Collaborations I suspect.

That's what worries me.

That they have tagged a rapper on to the lead single at the last minute, like Pitbull with All Night Long.

Yeah you could be right, and actually that could be a VERY plausible reason for the delay.

If it's a big name rapper like Kanye or Drake I will be thrilled though.
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They worked last time, don't think they will now. This is the time she should establish herself as an artist and make a statement with her 2nd album. Hopefully, there's no rapper or anyone else on the single...

Things seem to be going from bad to worse....performing the song in a random club for the first time and it's not even G.A.Y?...

RCA really are being arsey eh?

That hasn't been confirmed at all. The article says she may perform it. I think they're speculating to be honest. I would be very surprised if she did play it.

Also this talk of a feature is all speculation too. For what it's worth, Alex said the first single wouldn't have a feature.

Alex has been tweeting Wretch 32 (a rapper) 'xxxxxxxxxx'.

That was about a month ago, when the single was to be premiered at the end of August.

Something changed to delay the premiere, and it could easily be an added featured artist.

Why oh why have a rapper - it completely undermines her - its like saying 'sorry you can't do this on your own so we are going to add on a crappy rapper - oh and an added benefit of this is it will alienate a load of potential fans!! With love - RCA xxx'

Seriously they are useless - completely not impressed with them at the moment.

If this is true his name will become very ironic! bleugh!

Hopefully he won't be featured on the new single. I really don't like him and he ain't good.

He's a friend of Example's so I'm just HOPING that he has nothing to do with the single...also I don't really like his music.

Wretch is amazing...i wouldn't mind if she worked with him on the 2nd or 3rd single...it would give her more credibility if she worked with a UK rapper.

I still think they're looking for a single, anyway..there's no label that waits around having not 1 but 2 "amazing songs"...according to what we've heard so far.

You're right. Outside of Kanye, Eminem, Jay-Z or the riduclously popular Lil Wayne, or maybe Nicki Minaj there's no other American rappers right now that I'd consider a potential "game changer" for Alex's career if she did something with them. Flo-Rida, Wiz Khalifa, B.O.B, Pitbull, Travie McCoy....all indiscriminate renta-rappers, who don't have the same cultural cache as the "big 5"..

So if she can't snag one of the "big 5" of American rap at the moment, she may as well stick to UK rappers (if collabs do happen), who are at an all-time high in terms of their credibility (even American singers are trying to work with UK rappers these days).

If she collaborates with Wretch, it would certainly give Radio 1 a dilemma.

I would have serious worries about the quality of the material Alex has recorded if they are still looking for a single worthy song now. (I don't believe they are).

She said that's she's recorded five albums worth of material and the single was supposed to première on September 5th.

How on earth could they not have found a lead single worthy song by now?

She's been in studio during the week, but I presume that she's putting finishing touches to what she's already recorded.

Either she has two big potential lead singles (Benny Benassi & Erick Morillo) or she doesn't.

I would rather believe what she's told us on that front.

Other positives...

1. Michael Woods seemed to be very confident about what he recorded with Alex.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A40wrOppYmw

2. Autumn Rowe says the song she recorded with Alexandra and Ishi last October is "ridicuous" and will be on her album.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oLxoTtUN9AM

3. Alexandra obviously was pretty taken with the material she has recorded with Rico Love since she tweeted saying she had found the first single in June.

4. Thundacatz tweeted about two weeks ago telling people to follow Alex as her new material is sounding fantastic.

If they haven't found a lead single worthy song by now then I would worry about the quality of the album.

You've just put things into perspective really with that post. They've obviously got the right material...the delay is obviously down to something else, and I'm guessing it's an XF slot. I'm guessing she's been told that she'll have a slot, but they're just waiting on the date.

Great post universetipping.

Also, Usher said he was impressed with her new material, although he might just have been being polite.

Thanks. I don't have the energy to be negative anymore.

I just hope we hear something before the end of the month, and that all the waiting will be worth it.

Happens all the time, it even gets to the point where entire albums get axed by labels and artists go back to the drawing board. I don't think it's gone to that extreme but i don't believe the label are having a hard time picking between 2 great songs...

Producers are going to be hyping up the songs they've done for her....no writer/producer is going to make it seem like they aren't excited about their work with an artist. They're simply too biased.
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Well it that case, the album will be hopeless, and I just can't believe that.

They always say this - before swagger jagger and collide got released Autumn Rowe was bigging those up big time, and 'happy' was earmarked by Simon and ryan as bleeding love 2 and that bombed comparitively - im sure she has good material but the delay is a bad thing, there is absolutely no reason for it, fair enough this does go on behind the scenes a lot!!1 BUT this isnt behind the scenes - its been on again off again, so either they disagree a lot, have terrible communication or keep seriously changing their minds. Alex is easily capable of pulling off an amazing track, but if they don't promote and release it properly it won't do well, it is that simple - you cannot release and do well at THE busiest time of year when every single week there will be 2 new x factor performances viaing for the top spot unless your promo is TOP NOTCH. Until they release this and we get an idea of strategy I am just not confident.

And don't forget she is not just competing on sales, she is also competing on airplay - now would have been perfect as there is a small lull in new releases before the storm.

If they pick a killer track AND promote it properly Alex will do amazing, as she is genuine quality, but at the mo, it seems way to chaotic.

Its not that its hopeless - but every producer wants their song to be the lead, they are completely biased so it doesn't mean anything until we have heard. These tracks could be incredible, but if you had two that were unreal and knew would smash, you wouldn't waste time on releasing one of them 'because you couldn't pick' - there must be something else going on. it could be a good or bad thing going on, we don't know - but the delay itself isn't good, the question is whether it will be worth it! Fingers crossed it is.

^^

I can understand why you're saying that but it was James Reynolds who tweeted that the delay was down to the label deciding which song to run with.

Of course it's probably a combination of things.

I do think the X Factor slot probably has a lot to do with it.