Tim: Expectation adjustment for you: I wanted to switch this off within a couple of seconds.
Tom: You really know how to sell a song.
Tim: Then I remembered that Oscar is responsible for one of my favourite ever Melodifestivalen performances, so I figured I’d give him the benefit of the doubt, but then the verse wasn’t great, but I kept listening, and then the chorus came along. And it’s good. But what I really want to know is: is it good enough?
Tom: Wow, you’re right about the first few seconds. Those few seconds sound like someone’s trying to rip off Scooter’s style really badly, and those staccato synths are just obnoxious.
Tim: Because it is a really good chorus. If the whole song was in the style of that chorus, I’d love it. But the rest of it is instead, well, average at best, and downright irritating at some points, not least those squeaky vocal samples at the start and then return intermittently throughout.
Tom: And I’m sure I’ve heard that descending melody in the chorus before, too, in many different track. It’s not retro enough to be pleasantly nostalgic; it just sounds a bit like a kids’ song to me.
But I think my initial reaction of disappointment was wrong, because I did at least have some sort of actual reaction to the chorus. I didn’t just go ‘meh’, and that’s basically an endorsement by my standards.
Tim: The rest is okay, sure, though there’s not much I actively like. But then I keep coming back to the chorus, and wondering if it redeems it. And I don’t really know, and that kind of annoys me.