No, not the former Duchess of York, and not the famously irascible Manchester United manger (although how's about that for a duet?), but the woman otherwise known as 'her from Black Eyed Peas'. Solo records are often used to establish a musical identity separate from the singer's band, but here the results sound rather like...well, Black Eyed Peas.
In fact as well as a general pop/hip-hop air reminiscent of Fergie's chums, the song also steals the horn back-up from Beyonce's Work It Out, and then takes the entire melody from Gwen Stefani's Hollaback Girl. There's the trademark innuendo-filled lyrics ("how come when you come around I wanna go down like London Bridge"), Fergie's rather characterless vocals, and an infuriating air to the record that almost makes you look back fondly to My Humps.
It's just quite an annoying little pop record, nothing more, nothing less. It'll no doubt be huge, and the song's opening line of "oh shit" (and what an appropriate lyric that is) will probably be polyphonically bursting out of mobile phones everywhere in the next couple of weeks. Just one thing Fergie love, that bridge you're posing so prettily in front of on the front cover....that's actually Tower Bridge...
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