BOOTY AND THE BEATS OF MUSIC THERAPY
By Hattie Collins

IN A stuffy Top of the Pops studio, flush-faced youths sporting sweatbands and caps at funny angles eye the presenter as she enthusiastically introduces "top R&B babe Ber-ran-dyyyyy". The name perhaps doesn’t mean as much as that of number one R&B babe Beyoncé, but a guest appearance on stage by rapper/producer du jour Kanye West brings the audience further on side. She may have a way to go before she surpasses the over-achieving Ms Knowles, but ‘Talk About Our Love’, Brandy’s first single in two years, has just reached a very healthy chart high of No 6.

"Beyoncé and I are different. She’s like a young Tina and I’m a young Whitney," Brandy says when we meet two months prior to her TOTP performance in the rather more glamorous locale of Montego Bay, Jamaica. "My music is different. I’m a different type of girl; I’m just coming out of my shell, so I’m a little bit more innocent. Sometimes I look at Beyoncé and it’s like she’s already arrived." In all fairness they are as alike as Christina and Britney - that is, both women come from two very different sides of the same coin.

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