If anything was destined for a short shelf life, it was the tabloid-shocking, lip-locking, one-good-single-and-the-rest-was-pretty-crap teenage duo from Russia.
Apparently little more than pop puppets anyway, once they split from their shadowy svengali the writing was surely on the wall. Apparently not. Here they come again, and although the names in the background may have changed, there’s precious little revision of the winning formula. ‘All About Us’ is a fine first single, basically because it’s a thinly veiled re-write of ‘All The Things She Said’ and, surprise-surprise, comes with its own titilating video.
Beyond that, Dangerous And Moving takes a shocking nose dive. For all the talk of T.A.T.U being the most controversial band in pop, this is an unbelievingly tame experience recalling, at its most exciting, Roxette, and at its worst, the Eurovision. Blame it on the translation maybe, but the lyrics are appalling, while the music seems untouched by human hand, aside from a baffling brush with Sting on ‘Friend Or Foe’.
All that’s left for Lena Katina and Julia Volkova to do is deliver their bored vocals and hang around with not many clothes on. ‘Loves Me Not’ touches vaguely on the prospect of a bisexual relationship, but otherwise they’ll need to keep making those videos to maintain any sort of interest. Album three is looking less likely by the minute.