Grade: D–

Kylie has a place in my heart for having made the second-best single to feature the chorus ‘na na na na na na na na’. The best was Cozy Powell’s ‘Na Na Na’ (all the better for being capitalised), but Kylie’s magnificently vacant synth pop disco lament ‘Can’t Get You Out of My Head’, written by the ubiquitous Cathy Dennis, ran it close.

Everything else the pouting Aussie sockpuppet chanteuse has done has been utterly excremental, so credit to the lass for maintaining a certain consistency with her latest album Golden. It has received half-decent reviews in some quarters, but only, I suspect, from people who have either had their frontal lobes removed with a soupspoon or areso jaded they have forgotten up from down.

Golden is truly appalling. The list of producer/writer credits would stretch from Sydney to Bishkek, because of course Kylie has not even the slenderest writing talent, or even an idea of what the hell she is meant to be doing, nor a decent voice. We are told that she has been influenced by country music — which would account for the frequency with which an acoustic guitar is soullessly plucked before the generic, gutless, vapid, anodyne, unmemorable corporate machine kicks in, as on the excruciating ‘Dancing’ or ‘Stop Me From Falling’. There is the suggestion of a decent pop song on ‘Raining Glitter’ — and that’s it.

Give it up, Kylie, you dingo. You seem to be a nice woman. You were on Vicar of Dibley once — so why not retire now with good grace? We should be so lucky.