One of the many amusing things about rock snobs is their belief that they are all about music while pop fans are all about image and personality. If that were really true, Oasis' increasingly lousy records would have been laughed out of the charts years ago - a justice only prevented by Liam's brute charisma and the fans' dogged loyalty. Kylie, on the other hand, has absolutely zero charisma and only the slenderest fanbase to sustain her. Her peculiarly successful career, as represented by "Ultimate Kylie", really HAS been all about the music.
If you doubt the fanbase observation, witness the famously fallow deConstruction years. Beginning in 1994 with the gorgeously glacial, slinkily synthetic "Confide In Me", Kylie enjoyed brief success before fans fled in droves from awkward faux-rock like "Some Kind Of Bliss" (not included) and flimsy house like "Breathe". Proclaimed as the "real" Kylie revealing herself, what these records actually revealed was how little anyone is interested in the woman and how lousy her instincts are.
In fact, it's only because Kylie so easiily surrenders her slight personality and slighter voice to others that "Ultimate Kylie" almost accidentally happens to be crammed with such good songs. Her first masters were the unfairly maligned Stock, Aitken and Waterman, who used her absence of character as the perfect vehicle for the kind of cheap, potent pop that would have made Noel Coward shiver with delight. Just hear the full-on, crazily catchy "Hand On Your Heart" or the aching, plastic prettiness of "Je Ne Sais Pas Pourquois".
In the triumphant comeback years that began suitably in 2000, svengalis like Cathy Dennis and Robbie Williams recognised that same pliability and rewarded it with their two finest songs - the stone cold classic that is "Can't Get You Out Of My Head" and the crazily inventive, rampant "Kids". The fact that the new, lovely "I Believe In You" is written by Scissor Sisters is proof that exceptional talents still see her as the ultimate blank screen upon which to project their pure pop fantasies.
Elsewhere there are moments of sheer, naïve pop joy (the twin ecstasies of "What Do I Have To Do" and "Love At First Sight"), strangely masochistic longing ("Wouldn't Change A Thing", "Better The Devil You Know"), and surprisingly rare stinkers ("Celebration", "On A Night Like This"). There are 33 songs here, 18 of which are amazing - statistics to shame R.E.M.
The title "Ultimate Kylie" implies that this is some kind of distilled, vital essence of Ms Minogue herself - a laughable concept. But why not accept it as merely the brand for a shiny double CD of brilliant pop tunes? If she disappeared tomorrow few would really care, but if songs like this did we really, really would.
