The new glossed-up version of the LaBelle classic “Lady Marmalade” has proven to be a great marketing tool for Moulin Rouge. Unfortunately, it’s also a glorious track, produced by the addictive Missy Elliot and featuring three pop sirens- Mya, Pink, and Christina Aguilera- and one of the most salacious of female rappers, Lil’ Kim. All the spunky camp of the original has been sucked out and replaced with sultry carnality; these young performers have been sexualized in a disturbing yet predictable way (all four have tried to turn the heat up before without success). They are classy hookers down at ol’ Moulin Rouge, struttin’ their stuff on the street, and the Paul Hunter video has them in fetishistic attire doing their little peep shows. Aguilera, who remains true to the Mariah Carey School of Belting, has said that the collaboration is a display of female strength in the industry, which is an unnerving comment; someone might conclude that the message is that all women have slept their way to power in the world of pop music. Nonetheless, the “Lady Marmalade” of 2001 rocks. Done in a superstar-mini-marathon style, it jumps from Mya’s thin, appealing voice, Pink’s most capable performance to date, and Lil’ Kim’s boring rap to Christina Aguilera’s big build-up as the head whore of the pack, screaming her head off and giving more urgency to the classic “voulez-vous coucher avec moi ce soir” come-on than necessary. The ladies approached it as a sexual anthem for women in the new millennium and it ends up being both a slight statement on the promiscuity of young people and an undeniable dance anthem that teaches some kids just about the only French they’ll learn in their high school years.
By Andrew Chan [JUNE 13, 2001]