Author: Tim

Dario G – Hola

“IT’S DARIO G AND IT SOUNDS LIKE DARIO G YES I’M GOING TO START BOUNCING AT MY DESK NOW.”

Tim: Yep, Dario G – did Sunmachine, Carnaval de Paris, Dream To Me and maybe a few others way back when we were youngsters.

Tom: Not to mention a really good track on the Jeff Wayne’s War of the Worlds remix album. Yes, that’s a thing.

Tim: Huh, never knew. Also, now there’s this, somewhat out of the blue, because why not?

Tom: Well, I like that. I like that a lot. Why do I like that so much?

Tim: I mean, potentially because it sounds like it could be straight off an album from the then-trio twenty years ago. Some people might argue, mind, that if you’re coming back after a couple of decades you could maybe update your sound a bit.

Tom: That’s fair. This hits a lot of nostalgic parts of my brain. When I stop to think about it, I’m really not sure about basically the entire middle third of it: that chopping-and-stuttering effect doesn’t work for me. But if I don’t stop to think about it: it’s DARIO G AND IT SOUNDS LIKE DARIO G YES I’M GOING TO START BOUNCING AT MY DESK NOW.

Tim: That absolutely makes sense. After all, Busted updated their sound for the third album and it was garbage, then went back to the normal stuff for the fourth and it was excellent, so what do some people know? This is nice. It is, basically, a tune that could have been released by Dario G twenty years, and we’d all have been very happy with. Good shout, then – why mix with a winning formula?

Stockholm Noir – Glory

“Late ’90s trance synths with a gentle amount of late ’10s tropical hints here and there”

Tim: A Swedish dance act that we haven’t covered anywhere near as much as we should have done, as I think you’ll agree after hearing this.

Tom: I couldn’t tell you what decade that’s from. You’re right, though, it’s a good track.

Tim: Well there it is: we’ve late ’90s trance synths with a gentle amount of late ’10s tropical hints here and there so it doesn’t sound dated. And I for one absolutely love it. A lot of one great genre, a small amount of a fairly good genre, and a lovely vocal on top of it.

Tom: I can’t remember it after listening, but it’s the sort of thing that’d sit happily in the middle of a dance playlist. There’s nothing wrong with it, and by my standards that’s an endorsement.

Tim: I’ve no complaints at all, even at four and a half minutes long. It’s lovely.

Lana Del Rey – Doin’ Time

“I genuinely thought, ha, someone’s doing a really good Lana Del Rey impression and is using it on a completely inappropriate track.”

Tom: Have you ever had a moment, Tim, when you look at the world’s reaction to a track and think that something is terribly wrong?

Tim: Tom, we run a site largely dedicated to Europop, and are frequently fans of songs that end up at the bottom of the Eurovision table. Believe it or not, I have had many such moments.

Tom: Well, anyway. You know the old Gershwin classic “Summertime”? Jazz standard, probably the canonical version’s by Ella Fitzgerald, you know, the one that goes “summertime, and the living is easy”? It’d be a logical choice for Lana Del Rey to cover. It fits her style perfectly.

Tim: Correct. But she hasn’t?

Tom: She hasn’t. She’s covered Sublime’s 1997 highly-modified reggae cover.

Tim: That…is a lot better than I was worried it’d be, given how you sold it.

Tom: The world loves it. I’m driving through the US, it’s on the radio, the DJ’s describing it as the song of the summer. Positive review after positive review is cited in the Wikipedia article for it, and while some of that may be selective quoting due to the label’s PR team, those reviews were still written.

Tim: I wouldn’t disagree with so many of them – I think it’s alright. Doesn’t hugely push my buttons, but it’s a nice tropical vibe, which fits a current day summer style.

Tom: I thought it was a parody. I genuinely thought, ha, someone’s doing a really good Lana Del Rey impression and is using it on a completely inappropriate track. Even now, I’m not entirely convinced that this isn’t just someone’s idea of a joke that got out of hand.

Saturday Flashback: I DON’T KNOW HOW BUT THEY FOUND ME – Choke

“The chorus isn’t too bad, I’ll give you that.”

Tom: I know that “Utah-based indie band that sounds like early Britpop, doing a song that personifies Los Angeles and describes how the singer wants to choke the city to death” is well outside our wheelhouse, but given yesterday’s track, it seemed like a good time to talk about someone else who’s insisting on all caps.

Tim: Certainly is a heck of band name.

Tim: Oh. Oh, mate, why?

Tom: Mainly because — despite that introduction that places it outside our wheelhouse — that’s basically a schlager chorus, isn’t it?

Tim: Hmmm…yeah, actually, the chorus isn’t too bad, I’ll give you that.

Medina – Sir Det Ikk

“Curious message, but hey ho, we’ve got a decent song about it.”

Tim: Says Medina, in her native Danish, “Don’t Say It”.

Tom: Video editors haven’t got bored of the VHS filter yet, then. Anyway, sorry, yes. “Don’t Say It”.

Tim: More specifically, the message is ‘don’t tell anyone you think I’m amazing, particularly not your current girlfriend’. Curious message, but hey ho, we’ve got a decent song about it so I’m not complaining.

Tom: Well, we got a decent chorus, at least. The rest… well, it certainly is a song.

Tim: That is, after all, an absolutely lovely chorus, and while it may not have the big energy of a truly amazing pop song, it does have a delightful melody, sounding brilliant coming in after that pre-chorus gap (which I’ve checked, and it isn’t just there for the video). Three and a half minutes of delight, here, only slightly spoiled by thirty seconds of garbage on the front of the video.

Tom: And about five seconds in the middle, just to make sure you’ll play it through Spotify instead.

Tim: Well, obviously. And why wouldn’t you? The music’s fabulous.

Alyssandra – Himbo

“Now she’s sleeping in my bed, God I wish that you were dead.”

Tim: Remember when TLC made that song where they spent some of the time saying that they didn’t want no scrubs, but spent most of the time explaining exactly what a scrub is? Well, Alyssandra, formerly of Dolly Style, never really gets round to the explanation.

Tim: If you can’t guess it from the context, Urban Dictionary reports that it’s basically a male bimbo, which makes sense as a portmanteau, I guess. There are a number of good things about the lyrics, though, not least the line “now she’s sleeping in my bed, God I wish that you were dead”, which takes the prize of being my new favourite of at least the month so far.

Tom: It’s interesting how often you describe the same lyric as “favourite” and I describe it as “cringeworthy”. Which applies to the word ‘himbo’, the line ‘goofy in that Gucci dress’, ‘which bone in your body should I break first’, and ‘the himbo’s got to go’, which all appear within about fifteen seconds of each other. Which is a shame, because the composition and production are pretty good.

Tim: Some of those I will grant you are a little iffy, but it’s not all bad, not by a long way. As you said, musically it’s pretty good as well, and you might expect that given the talent on board: co-writing credit goes to none other than the great and glorious Max Martin, proving once and for all that, yep, Sweden’s still got it.

Kygo & Whitney Houston – Higher Love

“Recognisable, clearly inspired by, but also new. I can live with that, I guess.”

Tim: Slightly interesting history to this track: originally recorded by English singer Steve Winwood in the 1980s; covered by Whitney and made exclusively available as a bonus track on the Japanese edition of her 1990 I’m Your Baby Tonight.

Tom: I know the original well. And I always hear the chorus lyrics as “bring me a pie, oh love”, which means it’s basically ruined for me. And now you too, I guess.

Tim: Oh, thanks for that. Now remixed by Kygo, allegedly at the request of the Houston family, and first performed at New York Pride on Saturday.

Tim: Now, before I heard this I saw a couple of people discussing it on Twitter; one of them complaining that Kygo got rid of the middle eight, and I was immediately primed to dislike it. However, having heard this now without hearing the original, it doesn’t seem to be missing anything: sure, there isn’t one, but there’s more than enough variation present in what we do have for me to find it an enjoyable enough listen.

Tom: It reminds me of his Take On Me remix: recognisable, clearly inspired by, but also new. I can live with that, I guess.

Tim: One thing’s odd, though: although it does have a very different sound from the original, which is pretty much pure brass, it’s not all that Kygo-y, what with there being little in the way of tropical instruments. All in, though, it’s nice: a good song, nicely redone and released to a new audience. I approve.

Tom: And I can still hear “bring me a pie”, so I approve too.

Tim: Excellent.

Saturday Flashback: Hogland & Vinil feat. AVA – We Don’t Care

“Everyone, I’ve good news!”

Tim: Everyone, I’ve good news! Turns out, the rest of Hogland’s output is at a similar level to that of Letting Go, that brilliant track we featured last week! Here’s one from a couple of years back to demonstrate that.

Tim: You see? As previously, great production, great featured vocals, an absolutely fantastic post-chorus breakdown, and even a good middle eight!

Tom: The introduction and first verse remind me of OneRepublic, and I mean that as a compliment. Of course, it very quickly goes in a different direction. I’m really not sure about those steel-drum-like synths that just repeat one phrase over and over again, though.

Tim: My only question, to be honest, is: why haven’t I heard this guy before? I really don’t know, but I’m very very glad I’ve heard him now.

Sebastian Walldén – Sweet Summer Love

“A properly good dance pop track, I think?”

Tim: Current reigning champion of Swedish Idol, and here’s his third single, the first that I’m decreeing to be worthy for here. I think you’ll agree.

Tim: As the saying sort of goes, don’t bore us, get to the at least the vocal melody of the chorus, and I guess you can bring the instrumentation later if you feel it’s needed.

Tom: As long as you have the voice to carry it off. And, as you’d expect from an Idol winner, he does.

Tim: Right there, we’ve a properly good dance pop track, I think? BEATS in the music, THOUGHTFULNESS in the vocals, and SUMMER in the lyrics, which along with a decent melody is all I really need right now. Any complaints?

Tom: Weirdly, no.

Tim: Ooh, high praise indeed.

Tom: This is solid dance-pop, and if a few of those synth patches and effects are a touch dated, I don’t mind.

KEiiNO – Praying

“It just seems like they’ve taken a fairly average dance track and stuck some warbling on it.”

Tim: People’s Vote winner at Eurovision, so obviously they’re back with a follow-up. Namely, this one.

Tim: More than a little inspiration from early Alan Walker there, though those joik sections keep it very, very clear who’s running the show here.

Tom: It’s interesting how Avicii spawned a genre, whereas Alan Walker spawned a lot of people imitating his sound. I wonder what the difference is?

Tim: That one specific twiddly sound. It’s weird – Alan’s moved on, but he still seems to own it. Now, I was a big fan of these guys at Eurovision, because the song was just what the show needed, something fun, a good tune, with a little bit of novelty to get excited about. Here, though, I’m annoyingly not so keen, which is a shame as I’d like to be.

Tom: Yep, you’re not the only one. Joik is, uh, well, let’s say it’s an acquired taste, one that I definitely haven’t acquired.

Tim: It just seems like they’ve taken a fairly average dance track and stuck some warbling on it, and much as it’s cultural and all that, it just doesn’t do it for me.

Tom: Full marks for the grammatical pedantry of “whomever” in the lyrics, though.