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| Kylie Takes Over Viva |
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She’s the antipodean pop princess who has been at the top of the charts consistently over the past 20 years.
On New Year’s Day VIVA lets Kylie take over the channel in VIVA Kylie and Kylie X Live. To celebrate, and ‘especially for you’ (groan!), this issue of VIVA Mail looks at her changing style.
As Kylie continues to go from strength to strength (and image to image) VIVA takes a look back at the Pop Princess’ stellar career…
In 1986, Kylie captured the heart of the UK when viewers across the country saw schoolgirl turned mechanic Charlene Robinson marry Scott, played by Jason Donovan. But, as dungaree-clad Charlene headed into the Brisbane sunset, a different path awaited Kylie and Jason as they released top pop single Especially For You, which topped the charts in early 1989. Their duo was only beaten to the Christmas number one by perennial crooner Cliff Richard.
However, Kylie’s real success came after Jason with a string of Stock Aitken & Waterman tracks which showed off a memorable side to 80s fashion. In both the Locomotion (http://tinyurl.com/yzod98j) and I Should Be So Lucky videos we saw Kylie’s blond locks permed to within an inch of their life. Kylie took a classier turn with the French Noir inspired video to Je Ne Sais Pas Pourquoi (http://tinyurl.com/d8glud) which saw her waltzing in a deserted Parisian street.
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In an effort to shrug off her ‘girl next door’ image, 90’s Kylie left Stock Aitken and Waterman and released Confide In Me. The single saw a vamped up Kylie taking a different, more ‘credible’ direction (http://tinyurl.com/56qv8c) clad in a black PVC catsuit and with deathly white make up. The change was a shock for fans used to Kylie’s more ‘bubble-gum pop’ image, but the public soon got behind her, sending the single to the top of the charts.
Kylie’s next step once again shocked fans as she collaborated with Nick Cave on the 1995 single Where The Wild Roses Go (http://tinyurl.com/chf5dn) in which she portrayed a murder victim, drifting in a lake. The style for the video was based on a 19th century painting of Ophelia.
The second single from Kylie’s next album, Impossible Princess, saw Kylie embracing her changing style with a video where each previous incarnation of her look fights it out for supremacy (http://tinyurl.com/244voy). However it was around this time that Kylie’s profile needed a boost and there was one man ready and able to provide it…
William Baker was the man who came up with the costume for which Kylie became most well renowned – and it was for the bargain price of 50p from a charity shop! For the video for Spinning Around (http://tinyurl.com/yhu5b9j) in 2000, Kylie performed in tiny gold hot-pants, which soon became known as her trademark and gave Kylie her first UK number one for a decade. The hot-pants became widely copied and parodied and started the millennium on a high for the starlet.
Another outré outfit gave Kylie her biggest hit of her career when Can’t Get You Out Of My Head (http://tinyurl.com/3txz7b) reached number one in over 40 countries. The video, once again styled by William Baker, featured Kylie as a ‘hoodie hottie’ dressed in a bizarre, and revealing, outfit performing a robotic style dance. For the first time, the singles from this album enabled Kylie to build her profile in the USA – and we’re sure that the outfit had nothing to do with it! Baker described these videos as science fiction inspired, with routines that paid homage to Kraftwerk and Kubrick.
But at the peak of her career Kylie didn’t rest on her laurels, reinventing herself once more under Baker’s tutelage and becoming a Bardot-esque pin-up for singles such as Slow.
After a very public battle with breast cancer, Kylie returned to showbiz with X, her ‘come-back’ album. The over-arching visual look for X and the first single, 2Hearts (http://tinyurl.com/l3vomd), was described as Japanese Kabuki theatre meets London dance-clubs and featured Kylie in a more conventional look, albeit an unconventional video!
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Don’t miss Kylie Night on New Years Day!
19:00 - Viva Kylie! 19:30 - Kylie X Live. 21:00 - Film: Street Fighter (network premiere). |
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