Tatu: Happy Smiles

Today in Moscow Tatu released their third studio album, "Happy Smiles" (Veselye ulybki).  It comes after a three-year hiatus, begun by the band's departure from Universal in 2006.

Since that time, the duo's work has not progressed with any notable speed, due to a number of factors;  by way of example, work on Veselye ulybki began long ago, in the spring of 2007.

Recording sessions would take the band to Germany and Los Angeles, all with the intention of a late '07 release date.  Iulia Volkova (above, left) was, however, now expecting a second child, and so the release was pushed back.  This happened on several occasions, to the point where identical press releases would appear, differing only in the promised deadline.  When at least the cover art was displayed, it included a black square over the main figure's face.

Something remained unfinished.

This snail-like process at least gave the band time to release two singles:  White Robe (Belyi plashchik) and 220, shown below live as part of an Italian tour.  Central and Mediterranean Europe were the first two areas that embraced the ensemble outside of Russia;  with less attention now being paid to Tatu's output in the US, those same nations have shown themselves to be especially (doubly) loyal.

The band's PR dept has claimed that the two recent singles caused a degree of scandal on European radio, which is surely overstating the case.  These promotional stances, hoping to (re)inspire a piquant discomfort, come in the wake of a core problem:  how - following the faux lesbian chic of early releases - could Tatu possibly remain as profitably "troublesome" as before.

After all, the birth of Volkova's first child had put paid to girls' initial sexual mystery.  As a result, Volkova and her singing partner Lena Katina both attended Moscow's Gay Pride Festival this summer (below) in an attempt to (re)fan the PR flames.

One interesting twist of fate has been that although Tatu are now more reliant upon their Russian-language fan base than circa 2003, they are still a hugely popular outfit elsewhere in Eastern Europe.  Places such as Poland and Bulgaria normally express an active desire not to play Russian-language material on their airwaves, yet Tatu's recent work has started - perhaps - to reinstate a normal relationship with Russian pop music after the end of the Soviet Union.

For the entire production period of this album, it was reported that it'd be called "Waste Management" (Upravlenie otbrosami).  A mere month ago that rather cynical title was changed to the equally sarcastic Veselye ulybki.

Volkova and Katina, in search of well-feigned jolliness, employed not only the talents of high-end songsmiths, who had worked on earlier projects with Tatu (and even Madonna).  They also endorsed the lyrics to White Robe that were penned by a sixteen-year old schoolgirl from St Petersburg, Masha Maksakova.

This is important because Tatu have recently finished work on a film for Oscar-nominated director Roland Joffe ("The Killing Fields" and "The Mission").  This new feature - "You and I" - is, in essence, a very long trailer for our Russian songstresses.  Here's footage from Russian TV of Katina and Volkova promoting the project as a whole on Russian TV this week.

An English translation can be found here.

"The two heroines of the story, LANA and JANIE persevere as they are constantly challenged by seductive allure of the glitzy and glamorous pleasures and wealth and sex offered by the power elite of Moscow.  The ride is great!  It’s intoxicating!  But suddenly they’re forced to confront the cold and cruel reality that lies beneath the glittering facade and their bond is tested to the breaking point..."

One of the few reasons for hope in Lana and Janie's downward spiral is the chance to meet Tatu and write a song for them;  Joffe's film and the authorship of "White Robe" mirror each other.  The movie will not be released until 2009, but a lengthy, four-minute trailer (here) has just been made public and the promo-site is up and running.  It's aimed squarely at an American audience.

Let the comeback begin...

The film and Veselye ulybki are connected in another way, related to the amount of new songs showcased here.  The CD, given that it comes after the aforementioned three-year gap, doesn't exactly offer a great deal of material.  White Robe and 220 are included, together with a couple of short instrumentals.  That's a third of the album already.  During these first 24 hours of post-release interest, greatest enthusiasm on places like MySpace has been expressed for the track Fly on the Wall. 

We agree; it makes a logical next single.

All in all, the album maintains several trademarks elements of a Tatu recording, which although guarantors of continued high quality, also mean that there's no new ground being covered.  There are the same bold production values that were already audible on the first Russian-language CD, but were then properly institutionalized as the band's international norm by Trevor Horn.

We also tread familiar territory with songs of female amity and fidelity that make a cheeky nod in the general direction of sexuality.  Absolutely any of these tracks could have been bonus (or excess) material from either of the first two CDs.

And indeed, the group's current PR notes that the Joffe film will include "songs from Tatu's new album."  This is the main problem - which has yet to manifest itself.  The relatively small number of new numbers on Veselye ulybki will be reduced even further for "You and I" - and then placed in heavy rotation.

Given this troubling process, together with the loudest support currently audible in Poland and Bulgaria - where the band's expansion once began - we hope such developments do not mark the start of a broad reversal of fortune.

The most exciting work from Tatu has always been the remixes.  Never shy of severe mash-ups or radical reinterpretations of their material, the group has endorsed some super remakes in the past that stand head & shoulder above the tamer reworkings usually chosen by other primetime outfits.

It's time to call in the DJs.  The weird ones.