If you’re a fan of bad puns and unusual haircuts, you’re halfway to liking this lady.
Tim: If you’re a fan of bad puns and unusual haircuts, you’re halfway to liking this lady.
Tom: I like both of those things.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lC61ugCwqj4
Tim: And by now, you should be all the way there. I’d not heard of her before I saw a link to this video, but I wish I had because she’s actually done quite a few good tracks, including this one. The ooo-oo-oo-ooo bits in the chorus strike me as particularly good.
Tom: I’m not sure I have anything to add to that. It’s a decent track, although after playing it through once I’m not sure I can remember it all that well. It’s a good chorus, but it’s not a catchy one. I’d dance to it – I probably wouldn’t sing along.
Tim: On the other hand, I have trouble paying attention to this – good as it is, I keep getting bored halfway through, and moving on to other stuff. Perhaps it’s not lively and varied enough to keep my attention, and yet it clearly is. Maybe it’s too lively, and I keep wanting to get up and do things. Your thoughts?
Tom: I know it’s a proper name and all that, but it means different quaintly amusing things in the US and the UK. If you’re going to try and make your stage name one word, surely you’d pick a different one?
Tim: You know, I was going to try to find out what her real name was, but then I figured that typing ‘fanny play’ into Google probably wouldn’t give me the results I was looking for.
Tom: In the interests of science, I checked. It pointed me at a 1932 play called “Fanny” by Marcel Pagnol. Disappointingly accurate results, there.
Tim: Oh. Oh well. Anyway, Play did the delightful Destiny that we featured a while back. Disappointingly, this is entirely different.
Tim: Is this a bit dull? From the start, yes, and indeed for at least the first two thirds.
Tom: It’s got an excellent intro. Sadly, that intro lasts about two minutes.
Tim: Sure, it builds up a little bit forty seconds from the end, but not nearly enough to qualify as exciting. If I’m being honest I wouldn’t have bothered bringing this up at all if I wasn’t immature enough to find her name a bit funny. Especially at the seventeen second mark.
Feeling mateless? Just been dumped? Then this is the video for you.
Tim: Feeling mateless? Just been dumped? Then this is the video for you.
Tom: Also if you want an introduction that reminds you of both Dido and Whigfield.
Tim: So we have here a lady who’s just been broken up with, but tells us she’s alright because she’s got her friends. Well, either that break-up hit her very hard indeed emotionally or I’m entirely sympathetic to the bloke who chucked her. Because, and I’m sorry to break this to you if you’re reading this, Aura, that’s not a friend – it’s a weird shoe-robot that’s the weirdest type of companion I’ve seen since Lauri’s weird puppet thing, Amanda, about a year ago.
Tom: She’d get on well with Olly Murs, then. Although her companion is rather well animated, I must say.
Tim: Well-animated, yes. But MADE OF SHOES.
Basically, Aura, you shouldn’t be playing backgammon with it, you shouldn’t be baking a cake with it, you should be making actual friends and moving on – maybe even ask that nice policeman out on a date, rather than lying to him about your weird-is-putting-it-lightly house guest. Because what sort of a message are you sending out? That everyone will be happy after a breakup if they can only build a robot out of their obscene collection of footwear? Come on now.
Tom: Well, quite. Er, the music, though?
Tim: Oh yes, we probably should talk about it. Well, there’s a dec—OH BLOODY HELL SHE WEARS LAMPSHADES ON HER HEAD, so can’t we just move on?
Tom: I thought it was quite a good track, actually.
Tim: This came an incredibly close second in the Austrian race, and we’ll discuss this for a few reasons, not least of which is that it gives me the chance to point out that the winning entry is by the group Trackshittaz.
Tom: Well, that’s going to be an interesting name for Graham Norton to handle. Anyway, on with the show!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RDuHTfFVCig
Tim: I’m not too sure of what Conchita’s all about – the internet seems evenly split between drag act, entire fictional personality or genuine transsexual.
German Wikipedia and the official website indicate the second one, but as far as the song goes, this is very definitely passing along a Born This Way style message that accompanies the third.
Tom: The papers won’t have to deal with another Dana International, then. If it wasn’t for the beard, they wouldn’t care or notice – but this is prob… whoa. Okay, half way through writing this, the first chorus kicked in, and my word that’s quite a voice.
Tim: Isn’t it just? Whatever the act’s about, it’s a bloody powerful song, the chorus especially.
Tom: I feel the verses let it down a bit too far – there’s more than just contrast with the choruses, there’s actually a bit of buzzkill there.
Tim: I’m hard-pressed not to agree with you there, but even so, once those lights are going off over the place, it’s hard to shake the feeling that THIS IS DRAMA. Just a slight shame the cameraman tripped up at the end, really.
Tom: I wonder if that was enough of a blip to affect the voting, if it really was That Close?
This track made me go straight out and buy his album.
Tim: Hearing this track made me go straight out to my local music program to buy his newish album, Reborn. We’ve already very much enjoyed Underground and Toxicated Love (title aside) from it, so tell me Tom – what do you think of this?
Tom: I like it. Other than his voice sounding just a bit like Verka Serduchka, which is a bit distracting.
Tim: Hmm, I suppose it does a bit, actually. Other than that, though: the fade-out ending loses him a point or two, but aside from that I don’t think I can fault this. Lyrically it’s lighter than his last two tracks – a close relationship takes the focus, rather than poisonous feelings or the weird getting run over outside a nightclub thing that was in Underground.
Tom: I’m not sure about the “exclusivity” metaphor he’s got going on in those lyrics – it’s laboured to the point of being ridiculous.
Tim: OH COME ON – are you seriously telling me you’ve never had a password-protected relationsh—okay you may have a point.
Tom: Maybe I have. Does a safe word cou—actually, never mind.
Tim: Let’s move on. There is an enthusiasm in the backing there right from the start of the first verse, and when that chorus drops and you get the high-pitched synth running up and down for the rest of the song you can not help but move at least one leg in time to the beat.
Tom: I realised, while reading that paragraph, that my leg was indeed moving in time to the beat.
Tim: Exactly.
Tom: But despite that, the “love, love, love” middle eight and final chorus just doesn’t quite work for me.
Tim: Really? I love that whole section, and I also especially love the off-beatness of parts of it – the ‘you give to’ that introduces the chorus I think is inspired. If they sorted out the ending, this is a song I would have loved to see on stage competing in Melodifestivalen, because I think it would be an easy finalist, and maybe even a winner – it’s certainly on a par with everything that’s in the final this year.
Bold statement coming up: I reckon this would probably make the top three of the tracks we’ve featured here – it’s on a par with Lovekiller and What Makes You Beautiful, which were both perfect examples of pop music.
Tom: Whoa, whoa. I’m not so sure about that. To be honest, now we’re past 500 reviews, I think I’d be hard pressed to make a top three at all, but – while this is a great track – I’m not sure it achieves perfection.
Tim: Well obviously there are lots of great tracks, and personal favourites – The Silence, Hollywood Hills, Destiny (yes, really), Heart Is King, Call Your Girlfriend – wow, you’re right, there are loads – but when it comes to picking out flawless pieces of pop music, those two are the ones that stand out, and now this one.
Tom: It’s a cracking pop song, better than most that we cover, but those are high standards to judge it against.
Tim: True, but this matches them, I think. And regardless of whether you’re on ‘perfection’ or just ‘great’, I strongly advise getting his album Reborn, which came out in January, has not a single duff track on it and, unlike a lot of music we cover, is available in all good UK download stores.
5th out of a quarter of Sweden’s songs. We get Engelbert Humperdinck.
Tim: Six days before the BBC announced that Engelbert Humperdinck* would be representing Britain, a country that cares about Eurovision, and puts effort into finding a good song, had one of four semi-finals and noticed that a full four songs in it were even better than this.
* Engelbert Humperdinck, for crying out loud, whose notable achievement of the past ten years, according to Wikipedia, was auctioning his Harley Davidson for Leicestershire Air Ambulance.
Tom: What? Are you trying for the Run-On Sentence of the Year Award or something?
Tim: Put another way, a song as good as this one came fifth out of a quarter of Sweden’s songs, and we’re lumped with Engelbert Humperdinck. Jesus Christ.
Tom: I’m still not sure I follow you.
Tim: Tough.
Tom: Ooh. Their staging team have taken a couple of cues from Beyonce with that video wall. Which is probably for the best, because that opening is a bit naff compared to the rest of the song.
Tim: Wow, that Beyoncé’s things cool. But this opening, compared to the rest, yes it is a bit naff. But the rest is brilliant, which means the opening is still great.
Tom: Aside from that, and the middle eight, though – a bit too lacklustre for me there – this is a cracking song. I did keep wanting to sing Take That’s “Happy Now” over the top of it though.
Tim: Engelbert Humperdinck. My work is opening up a store in Stockholm later this year. You have no idea how much I want to get a transfer there.
“Yep, I totally brought philosophy into a bubblegum pop music review. DEAL WITH IT.”
Tim: Dance Dance Revolution fans, fire up your consoles please.
Tom: Wait, I don’t see ‘Saturday Flashback’ up there. They’re still going? Wow.
Tim: Slight personnel change, but yep. Still going.
Tom: Like many Eurodance groups, they’re a Trigger’s Broom problem: if you’ve replaced all the component parts, is it still the same item?
Yep, I totally brought philosophy into a bubblegum pop music review. DEAL WITH IT.
Tim: I’ll deal with that, but Trigger’s Broom? Mate, we’re a pop music blog. I think you’ll find it’s called the Sugababes Conundrum.
Tim: Here, we have an example of slightly wishful thinking. Dream about somebody, try to find him on the internet (despite a total lack of evidence that he actually exists), unsurprisingly fail, and then he phones you up on a good strong 4G connection. Sounds reasonable, right?
Tom: Smile.DK songs had two good points when they featured in DDR games: first of all they were over-the-top cheesy, and secondly they were cut down to only 90 seconds long. This one seems to lack both of those. The plot of the song isn’t really important.
Tim: Well, the plot isn’t hugely important, no, but it does matter that you’re so happy it’s happened that you throw in one of the most ridiculous key-changes this side of Evergreen. Perfect day all round, really.
Tom: The strange thing is this: I don’t like the song. So why on earth did I start tapping my foot after that key change? Suddenly that bit of uplift made it all better. What’s wrong with me?
Tim: The M from EMD; his former bandmate Danny competes in Melodifestivalen’s fourth and final heat tonight but Mattias was, unfortunately for him, knocked out last week in fifth place.
Tim: So, we start out with a fairly gentle, not hugely inspiring ballady thing, and we all know what happens next – something drops in, another instrument or two, yes, here’s a drumbeat building up to the chorus and what the hell just happened?
Ooh, we’ve moved genres, and it’s actually very listenable.
Tom: I was expecting the kick-in about four bars earlier – in fact, this track kept defying my expectations. It kept zigging when it should be zagging. That’s not necessarily a bad thing, but it is bloody confusing.
Tim: Let’s just hope people forgive the boring intro.
Tom: And the boring middle eight.
Tim: You can probably guess what the title translates to, what with the excessive desperation he’s singing with, and bless him, what’s he done to upset the average Swedish voter? Oh, I don’t know – probably that fairly boring intro he felt it necessary to start with. All he really wants is for them to forgive him enough to vote for him.
Tom: Which they didn’t.
Tim: Indeed not. But you know, I actually don’t think it was the boring start that did it for him. My money’s instead on the backing dancers, because they really should know that’s not how you hold a lightsaber, and people clearly punished him for that. Sad, but that’s Eurovision for you.
Oh my word, it’s like the Eurovision of the 1990s has come back to haunt us.
Tom: The last chance before Jedward. What’ve we got?
Tim: The cheap route for the video here, going for the ‘let’s take some cameras into the recording studio and film it a few times’ method. And fill it out with some waffle at the end about how we want you to vote for us. Believe it or not.
Tom: Oh my word, it’s like the Eurovision of the 1990s has come back to haunt us.
Tim: If only.
The good thing about this video, and in particular the ‘cut the screen up to show what’s happening’ effect, is that is helps to point out that while this starts out fairly sensible, it gradually gets more and more excited throughout the song, until we get to about 2:30, when we’ve got nine things going on at once and it can only really be described as ‘batshit crazy’.
Tom: This is the first of the Irish songs where I’ve found my foot automatically tapping along. Which means it’s good – it’s also incredibly cheesy, though, and while it’d do well ten years ago (Love Shine A Light, anyone?) the rest of Europe is looking for modern pop music, not something that could have been written as a dodgy anthem for the Barcelona Olympics.
Tim: Oh, but I like the cheese.
Tom: I do, in general, but this is too much: this is a whole industrial-size buffet-style fondue set. It reminds me of the Brittas Empire for some reason. That’s not a good thing.
Tim: I think this is fantastic, I really do, because, well, there’s just so much happening. Even though the video makes it look like David has to consult his lyrics sheet on a couple of occasions, everything and everyone just seems so energised – they have PURPLE VIOLINS, for crying out loud. The two of them seem to be competing with regard to who can sing most enthusiastically, and part of me wouldn’t be surprised if it turned out they decided to throw that key change in on the day just for the hell of it.
This is amazing, brilliant, almost out of this world pop music, and I love it.
Tom: And it’ll do terribly if Ireland picks it. Which is a great shame.
In fact, I’m going to go off on one now, about everyone (especially the Great British Public every time our song is chosen) who say ‘oh, it’s not a Eurovision song.’ I wrote a thing on my long-defunct Canada blog a couple of years back after the 2010 contest. Full thing’s here, but two important sentences are:
‘[When it started in 1956] the idea was that each country would join in, play what they thought was good music, and hope that other countries would agree with them.
Basically, my point is that there’s no such thing as a Eurovision song and we should choose music we like, and I’d hoped that you would agree.
Tom: It depends whether you want to follow that original idea – play good music and hope people agree – or whether you want to win. I’m talking about these with the latter in mind.
Tim: No – you’ve completely missed my point, which is that it’s pointless choosing them based on ‘what’s going to win’, because there’s no way of predicting it. Like I said earlier, last year’s winner wasn’t far off this in cheese terms, and who the hell would have predicted a victory for Lordi?
But even if you’re right, and if it would do terribly, I don’t care about that – I want it performed on a massive stage, with insane production values (sadly the Late Late Show set isn’t really built for that), if only to see what they come up with.
This is proper lighters-in-the-air stuff and it’ll get votes.
Tim: This guy’s taking this thing seriously – it was up on iTunes within hours of being unveiled on the radio, and there’s an official video and everything.
Tom: And yet, he still doesn’t stand a chance against Jedward.
Tim: The obvious thing about this is the very military snare drum in the background, which wouldn’t be a bad thing, if there was something else to draw attention from it. There’s the piano, sure, and the guitars –
Tom: — wait, isn’t that —
Tim: Yes, before you interrupt me, I have just described a full backing orchestration, but if you’ll let me continue – it’s the drums that stand out. The piano’s only audible in the quiet bits, when the drums are there as well, and the heavy guitars, rather than taking this back towards friendly happy music, only make it seem more serious, more soldier-like, and overall less fun.
Tom: See, I’d use some different words there: “anthemic” and “emotional”. That second line of the chorus, with the rising chords, is just beautiful. I can see this doing very well – maybe not top of the table, but this is proper lighters-in-the-air stuff and it’ll get votes.
Tim: Oh, probably. It’s listenable, sure, and it’s a decent song – just, did you have to choose that backing?
Tom: I’m glad he did. Compress that much emotion into that space of time, and I think you’ve got a decent chance.
