Doll Domination: The Mini Collection

At first glance, this release seems more than a little strange. After scoring their biggest hit of the Doll Domination era with 'Jai Ho! (You Are My Destiny)' - a bandwagon-jumping dance track recorded several months after the album came out - the next move seemed obvious for the Pussycat Dolls. Tack the Slumdog-sampling smash onto the end of the original album, add a couple more new tunes and call it a 'Deluxe Edition'. Instead, their label's assembled a six-track 'Mini Album' featuring 'Jai Ho!', each of the Doll Domination singles (the pneumatic 'When I Grow Up', the melodramatic 'I Hate This Part', the slinky, Missy Elliott-assisted 'Whatcha Think About That') and that obligatory pair of new tracks. 'Painted Windows' is an impressive new Rodney Jerkins production, stomping and scuzzy in equal measure, while 'Hush Hush; Hush Hush' is a faintly ridiculous house remix of a Doll Domination album cut. It now comes complete with a whopping great lift from 'I Will Survive', but somehow it works. First impressions notwithstanding, in an age where music fans can download what they fancy on a track-by-track basis, the 'Mini Collection' actually starts to make sense. For £3.99 on iTunes, or just under a fiver in the shops, you get a fat-free serving of Pussycat hits without the padding that bogged down the original Doll Domination. Equally, if this is the last non-single PCD release - and those "featuring Nicole Scherzinger" credits are pretty ominous - it makes a fitting end to their chart reign. Well, how would you rather remember them - as a fairly anonymous pop group who released a couple of patchy albums, or as a very good singles act?