Pop corner

AILBHE MALONEon expecting a new album from Beyoncé

TRACK OF THE WEEK: Climaxby Usher

The smoothest singer in the game is back, with some seriously silky vocals. While Usher calls his new track “revolutionary pop”, we’d instead point you to the Diplo production, which keeps this seductive tune from slipping into creepy back- massage territory.

Exciting news! Halo writer (and frontman of borepop group One Republic) Ryan Tedder says that despite y’know, having a baby, Beyoncé’s not taking time off this year. Not only that, there might be two albums from her by the end of 2012. “The conversations about her next album literally just started and there (are) two projects happening. All I can say is you kind of feed her the best that you have and she’s this phenomenal filter and she takes it all in.”

Adele’s had a busy week of it. Not only did she win ALL the Grammys, she’s also moved house. She now resides in a 10-bedroom mansion in Sussex, with two swimming pools and a tennis court. It’s a far cry from her first attempts at living solo, she explained to Anderson Cooper, the host of American talk show 60 Minutes. “After my first record I moved out of my mum’s to Notting Hill on my own. My life fell apart. My phone got cut off, my credit card got cut off, the house was a mess. It was awful. I couldn’t function without my mum, so I moved back in with her. I’d rather be defeated than one day come in and the rats would be eating me. It was basically a bedsit with walls.”

Alas alack, Mel C has put the kibosh on any plans for the Spice Girls to reform. Speaking on the Lorraine show, she confirmed that while reforming for the Olympics would be “an incredible opportunity and what a wonderful thing to be able to do. And the concert looks like it’s going to be out of this world, but unfortunately – bad news for any Spice Girls fans – we don’t plan to perform or reform. So I’m sorry to disappoint anybody.”