FEATURE:
Light Years Ahead
The Relevance, Importance and Influence of Kylie Minogue in 2025
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THERE is no denying that…
this year has been huge for Kylie Minogue. In terms of chart success, her new Christmas album has reached the top of the charts in the U.K. (she could also score a Christmas number one single with XMAS). Even though there are fewer albums out in December, it is clear that Minogue is hugely popular and adored. No question why she would be a number one success. It is also the quality of the music and consistency. Kylie Christmas (Fully Wrapped) is phenomenal. The Guardian reported on the news of a huge feat for one of the greatest Pop artists ever. One of the most influential too. I shall come onto that deceleration and expand:
“Kylie Minogue has scored her 11th UK No 1 album, putting her level with David Bowie and Eminem in the league of all-time album chart-toppers.
The album, Kylie Christmas (Fully Wrapped), will sound familiar to her fans: it’s a reissue of her 2015 album Kylie Christmas (which only reached No 12), containing four newly recorded tracks and an altered tracklisting. It had already been reissued once before, in 2016, as the Snow Queen Edition. Nevertheless, the Fully Wrapped version counts as a new album in chart terms, and so continues a non-consecutive run of No 1s that began in 1988, when Minogue’s self-titled debut spent six weeks at the top.
Overtaking Abba, Coldplay, Michael Jackson, Elton John and Queen in the chart-topper list, she also draws level with Rod Stewart and U2, but is still some way off joint leaders the Beatles and Robbie Williams, who both have 15 No 1 albums to their names. Williams will be hoping to become the all-time leader in February with the release of his forthcoming studio album, Britpop.
Minogue is also in the singles chart this week with Xmas, one of the retailer Amazon’s now yearly exclusive Christmas songs. Xmas is at No 16, though will undoubtedly rise during next week’s race for the Christmas No 1 as CD and vinyl editions are released today, sales of which contribute greatly to chart positions in the streaming era”.
I grew up listening to Kylie Minogue, and she helped shape my understanding of Pop. I was listening to her earliest albums, and it is hard to believe that her debut single, The Loco-Motion, was released on 27th July, 1987. I wonder if Minogue will mark that anniversary in 2027?! Nearly four decades after that debut, Minogue remains so relevant and important. I am not seeing any articles where Minogue’s influence today is present on the Pop landscape. I am going to come to a review with Kylie Minogue from earlier in the year. If artists like Madonna and even Kate Bush – who I obviously write about a lot and know is hugely influential – are name-checked and get credit, I think that Kylie Minogue is left out of the conversation. In terms of how her career progressed, how she had this split from factory-produced Pop and created an Indie album with Impossible Princess in 1997, and then reinvented herself several times since then, this can be seen in most of the biggest Pop artists of today. I definitely think Sabrina Carpenter and Taylor Swift draw influence from Kylie Minogue. Not only in terms of their sound and mic of genres. Also, their stagecraft and live performances. I will come to two Minogue albums that are particularly influential this year. However, think about how Minogue has enjoyed some of the biggest suycecss of her life in the past five years or so. In an industry where there is huge ageism, especially towards women, Minogue has released chart-topping albums and gained a lot of press respect. DISCO, released in 2020, is partly an incorporation of 1970s Disco, Minogue’s early-2000s albums and modern-day Pop. 2023’s TENSION was another slight move forward and embraced Electronic-Dance more. When many female artists in their forties and fifties are being marginalised and are expected to produce quieter, calmer and less ‘youthful music’, artists like Kylie Minogue and Sophie Ellis-Bextor are releasing this incredible upbeat and energetic music that is the equal of what any other Pop artists are doing.
Kylie Minogue is influencing artists of today in so many ways. Putting our Christmas music and it being a chart success will give artists impetus to become more engaged with that side of things next year. Also, as we will see in this interview from 2023 from Numéro Magazine. Earlier this year, they revisited their 2023 album, as Minogue released Tension Tour//Live 2025, a new album recorded during her latest tour. Minogue constantly exploring new ground and not being easy to define is something that has affected so many huge artists today:
“The flamboyant 55-year-old Kylie Minogue may be one of the greatest musical icons of the last three decades, with 80 million records sold, yet the Australian singer never stops reinventing herself. After one country and another disco one albums, she released Tension on September 22nd, 2023. This dance, house, synthpop and electro opus is tinged with the muggy atmosphere of nightclubs.
What was your mindset when you recorded that album?
I started working on Tension with my long-time producer Richard ‘Biff’ Frederick Stannard, who produced so many amazing songs for the Spice Girls, among others. We started our creative collaboration years ago and our songs are still relevant today. We started this album in a casual way. I wasn’t going to the studio every single day. It was just a couple of sessions from time to time and seeing what happened. Three months later, I felt I was ready for a new project. I got closer to writers and received several demos, like Padam Padam, Green Light, or 10 out of 10. I’m very open to that modus operando – if there’s a good song out there, give it to me! But I also love being in the studio and creating songs from scratch.
Could you tell us more about the recording process?
I record a lot by myself at home, in hotel rooms, on coffee tables, anywhere I can plug in cables, crawling around and trying not to make any mistakes. It’s the opposite of glamorous, but it’s something I love doing on my own now. It offers me so much. Not just in terms of ownership of my creations, but because it gives me a better understanding of what I’m doing and how I can explore my voice and my relationship with a microphone. Because there’s a big difference between your everyday speaking voice and your singing voice. I tend to record myself straight away, and I have no idea how many hours I’m going to spend on each single track. It’s often a very long process. The number of times I would redo a take could be pretty extreme. I am always under pressure to some extent, either because they need the track quickly or because I want it done quickly. But that’s my process and it is what it is.
How would you define this album?
This project is very different from my previous albums… My previous records had a clearly defined theme and sound – country and disco. I approached this new album like a white beach, without any definite theme. Creating Tension has given me a deep sense of freedom. It was great to make an album without a real central theme and it helped me get through difficult times and celebrate the present moment. If I had to choose one word to define it, it would be “surprise”. Every track is different. One moment you think you’re in one place, but next thing you know, you’re in a different location. I’m at a point in my life where I’ve been through a lot. I’ve been through difficult times in the making of the album, like Covid, and also personal things.
How do you explain your longevity in the music industry?
If I knew the secret, it would be a lot easier (laughs). I don’t have the answer, but I do know that I always feel inspired by multiple things. I’m always curious, and maybe that’s my destiny too. I think I’ve tried to stay relevant in my music and to look at what’s happening around me. So, in the 1990s, I drew my inspiration from the indie scene, and then, from the futuristic pop music of the 2000s. I feel like I’m naturally versatile. I like to be adaptable and to transform myself. Maybe that’s why I’ve been able to navigate through different musical genres”.
I wonder why there is very little written about a Pop queen and her undeniable influence. She has won over a whole new generation. There is so much focus on young artists today and how amazing and inventive they are, though virtually nothing about some of the legends who paved the way and have undeniably influenced them. As I said, Kylie Minogue can be heard and felt in the music of some of today’s most respected and brilliant Pop artists. Whilst her reinventions and constant curiosity is a big drive for many other artists, in terms of the sound of Pop today and a lot of the mainstream best, I do think that 2000’s Light Years and 2001’s Fever are most important. Light Years turned twenty-five earlier in the year. Perhaps Minogue’s best album, Fever, is twenty-five on 1st October. Its lead single, Can’t Get You Out of My Head, is twenty-five on 8th September (quite random, but hard to believe that was three days before the atrocities of 9/11; Pop joy and this ecstatic song’s impact soon dampened by this awful day). Maybe it has been the case for a few years, though I can really feel the spirit and brilliance of these two stunning Kylie Minogue albums in modern Pop. This regency and real golden period, I think Light Years and Fever are two of the most fascinating, important and simply stunning albums of the past few decades! I do feel like Kylie Minogue should have headlined Glastonbury this year. I am not sure if she got the call and was busy or the budget would have been too much though, twenty years after she was meant to headline but had to pull out due to a cancer diagnosis, it would have been fitting. She was owed that headline slot! Also, as I have said many times, only one woman over the age of forty has headlined the Pyramid Stage since Glastonbury started – well over fifty years ago.
It would also have been great to have two female headliners this year, as having one (the standout, Olivia Rodrigo) seemed like a step back for a festival with a real issue when it comes to booking women to headline its main stage. Also, after such a successful five years with this new success and some of her best work ever, tied to the fact her 2025 live shows have been heralded and world-class, a Saturday night Kylie Minogue Glastonbury headline slot, where she plays 1980s early hits and a career-spanning mix of bangers, would have been among the best Glastonbury sets ever! One can only imagine what sets would have been unveiled and what would have gone down. It is a shame on this festival, and all other major ones, that Minogue was not asked to headline. Still this big issue with age and booking younger artists to headline. Also, it would highlight and cement her reputation as an innovator and godmother of modern Pop. In terms of the women (and men) who look up to her and have clearly been inspired by her. Minogue will not mind too much, as she has ended 2025 with a massive success.
A number one album and wrapping up one of the most successful half-decades of her life, she will enjoy this peaceful Christmas: “Reflecting on her Christmas plans, Minogue said: "I will be with my family. I will be very quiet compared to the year, just some stillness. "I say that but family Christmas is a whole different version of hectic … Let’s get through Christmas day and get to Boxing Day. I’m just looking forward to some really good and much-needed family time”. It is disappointing that there is little discourse, discussion and dissection when it comes to Kylie Minogue and the incredible influence she has on modern music. Not only Pop. Much wider afield. Not only motivating and firing up young Pop artist. Also breaking barriers and smashing an ageist industry. In terms of her quality, constant ability to reinvent and remain relevant, together with her boundless energy and joy, it shows that women over forty deserve much more representation, respect, opportunity and airplay. There should be essays and think-pieces about Kylie Minogue and how shew has shaped and affected modern music. A deep interview with her when Minogue discusses her musical influences and what she thinks of the current crop of Pop artists who are no doubt indebted to her in some form or the other. In so many ways, the iconic and peerless Kylie Minogue is…
HELPING shape the best Pop music of today.