Release and Promotion
The release of X was announced on 21 September 2007. To promote the release of the album, Minogue performed on an exclusive show on ITV1 called The Kylie Show, featuring six songs from the new album, and four of her previous hits. It aired on 10 November 2007. Minogue also joined Jo Whiley on Radio 1 for a special show promoting the new album called Kylie and Whiley during which they recreated a scene from Neighbours. In addition, Kylie performed several songs in various European TV shows.
On 28 November 2007, Minogue announced she would promote X with a tour, to be called KylieX2008.
To promote the album, Minogue appeared on 14 January 2008 on the Australian morning program Sunrise. To promote the lead single and the album in the United States, Minogue appeared on several shows. On 31 March, she gave an interview on the Today Show with Matt Lauer. Minogue performed "All I See" and "Can't Get You out of My Head" live on the results show 1 April 2008 of the American program Dancing with the Stars. She also performed on The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson. She also appeared on The Ellen DeGeneres Show and performed "All I See" on 7 April 2008 and appeared at the Idol Gives Back special on the seventh season of American Idol the following day, along with some of the biggest names in music, such as Gloria Estefan, Celine Dion, Bono, Annie Lennox, Maroon 5, Emma Bunton, Geri Halliwell and many more. This was Minogue's final appearance in the United States before heading back to England to prepare for the tour, which began on 6 May 2008 in Paris.
A major problem with the album's promotion was Minogue's management selecting poor choices of singles. Numerous sources, including Perez Hilton, responded very positively to the track "Speakerphone", produced by Bloodshy & Avant. Another fan of that song is American singer Madonna who included the track on her Celebrity playlist for iTunes in 2008, stating that she thought that "Speakerphone" was the best song on the album. On the season 2 premiere episode of America's Best Dance Crew, which aired on 19 June, Fanny Pak used "Speakerphone" in the Crew Choice Challenge. The song was commended for being overly modern and progressive, especially for an American audience who responded to "Can't Get You Out of My Head".
Others responded that "Wow" or "Like a Drug" would have been a suitable first single for the album in the United States. Instead, with the mentality that the only substantial way to boost album sales in North America would be to appeal to an urban market (similarly to Minogue's ninth studio album, Body Language), "All I See" was released as that region's lead single and failed on the mainstream charts, despite the single version featuring American rapper Mims.
Another problem with the album's American promotion involved Minogue's low-public profile in comparison with the rest of the world. In the past, she had rarely appeared in the public eye in the region except for heavy airplay of "Can't Get You Out of My Head" and "The Locomotion", seldom appearing on general music channels such as MTV and VH1 and never having a tour on the continent of North America. In Europe, additional problems arose in the release of "2 Hearts" as the song was a drastic jump from Minogue's other work (especially on X) and clearly duplicated from the Kish Mauve version. The release of the final single, "The One" was a neglected release as it featured only a digital download single along with a promotional music video. The single version was remixed with a more club feel by the Freemasons.
Shortly after this, Minogue expressed disappointment with the album to The Sun, but insisted that she was pleased with the singles "In My Arms" and "2 Hearts". "In retrospect we could definitely have bettered it, I'll say that straight up", she admitted. "Given the time we had, it is what it is. 'Wow', 'In My Arms', 'The One' and '2 Hearts' are crackers. They go off like a frog in a sock."
Read more about this topic: X (Kylie Minogue Album)
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