Alesha

Alesha Dixon refuses to put a foot wrong. Self-assured, smart, stylish and focused, Dixon grew up looking for energy and inspiration in the popstars she idolised and in 2008 she’s paying it forward with a scorching album as rewarding to extended home listening as it is to high octane blasts of pleasure during a night out on the tiles. With an effortlessness rare in superstars on either side of the Atlantic Dixon skips her way though world class ballads, frenetic dance tracks, loopy party numbers and instantly hummable hits-to-be. Ladies and gentlemen, please take your seats: the curtain’s coming up on 'The Alesha Show.'
Alesha's been a busy woman since signing to Asylum Records earlier this year and is blasting back with 'The Boy Does Nothing', an irresistible, undulating smash-in-waiting which ranks at 5.5 on the mambo Richter scale and is simultaneously one of the most unabashed and most perfect pop singles for years. It’s certainly one of the few whose lyrics reference both washing up and sweeping the floor. At the centre of the song is an inept, two-left-footed fella whose experience of rug-cutting begins and ends with a Saturday job at Allied Carpets. "I adore the line ‘if the man can’t dance, he gets no second chance," Alesha says. "I love to be impressed by somebody’s dance skills." Alesha describes the song as "bottled happiness"."The song is super sassy and uplifting. I think some people thought I might come back with a song that was moodier, but that’s just not me." It’s the sort of excitable jamboree we’ve come to expect not just from Alesha but from the song’s producer Brian Higgins and his Xenomania team – pop maestros behind artists like Girls Aloud ,Gabriella Cilmi and The Sugababes – but while it hits the pop bullseye it’s also a brilliantly left of centre, effervescent introduction to an album which dips its toe effortlessly across a plethora of music styles from 60s R&B and perfect pop, right through to classic ballad, while documenting life’s ups, life’s downs and life’s sideways bits.