the girl next door soundtrack

What a difference a door makes. At Church, a new restaurant and bar tucked into a quiet pocket in the Fenway area, it's a matter of, "What's behind door No. 1 and door No. 2?" Answers: a Hard Rock Cafe and a Pottery Barn, figuratively speaking.

more stories like thisIf you walk into the first door, you'll be in the bar, where the click and clack of billiards competes with whatever rock soundtrack is being piped in at the moment (or possibly a DJ or live band). Walk down to the next door, and you're inside the upscale restaurant, where someone has decided to cue the elevator jazz, dim the lights, burn vanilla candles in the bathrooms, and adorn the walls with giant photos of creepy gargoyles. Oddly, the two aren't connected, and you have to exit and enter each from the street; the disconnect couldn't be more obvious.

Head to the restaurant first. That's what we did earlier this week, with just three other tables dining at 8:30 on a Monday. Perhaps it gets crowded on the weekends, but you'll notice this place has all the reverence and quietude you'd expect of a restaurant named Church. It's not quite a sanctuary (and our deadpan waiter was a breath of comic relief), but it's certainly not an overrun hot spot, which has its perks, of course.

Church tries hard and wants to do well, and we hope it does, too. But so far, it's a little timid and too laid back - you know, kind of like that bashful girl in high school who rarely talks, but when she does, you realize she's, like, totally into Tom Waits and saving Darfur and way cooler than you'll ever be.

That's Church. It's a bit reserved after opening a little more than a month ago, but once people catch on (particularly the Fenway crowd), it has every reason to flourish on this stretch mostly known for the nearby El Pelón Taqueria. The food alone deserves a fan base. Chef Andy Beer has devised a menu that's both casual and pleasing, a good mix of high-end fare and comfort food. He just needs to lay off the salt in a few dishes; you shouldn't feel dehydrated from an appetizer soup of lentils with smoked pork, after all.

Usually, though, he's right on the mark. A caramelized onion tart with Gruyere cheese had the gooey goodness a brisk evening calls for, with a smear of pureed fig as the perfect accompaniment. And the crispy spring rolls with sushi-grade tuna were a big hit with nearly the whole table and got an extra zing from the spicy peanut sauce on the side.

The entrees drew envy - everyone coveted their neighbors' choices. Every entree except mine, that is. A salt shaker must have fallen onto my baked cod fillet (I kid, but that's an apt description), and I wished I had ordered the pan-seared halibut - a note-perfect flaky fish atop a creamy, fuchsia-colored ragout of beets and sunchoke.

Likewise, the eggplant rollatini made a believer out of a diehard eggplant hater, but then, with all those Italian cheeses, marinara sauce, and hunk of garlic bread, what's not to like? The grilled cheeseburger doesn't really belong on this menu, but it's a nice addition for less-adventurous diners.

On a visit the next night, we dropped by the bar, where the silence was nearly deafening. "Did we just interrupt a private party?" we asked the friendly bartender. "No, they're just giving swing lessons up front," she said, admitting that she, too, had been practicing her moves a little earlier in the night. The evening's DJ is about to spin a set called "Swingology" (since when are Dusty Springfield and Bill Withers considered swing music?), and he's giving quick lessons to the handful of patrons waiting for the music.

It's low-key to the point of loneliness in the bar, where you can order a few items from the restaurant's menu and some extra sandwiches. A glass of pumpkin ale goes down rather quickly, but then the music starts and people start spinning across the floor. Here's hoping they keep it up and bring their friends with them.

Church, 69 Kilmarnock St., 617-236-7600, churchofboston
Back in January, Kylie Minogue became the only person other than the Queen to be modelled in wax four times at Madame Tussauds. The latest version sees the showgirl pop princess in floor-length red sequins and was the first "scented" figure, infused with her signature perfume, "Darling".

The recasting was a sign of how much she is loved and what she is loved for � the camp, the glitz, the girliness. Even when the girl-next-door who sang I Should Be So Lucky morphed into a bit of a sexpot, she was still essentially cute and silly: little Sandra Dee dressing up in tight black Lycra rather than a genuine bad girl.

I was a teenager back in her Stock Aitken Waterman days. My friends read the NME and bought records by obscure indie guitar bands. Our little sisters would pinch our mothers' high heels and lipsticks and bop along to Kylie records and we sneered even as we suspected they might be having more fun. Then we grew up, stopped taking ourselves so seriously and, in our twenties, whooped it up on the dancefloor as the pulsating beats of the fabulous Can't Get You Out of My Head mixed sublimely into New Order's Blue Monday. Kylie was cool. Then she was ill. Then she was back in big feathers at Wembley to see in the New Year 2007 as the nation's sweetheart.

Now her 10th album sees her playing with tinselly, semi-retro, winkingly arty electropop � from the glittery, glam-stomp of Two Hearts, through the breathless rush of the Cathy Dennis-penned Wow, to the coquettish Nu-di-ty where synths splutter and fizz like old fluorescent tubes.

advertisementHer voice is still cute, slight, girlish, except for on the rapped Heart Beat Rock for which she does an odd Robbie Williams impression.

Critics who think she's competing with icy, adult electro divas such as Alison Goldfrapp or Róisín Murphy are missing the point. She's no innovator. She's providing the safe, superficial, silly soundtrack for little sisters to dress up to and have a bit of fun. Helen Brown

Dion
Son of Skip James
SPV, ￡12.99

Dion DiMucci is one of the last 1950s rock and rollers still in action; his career has spanned early rock, a folkie interlude and a brief, stormy collaboration with Phil Spector. Earlier this year he made a comeback with Bronx in Blue, a collection of blues cover versions. Son of Skip James repeats the formula, with even better results, thanks to its superior repertoire, courtesy of Robert Johnson, Willie Dixon and Chuck Berry, among others.

Dion, an Italian-American New Yorker with an accent fit for a Martin Scorsese movie, sings without the faintest affectation ― a veteran returning with wisdom and zest to the music that first inspired him. Andrew Perry

Remi Nicole
My Conscience and I
Island, ￡11.99

"Write what you know" is the lyrical trend of our time. But what if what you know isn't terribly interesting? Like Alex Turner and Lily Allen, 24-year-old London indie kid Remi Nicole sings about ordinary events in ordinary language.

She hasn't got their wit, though; on this debut, her observations are often as mundane as her subjects. Remi's memories of childhood: "Mum made you dinner, and you hated greens/ Then it was time for a bath." Her thoughts about summer: "You know it's hot outside when things are really going right and it's still light at night." The music - sugary guitar-pop, pedestrian ballads - is pretty ordinary too. Michael Deacon

JAZZ

Duke Ellington and his Orchestra
Live in Zurich 1950
TCB, ￡12.99

This is quite a find for lovers of Duke Ellington's music. It's a hitherto unreleased concert recording, in excellent sound for the period and capturing a little-known version of his band playing some unusual repertoire.

In May 1950, Duke - out of fashion in the cool jazz era, and slipping in popularity - was touring Europe. But, as this album demonstrates, his music remained wonderfully rich. In Paris he had picked up an extra musician, the great tenor player Don Byas. Other treats for the collector are two rare compositions by Ellington's co-composer, Billy Strayhorn, a piano excursion by Strayhorn himself on Take the A Train, and a very persuasive performance of one of Ellington's better extended pieces intriguingly entitled The Tattooed Bride. Martin Gayford

WORLD

Oi Va Voi
Oi Va Voi
V2, ￡10.99

Four years on from a debut that saw them hailed as "one of the most exciting bands in Britain", London klezmer fusionists Oi Va Voi make a somewhat embattled return. First they saw guest vocalist K?T Tunstall rocket off to solo stardom, then came the departure of their principal live asset � charismatic violinist Sophie Solomon � and a growing Balkan-beat vogue that has stripped their music's Eastern European tinge of its novelty.

While their trademark blend of introspective songwriting, urban rhythms and global influences remains distinctive, these elements aren't always deployed to their best advantage. New singer Alice McLaughlin lacks Tunstall's light touch, and the album's artful arrangements and bittersweet melodies are too often wasted on jokey instrumentals and misfiring songs.

Only the anthemic Black Sheep builds on the unique pop-world-dance feel of their first album. If they're to survive, they'll need a lot more like that on their
teacher at Stormonth Elementary School in Fox Point, recently asked her students to write about their greatest musical hero.

Hannah Montana


If You Go
Who: Hannah Montana
When: 4 p.m. Dec. 8
Where: Allstate Arena, Rosemont, Ill.
How much: Sold out

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Who: Billy Ray Cyrus
When: 8 p.m. Saturday
Where: Milwaukee Theatre,
500 W. Kilbourn Ave.
How much: $28 to $38



Related Coverage
Girls, parents look up to Disney star
Dad knew she was right for role
Scalping prompts a closer look

Advertisement


Buy a link hereNot surprisingly, Hannah Montana was the most popular choice.

"I like her acting because it makes people laugh. It even makes my dad laugh," wrote Sara Nocton.

"In real life she cares a lot about her friends and family," added Signe Wright. "She is a good friend to her best friend."

"I think she is a hero because she is a role model for kids my age," wrote Krista Kemppainen. "The lyrics are special, too, because they have meaning to me. . . . I would love to have a conversation with her to tell Miley Cyrus these things."

In a little over a year, "Hannah Montana" has catapulted from just another cable sitcom to the hottest concert attraction in the land, drawing ticket prices as high as $2,500 on the resale market, redefining the Disney girl-next-door heroine for a new generation, reigniting the career of a '90s country star and possibly even changing the way music and concert tickets are marketed and sold.

On the chance that you're not a 12-year-old girl or the parent of one: Hannah Montana is the title character of a Disney Channel sitcom and the star of a sold-out tour that has desperate adults coughing up hundreds and occasionally thousands of dollars to pay ticket brokers.

Hannah is portrayed by 14-year-old Miley Cyrus, daughter of country singer Billy Ray Cyrus of "Achy Breaky Heart" renown, who plays her dad on the show.

By day, Miley Stewart is a normal middle-school kid, but at night she's secretly the popular rock star Hannah Montana. (On the current tour, which has no Milwaukee stop, Miley performs one set as Hannah and another as herself.)

Although only a blond wig separates Hannah and Miley, only her family and closest friends know Hannah's true identity.

Hot tickets
The show, which debuted in March 2006, has been an enormous hit. It has already spawned two multiplatinum soundtrack albums, "Hannah Montana" and "Hannah Montana 2: Meet Miley Cyrus." There's a Hannah Montana clothing line, and Hannah Montana costumes were a big part of this year's trick-or-treat fashion parade.

The crush for tickets and the large number of tickets snapped up by brokers has led the district attorneys in Missouri and Arkansas to launch investigations and prompted a state senator in Nebraska to introduce legislation to thwart high-tech scalpers.

The show has even revived Cyrus' dad's career as a country artist. Billy Ray Cyrus' new album, "Home at Last," went top 5 on the Billboard country chart, and he's back on the road with a date at the Milwaukee Theatre on Saturday.

So what is it about Hannah Montana that has captivated the braces-and-Barbies constituency?

Entertainment Weekly senior writer Chris Willman thinks part of the appeal is that with her secret identity, Hannah Montana represents a superhero character that has usually been pitched just to boys through characters like Spider-Man and Batman. Willman guesses that the boy audience for Hannah is somewhere in the realm of 2%.

But if the boys don't relate, the girls are getting support from another quarter: their parents.

Positive lyrics
"I think parents are running scared," Willman says. "What's safe for them? The line between kid entertainment and adult entertainment has blurred so much over the years. Animated movies have kind of risqué jokes a lot of the time. I think parents are tired and want something where (they) can leave the room for a half-hour and not worry about it. This certainly provides that."

The tunes tend to have positive girl-power messages dipped in a bright suit of candy pop. Instead of the precocious sugar-coated teases of early Britney Spears, there is affirmative stuff such as "True Friend," "Life's What You Make It," "As I Am," "You and Me Together" and "Find Yourself in You."

Hannah Montana feels like the newest model of the cheerful, wholesome, peppy girl next door that Disney has been selling for a half-century, from the days of Annette Funicello and Hayley Mills through to Hilary Duff and Raven-Symone. Billy Ray Cyrus acknowledges as much.

"Is there a kind of spunky-girl-next-door archetype that Disney keeps recycling? I think they've been quoted as saying that they're looking for that all-American girl," Billy Ray Cyrus says. "They're looking for somebody who has that thing that other kids can relate to.

"I think that's what a lot of kids see and hear in Miley," Cyrus says. "Her music is about reaching your dreams and standing strong and being yourself."

Learning from dad
Although there was an Internet hoax that Miley was pregnant, so far she has been able to dodge the kind of scandals that have tainted other recent Disney girls such as Lindsay Lohan and Vanessa Hudgens.

Willman speculates that having her dad's experience to rely on might help Miley avoid the rush to adulthood that has derailed child stars since the days of Judy Garland.

On the other hand, Billy Ray readily admits that as a disciplinarian, he is somewhat less than Pattonesque.

"My goal as a father is to be Miley's friend so if she makes a mistake, if she does something that's not a good decision, I want to be the person she calls to help figure it out," he says. "Sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't, but that's what I've found to be the best way for me. . . .

"I've been a great playmate," he continues. "I've taught my kids to ride horses and motorcycles and build campfires and roast wieners and marshmallows, but I never was good at sitting down with them and saying, 'I want you to do this algebra and here's the way it goes. . . . '

"I leave that up to the mama. You know, she'd be the first one to tell you that that's a cop-out, that there have been times when I should have put the hammer down, but I just ain't no good at that. I'm no good at confrontation."