A singer who had been dropped by her label came back with an album that topped charts on several continents. The singer was Kylie Minogue, and the album was Fever, her eighth studio album, released on 1 October 2001 by Parlophone. It arrived 25 years ago and turned a career in trouble into one of the biggest pop stories of the decade.
It arrived 25 years ago and turned a career in trouble into one of the biggest pop stories of the decade.
A dance-pop record with no ballads
Fever is a dance-pop and nu-disco record with touches of disco and Europop. It has no ballads at all, unlike Minogue's earlier albums. The sound leans on 1970s disco and European pop, and the lyrics stay on love and pleasure from the first track to the last.
The album opens with "More More More", built on a funky bass line, and closes with "Burning Up", a slow-burning disco number. "Love at First Sight" starts with an electronic piano and adds elements of teen pop, while "Give It to Me" is aggressive and also teen-pop in flavour. "Come into My World" drew comparisons from critics to the album's biggest song, and the title track "Fever" carries synth-pop touches. "Dancefloor" leans toward club music, "In Your Eyes" has shades of disco and techno, and "Fragile" shows ambient influence. Minogue's voice moves from sensual on "More More More" to sweet on "Your Love", which features acoustic guitar.
From Deconstruction to Parlophone
The road to Fever began in 1998, when Minogue left the label Deconstruction after weak sales for Impossible Princess. She moved to Parlophone and released Light Years in 2000, which became a success: four times platinum in Australia and platinum in Britain. Its lead single, "Spinning Around", also sold well, and she toured behind it with the On a Night Like This shows. Recording for Fever took place from January to August 2001 across studios in Dublin, London, Chicago and Canterbury.
A large production team worked on the record, including Cathy Dennis, Rob Davis, Richard Stannard and Julian Gallagher. Dennis co-wrote three songs and co-produced two of them; Davis co-wrote and co-produced three; Stannard and Gallagher worked on five, among them "Love at First Sight", "In Your Eyes", "Love Affair", "Boy" and "Rendezvous at Sunset". The cover was styled by William Baker with graphic designer Tony Hung, photographed by Vincent Peters, and shows Minogue in a white swimsuit by Fee Doran and Manolo Blahnik shoes. The American edition used a different cover, a close-up of Minogue biting a bracelet.
Singles and the Grammy win
The first single, "Can't Get You Out of My Head", came out on 8 September 2001. It is a robotic dance song in the nu-disco style and reached the top of charts in 40 countries, becoming the best-selling single of Minogue's career with more than 12 million copies sold worldwide. "In Your Eyes" followed on 21 January 2002, "Love at First Sight" on 3 June 2002, and "Come into My World" on 4 November 2002. The video for "Come into My World", directed by Michel Gondry, shows four copies of the singer, and the song won Minogue her first Grammy, for Best Dance Recording, in 2004.
Fever reached the top of the charts in Australia, Austria, Germany, Ireland, Russia and Britain, and it went to number 3 on the Billboard 200 in the United States, where it was released on 26 February 2002 by Capitol Records. It was Minogue's first American album release in 13 years, since Enjoy Yourself in 1989, and it became her best-selling album there. The record earned seven times platinum in Australia, five times platinum in Britain and platinum in the United States, and in 2002 it won International Album at the Brit Awards. By 2012, worldwide sales stood at six million copies.
Minogue supported Fever with the KylieFever2002 tour, split into seven acts, with costumes by Dolce & Gabbana and eight outfit changes per show. A special edition of the album appeared on 19 November 2002 with a previously unreleased song, "Whenever You Feel Like It". The album's blend of disco and electronic pop set the tone for dance music on the charts for years after, and the robotic pulse of "Can't Get You Out of My Head" is still one of the most recognisable sounds in pop.