Album Review: Kylie Minogue – Tension II

The announcement of Tension II was a pleasant surprise. Although my expectations were tempered purely based on the post — what I suppose is now referred to as — Tension I singles we had gotten. “Midnight Ride”, “My Oh My”, “Edge of Saturday Night” and “Lights, Camera, Action” were not good songs. Which is unfortunate, because these are all the worst songs on Tension II. For each of these songs, there is another song on the album which would have made a far better single choice. With the exception of “Lights Camera Action”, I don’t think the other songs were recorded specifically for Tension II. And perhaps Tension II wasn’t supposed to be Tension II at all, but something else entirely. But we’ll get to that.

When it comes to albums, Kylie can be a bit hit and miss. For me personally, she has never been a period where she’s had a great streak of albums. There is a consistent pattern of a couple of good albums, and then a miss or two. Then the cycle repeats. And Tension II is a complete miss which comes after two albums which were pretty good.

Disco wasn’t particularly great, and neither was Tension I. But both were a whole lot better than Kiss Me Once and Golden. Tension I was a good time. Short, sweet and with a lot of the warmth, vibrance and energy which Disco lacked. But I did feel it could have been better and a whole lot tighter had it committed to a sound and a vibe. Tension II at least manages to commit to a vibe…kinda. But the songs on Tension II are nowhere near as strong as even the weakest songs on Tension I. For all of its faults, Tension I was still a collection of really good songs, each of which could’ve been great singles. The only real let down being “10 out of 10” — which never shoulda featured on the album — and “Green Light”. And even as much as I don’t like “Green Light”, it still would have made a good single, albeit a boring one which would have been more representative of Disco than Tension. But Kylie barely acknowledging the album title track as a single — despite it being SO fucking good — choosing not to push any further singles and only performing “Padam Padam” spoke volumes. Tension I pretty much became the “Padam Padam” album, and that’s unfortunately what drives Tension II and the reason it exists in the first place.

Tension II feels very reactive. I don’t think there was a plan for there to be a Tension II when Kylie was putting together the first one. Tension II is a clear response to the success of “Padam Padam”, and the name of the game here was to make a bunch of the songs on it sound like “Padam Padam”, and it’s not the slightest bit subtle. Ina Wroslden — the writer of “Padam Padam” — is unsurprisingly credited as a writer on half of Tension II. “Lights Camera Action”, “Kiss Bang Bang”, “Hello” and “My Oh My” all sound like “Padam Padam” knock-offs. “Kiss Bang Bang” is legitimately a good song, but it’s hard to take it as its own thing, when it so clearly sounds like “Padam Padam” to the point where you can’t separate them. At least when Max Martin decided to have Britney Spears completely retread “…Baby One More Time” with “Oops!… I Did It Again” he delivered with a song which — in my opinion — was better in every way. But both songs can still stand alone as two great songs in their own rights. Here, it’s like Wroslden and co. barely even tried. But part of what allowed Martin and Spears to get away with it, is not only that the songs were good, but the Cherion era was what they were both defined by. They’d built a brand around that sound, which pretty much defined a period in music where it was a dominant sound that other acts (Backstreet Boys and NSync) also had. And Martin delivered every. Single. Time. Martin knew the formula and had a knack for changing JUST enough that each song could stand as its own great song, whilst also feeling like it’s part of a tapestry. Kylie’s music experienced a similar thing during her Stock Aitken Waterman days. All of her singles shared a sound, which was part of a tapestry which included songs from Rick Astley and Sonia.

But the problem with these “Padam Padam”-alikes, is that they aren’t riffs of “Padam Padam” or songs made to be companions to it. They are just straight up re-creations of it and nothing more, which makes Kylie look like the one trick pony that she’s not. If Kylie really wanted to milk “Padam Padam”, then she should have just re-released “Padam Padam”. I don’t see why we even got “My Oh My”, when a version of “Padam Padam” with Tove Lo and Beba Rexha woulda gone down a whole lot better. The ‘make every song “Padam Padam”’ mandate is really unfortunate in the case of “Kiss Bang Bang”, because the verses are so good, with really nice chord choices and a vibe which matches the album cover. But then the chorus hits and it’s just “Padam Padam”. And this leads into another problem with Tension II — a bunch of songs which have something which works, but not well enough to stick the landing.

Kylie Minogue – Tension II | Kylie Minogue/Darenote

Kylie has never really been once for range. And Tension II by no means runs a gamut of topics. It’s still just Kylie flitting between leaving a guy and wanting him to blow her back out. But we get some cool framings here, such as the song “Someone for Me” where Kylie is witnessing her friend enjoying their new boo and is like ‘I’m happy for you babe, but do either of you have someone for me?’. Or “Diamonds”, which likens the act of fucking to making diamonds, because pressure and [turns and looks into the camera] tension.

The liner notes for Tension II feature far more names than Tension I did. Where-as Tension I was mostly produced by Kylie’s longtime collaborator Biff Stannard alongside Duck Blackwell, they only contribute to one song on Tension II. Every song on this album features a different set of writers. There are some which pop up regularly across songs. But no two songs on this album are written by the same people. Kylie had mentioned that following the success of “Padam Padam” she was being sent songs left and right from everybody, and you get a sense of that listening to the album. Because Tension II sounds like an ‘everybody’ album, with songs bearing resemblances to some acts who are popular right now. “Someone for Me” sounds like a Troye Sivan song, which is probably because it was co-written by Brett McLaughlin, who co-writes near enough all of Sivan’s songs. “Good As Gone” sounds like a Dua Lipa song, which is probably because of Peter Kelleher, Thomas Barnes and Caroline Ailin who had contributed songs to the deluxe edition of Lipa’s debut album and its follow-up Future Nostalgia, the latter of which “Good As Gone” sounds like it’s lifted from. And the one song which Biff Stannard and Duck Blackwell did co-write and produce sounds like a Taylor Swift song, which is fitting, because their contributions on Tension I felt like instances of them wearing other hats and tapping into sounds of other acts. Neither Stannard or Blackwell really have a signature sound of their own.

Despite the larger roster of talent involved in Tension II, there is still a form of consistency in the sound. Tension II is split between dance music and disco, pretty much as Tension I was. But the amount of writers involved here make it all the more shocking that so many of the songs feel incomplete lyrically. Too many songs on this album feature strong verses and weak choruses (i.e “Kiss Bang Bang”). Or strong verses, a decent chorus, but a terrible middle eight (“Diamonds”). Or are just terrible from top to bottom (“Taboo”). The production across this album is also pretty uninspired, and the dodgy songwriting is what shines a light on just how uninspired it is. Every single song on this album needed a rewrite, a reworking, additional production and Kylie in a studio with somebody to vocal produce her. Ever since having to record her own vocals for Disco at home alone, during the height of the lockdowns of 2020, Kylie has taken to travelling with a microphone and a MacBook in her D&G purse to record herself. I think it’s great that Kylie knows how to record and engineer herself, and that it’s given her a freeness and independence to how she records songs. But I also feel it’s resulting in her songs sounding flatter, because she doesn’t always have a studio setup for her vocals to sound super clean and doesn’t have somebody there with her to push her and produce her vocals. There is so much space on some of these Tension II songs, which should have been filled with vocals, whether it be background vocals or ad-libs. And there is also a flatness to Kylie’s vocals across this entire album, which in conjunction with the iffy writing and uninspired production, causes songs to sound pretty boring, with there not being big enough shifts in energy from song to song. It’s a stark contrast to Tension I, where one of the coolest things about that album was that Kylie’s energy on each song was so different from the last.

Kylie Minogue – Tension II | Kylie Minogue/Darenote

As much as I didn’t think Tension was anything amazing, I at least got the sense that everybody involved with that album had an understanding of the assignment. Making an album of great pop songs, which are fun, all of which could fly on radio and be singles, each in a style of song that Kylie is known for. But Tension II was driven far too much by trying to chase the sound of “Padam Padam” and I think this was a mistake. Defining Kylie by one song is such a dangerous thing to do at this point in her career. Sure, it’s worked for somebody like Mariah Carey. But as a fan of Carey, I find it unfortunate that her career now seems geared towards promoting just one song, to a point where the possibility of a new album seems less and less likely, because general audiences don’t want anything new from her. But, as much as I am tired of Carey pushing that blasted Christmas song, she started to do it in response to audiences playing the shit out of it each year, crowning her the Queen of Christmas and wanting her to embrace it all. She wasn’t releasing Christmas songs every six months and demanding she be a face of the holiday. Comparatively, Kylie is out here trying to make “Padam Padam” happen again with songs which aren’t “Padam Padam”. And whilst people embraced “Padam Padam”, I don’t think her fans or her new audience just want “Padam Padam” from her for another year until the end of time. They just want great pop songs and moments from Kylie, and Tension II completely misunderstands this. Tension II feels like an album where everybody tasted the Kool-Aid, smacked their lips, guessed the flavour and got it wrong. A sequel to Tension should have either been a flat out dance album or an 80s album. Not Padam Padam II, Padam Padam Turbo, “Padam Padam Alpha and Padam vs. Capcom. “Padam Padam” is a fun song, but I don’t think it’s a particularly amazing song. For me, it was one of the weaker songs on Tension. It didn’t even fit the album. I skipped it every single time. And if I were to do a tierlist of Kylie’s singles, “Padam Padam” would be close to the bottom.

I get it. “Padam Padam” was a huge career changing song for Kylie, which resulted in her finally breaking North America in a way that none of her concentrated and intended efforts in the past had allowed her to. Kylie’s audience base grew in an unprecedented way for somebody who is nearly four decades into their career. And it also won her a Grammy. But to just throw out a follow up to the album “Padam Padam” was on, where half of the songs just shamelessly sound like “Padam Padam” was such a bad move, even if I understand the reasons behind it. Post her Stock Aitken Waterman days, Kylie had never felt compelled to try and recreate any of her biggest hits. It’s one of the things I’ve always liked about her. It woulda been easy for Kylie to have released a follow-up to Light Years which had a lead single which sounded just like “Spinning Around”, but she didn’t. Instead, we got “Can’t Get You Out of My Head”. And it woulda been easy for Kylie to follow up Fever with an album preceded by a lead single which sounded like “Can’t Get You Out of My Head”, but she didn’t. We got “Slow” instead. Each song different from the last. Each one amazing, and expanding Kylie’s sound in some way. And each of the albums were different in vibe too. And, I know, I know. Tension II is a sequel album. But, still. It’s a real shame that Kylie and her team didn’t make something which felt like a continuation of Tension as a whole and not just a shameless reason to put out more songs which sound like “Padam Padam”.

I guess one other notable thread which follows through Tension I and II aside from that padamn song, is that neither album seems sure of what it wants to be. Tension I sounded like it couldn’t decide on whether to be a dance album, an 80s synth pop album or something which connects to Disco. Tension II can’t decide whether it wasn’t to be an album of “Padam Padam” variations, a collaborations album or Disco II. And the end result is an album which sounds like a collection of leftovers. Each of the “Padam Padam” knock-offs sound like early iterations of “Padam Padam”. The collaboration songs are each underwhelming. And the disco cuts are the strongest songs on the album, but that’s not saying much given the quality of everything else. “Diamonds” sounds like a song which was probably intended for Tension — which would make sense given the diamond motif of the album visuals and that Kylie mentions ‘tension’ in the song — but was left off, because it (ironically) wasn’t strong enough. And “Good as Gone” sounds like a song which was intended to be a collaboration with Dua Lipa. Maybe there was a plan to re-release a deluxe edition of Tension in a similar fashion to Disco, where each of the additional songs had a guest feature. Because the songs with Sia, Diplo, Tove Lo PERIOD, Bebe Rexha and The Blessed Madonna are dumped at the end of the album like bonus tracks, as opposed to being placed within the album itself.

Much like Tension I, every song on Tension II feels far too short. There are only four songs on this album with runtimes longer than three minutes. And there is not a single song longer than four. I am fine with short songs if they feel complete. But there are one too many instances on this album of songs which just end, when there should have been one more run of a chorus or an instrumental outro. It’s so weird to me that in 2024 artists are putting out two and a half minute dance and disco songs. Fuck TikTok. No dance or disco song should be two and a half minutes. Artists and producers seem to be divorcing the sounds and genres of songs from their original contexts and origins. Dance and disco music was for the clubs. These are genres of music known for being five to six minutes long. Now, I get that styles of music and genres adapt and change over time. Club culture in 2024 is not what it was in the 70s and 90s. But that doesn’t mean the purpose these genres of music served should change. A fundamental part of disco and dance music was escapism. Providing something that people can get lost in. Where they can shed the day or the week and be free and revel in euphoria. And no song on Tension II is long enough for you to get lost in them. There is an Extended Version of Tension II which features extended mixes of every song. But, as per Tension I and also Disco before it, the extended mixes are incredibly slapdash. It’s just a case of instrumental passages thrown into sections of the song which don’t make sense. And because the songs on Tension II have so little meat, the extended versions just further expose that. “Good as Gone” is the only extended mix which is better than the original version, because it actually adds something to the song and is what the original version shoulda been. Just like the Extended Mix of Tension I’s “Vegas High” and Disco’s “Say Something”.

I am really tired of this trend Kylie has developed, of releasing a standard version of an album and then a separate Extended Mixes version. Bitch. Just make full proper songs and have some of the songs be four to five minutes long. Especially when there are instances (such as “Good as Gone”) where the Extended Mix sounds like the fuller original version anyway. Which makes me wonder if some songs are being edited down for the sake of having an extended mix album as an additional cash grab. I would be all for an extended mixes album if there was some actual care taken with the mixes. But everything about the Extended Version of Tension II is lazy. Then again, everything about Tension II is shockingly lazy.

Kylie Minogue – Tension II | Kylie Minogue/Darenote

I can understand Kylie being high off of the success of “Padam Padam”, because of how transformative it had been for her over the past year. But Kylie and her team should have tempered any idea of “Padam Padam” becoming the beaten dead horse whose carcass was to be thrown into a pot to cook up Tension II. Kylie is so much more and so much better than this. Tension II almost feels like a waste. And it’s unfortunate that songs from this album are going to end up taking up setlist slots on the Tension tour, which would be better off being given to literally ANY other song in Kylie’s discography. Kylie could and should have used Tension II as a chance to test out potential ideas for a new album proper, whilst still keeping it within the soundscape of Tension. She also could’ve used the Tension tour to see how they go over with audiences live. But nope. Half of Tension II was squandered on that padamn song and that seemed to be the only real focus here. If Tension I got a re-release with a couple of Tension II songs as extras, I’d be more forgiving. But putting out a whole album and for it to just be THIS!? This is not fun to me. And it sounds a little too much like something I already know and was done with.

Album Highlights (if I HAD to pick a couple):

▪ Kiss Bang Bang

▪ Diamonds