Various: Fever Pitch — The Official Music of the 2002 Fifa World Cup

By RUSSELL BAILLIE

(Herald rating: * )

A collection which from Anastacia's "official song" Boom (think Tina Turner shouting from the book Songwriting for English as a Second Language Students Made Easy), to Vangelis' "official theme" could only be more awful if Mrs Beckham had done her bit for England.

It's informative in a way: here you can learn Italy's Alanis Morissette is called Elisa, Spain's is called Monica Naranjo and that bad pop and dance music knows no borders.

At least Portugal had the good sense to just buy in Canadian-Portuguese popstress Nelly Furtado's Party for the job, while Germany gets points for honesty with Die Toten Hosen's We Will Be Heroes sounding like a bunch of Teutonic football fans playing pub-wrecking rock'n' roll. But as for the rest ... off, off, off.

Label: Epic

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