The Next Best Thing

1	Boom Boom Ba 3:41
2	Bongo Bong 2:55
3	Don't Make Me Love You (Til I'm Ready) 3:39
4	American Pie 4:33
5	This Life 4:18
6	If Everybody Looked the Same 3:39
7	Why Does My Heart Feel So Bad? 4:23
8	I'm Not in Love 4:41
9	Stars All Seem to Weep 4:39
10	Time Stood Still 3:48
11	Swayambhu 3:07
12	Forever (And Always) 6:00

Barnes & Noble

As costar (with Rupert Everett) of gender-identity comedy THE NEXT BEST THING, Madonna is, of course, a major presence on the soundtrack, which is on her Warner Bros.-distributed label, Maverick Recording Co. Madonna's still in her electronica phase, and that is good news because in this vein, she's made her most listenable music ever. The most-hyped track here is her remake of Don McLean's "American Pie," and it's okay. Considerably more intriguing is the new song "Time Stood Still," a dreamy, slightly edgy ballad etched with synthesizer. THE NEXT BEST THING is full of tangy dance-pop-electronica tidbits, most of them exceedingly engaging (except for Christina Aguilera doing her usual ho-hum jailbait thing in "Don't Make Me Love You"). There's cute novelty stuff like electronic/hip-hop producer Metisse's album opener "Boom Boom Ba" and French singer Manu Chao's bouncy "Bongo Bong"; intoxicating slices of atmospheric swirl such as Brit act Mandalay's "This Life" and Solar Twins' "Swayambhu"; and superb tracks from Beth Orton ("Stars All Seem to Weep") and field-holler connoisseur Moby ("Why Does My Heart Feel So Bad?"). "American Pie" is not the only '70s hit to get remade here: 10cc's rapturous "I'm Not in Love" is given quite a nice treatment by new maverick group Olive, a duo whose producer/keyboardist is a Simply Red alum. Stick this one in the CD player, and prepare to drift away on blissful sonic clouds. Moira McCormick

All Music Guide

Unlike so many of the various-artists samplers that masquerade as soundtrack albums, The Next Best Thing has a consistent sound: it's filled with bouncy dance music propelled by the latest in synthesized beats, and many of the vocals are either by the film's star Madonna or a virtual soundalike. The copycats include British artist Mandalay, singing "This Life," and Metisse with "Boom Boom Ba," though teen sensation Christina Aguilera, doing another par-for-the-course teen anthem called "Don't Make Me Love You," and Beth Orton on "Stars All Seem to Weep" also seem to be singing in Madonna's register. The star herself continues in the electronica-styled music of her most recent album, Ray of Light, once again enlisting producer William Orbit for her two tracks. Manhandled cover tunes seem to be inevitable in this sort of collection, and this one has two: an inoffensive but unimaginative remake of 10cc's 1975 hit "I'm Not in Love" by recent Maverick signee Olive, and Madonna's take on "American Pie." Once you get over the surprise of Madonna covering such a song (it's as strange an idea as Donna Summer singing "MacArthur Park"), you find that she has done exactly what you'd expect -- keyed off the opening verse's line "I could make those people dance" and dumped most of those pesky lyrics. The result is perhaps less ridiculous in the context of an album full of cut-up, mix-and-match sounds such as this than it will be to fans of the original recording hearing it on the radio, but it's been almost 30 years since Don McLean took his version to number one, and probably most of Madonna's fans will be hearing the song for the first time. If it doesn't make any sense, so what? Most of them will be dancing too hard to notice. William Ruhlmann