It's not exactly "Stole" is it?

Poor, poor, Kelly Rowland, while fellow Destiny's Child alumna Beyonce has had an astonishingly successful solo career which has seen her set the cultural and musical mood (c.f. Crazy In Love, Single Ladies), Kelly has failed to make the same commercial and critical impact and at times has stuggled to even hold on to a record deal. Yet over the past year, Kelly has been able to hold on to musical relevance thanks to a lucrative collaboration with David Guetta. Whilst When Love Takes Over gave Kelly her second UK number 1 outside of Destiny's Child (although, if we're honest, we'd just prefer to forget about Dilemma. On the face of it, all looks fairly rosy, and perhaps this explains why Kelly's hooked up again with Guetta again on new single Commander.



We're distinctly in two minds about this offering. On the one hand, it's exceptionally catchy, and the video makes use of the often-underrated "let's have a dance-off with myself" trope. Commander is a well-pitched club anthem which frankly looks set to snag the pink pound and could thus be a real contender for a top 5 placing now that all of this ludicrous jingoism looks set to disappear from the charts.

On the other hand, it's hard to reconcile this outing with the promise which Kelly's early solo career showed. It's almost at this stage that she requires someone like Guetta or the Freemasons on hand to work with the raw materials and produce something chart-worthy. Longer term, this has to be a fairly risky strategy. Fairly or unfairly, Rowland's work will always be held up in comparison and competition with Beyonce's, and Rowland has never shown that spark or zeitgeist-seizing sensibility which has kicked her output into the stratosphere. Yes, Commander is a very good single but it's somewhat disheartening that Rowland has to share the credit with someone like Guetta in order to have a hit on her hands. It sort of reminds us of the good old days when people like Kelly Llorenna would stick their head above the parapet and have the odd top ten hit, but ultimately would be overshadowed by their association with dance outfits/producers which really provided the caffeine injection behind their vocal abilities. Everyone remembers N Trance. How many people remember Kelly Llorenna?

Perhaps this is an unfair comparison, and really, at the end of the day all that counts is that Kelly (Rowland, that is) will have a top ten hit on her hands and everyone will congratulate themselves on a job well done. Perhaps we're trying to find a story here where there is none.

But nonetheless, we're left with a prevailing lack of enthusiasm about Kelly Rowland's chances in the months and years to come. Just as Daylight faded away to nothing after Work brought her back into the spotlight, we can't help feeling that Commander will give Kelly a brief bit of attention, but ultimately isn't the foundation stone for a chart career which definitively proves that more than one Destiny's Child alumnus can stand on their own two feet and be a viable solo artist.

It's a shame, don't get us wrong. But, sadly, it's just a fact that some people are pretty much destined to be superstars, where others are fated to live from record deal to record deal to retain their prominence. We sincerely hope that Commander at least does the trick on this front for Kelly.