Mix to take up the Girls Aloud baton and continue the UK's tradition of girl power. Long may they reign supreme!

Even their cover art looks fresh and fun, a far cry from the tired black & white 'safe' shots of past winners. Hearing them take up Damien Rice's classic acoustic number and transform it into an impassioned enormo-ballad, it was clear they were already in another league from runner up Marcus.

I'll be the first to admit I was sceptical about the group during the course of the series, but from the moment they banged out their ace cover of You've Got The Love, I knew they had what it takes.

The styling, spot on. The vocals - well, Perrie showed the whole UK exactly what she's capable of on the group's take on Silent Night. Simply beautiful, truly sublime.

This is the new face of pop, the new force for good. Yes, the winner's single isn't perfect - we all wanted a Sound of the Underground-esque up-tempo banger... but you can't have everything.

What does their cover of Cannonball have going in its favour? Well, on the most basic level, it's a well-rounded, distinctly 'pop' version of the original, erasing all the singer-songwriter trappings of Damien Rice's version. Its best moments are in the gorgeous synth flourishes, crisp R&B beat and echoey piano riffs - as the string sections surge in it all gets a bit Madonna 'Power of Goodbye' - which is a very, very good thing. But above all, it shows how accomplished the group are vocally.

We can only wait and hope that when the girls' career-proper begins, they'll deliver a pop album of genuine merit. Cher Lloyd showed it could be done, I expect even better from Little Mix.