Europop – Page 40

Saturday Flashback: DJ Ötzi & Nik P. – Ein Stern (der deinen Namen trägt)

“This is INCREDIBLE.”

Tim: Courtesy of Apple Music’s German Pop division, I discovered a DJ Ötzi Essentials playlist, and I was DELIGHTED. Here, as his most successful one in his native Austria, is “A Star (That Bears Your Name)”.

Tom: Hahahahaha that’s amazing from start to finish. Never mind the music, there’s the video: the dodgy CGI, the individual dancers, the acknowledgement that they’ve not got quite enough to make a full video there so they cut to the behind-the-scenes and stock photos.

Tim: Isn’t it just beautiful? Anyway, this here stayed at number one in Germany for 13 weeks, and for 14 weeks in Austria, in early 2007, and I don’t really know what to make of that fact. I mean, it’s good – love the melody, love the electric guitar/dance beat combo, obviously love the key change – but THREE MONTHS?

Tom: Mate, Saturday Night lasted 15 we– sorry, I just got to the key change and BLOODY HELL. This is INCREDIBLE.

Tim: Apparently many pop music radio stations refused to play it, with it not quite fitting into the musical zeitgeist of the time – that could, arguably, have helped it, with fans buying it either in protest or just so they could play it. But even so – three months?

Alida – Cool With It

“I like it a lot, because it’s good at what it’s doing.”

Tim: Alida’s been around for a while, though we’ve never featured her before. Here’s a track which, I’ll warn you in advance so you don’t have any hopes dashed, does not come with a massive drop into the chorus.

Tom: I’m disappointed already.

Tim: Well, to make up for it, have a lyric video with an entirely unapologetic lack of syllabic consistency.

Tim: Here, you see, I have no issues with the instrumental chorus being quieter like it is. The focus is on the vocals, particularly in the latter part of the verses, and underneath them is a constant fairly pleasant rhythmic beat.

Tom: I agree with you, and I see what Alida’s aiming for, but I can’t help just really wanting a remix. There are a lot of good parts in here, it just doesn’t quite gel for me.

Tim: Entirely understandable, as I’ll appreciate that this is entirely subjective – if that style’s not your thing, you’ll have no time for that chorus whatsoever. On the other hand, I like it a lot, because it’s good at what it’s doing. Well, right now, anyway. If I come back across it a week from now I might not have any time for it whatsoever, because I can easily see myself at some point getting bored and switching it off. But right now I’m good with it, so HOORAY.

Tove Lo – Disco Tits

“WE GET IT, IT’S ABOUT SEX.”

Tom: Strong title.

Tim: For a strong video, though I won’t lie – it is fairly disturbing, and not just because of the rude words. Please, whatever you do, don’t use it as a driving instruction video.

Tim: Quite the video, isn’t it? Strikes me as more of an art project than anything else that a normal professional video producer might up with, but there you go.

Tom: It’s possible to pull off a weird art-video, sure, but this just seems dull. It’s a single joke stretched out to minutes long. Which… actually, that kind of sums up the song, too.

Tim: Right, that’s the thing: it does distract quite nicely from the fact that the song itself isn’t really up to much, what with it being mostly comprised of a fairly short and not particularly inspiring hook repeated a lot.

Tom: Yeah, beyond the attempt at shock value, there really isn’t anything here. WE GET IT, IT’S ABOUT SEX.

Tim: Having said that, though: it is strangely enjoyable regardless. Though that might be because of the video, which, however disturbing, I do quite like. Good old puppets getting some action at last.

Tom: Speak for yourself. I’m not watching that again.

Saturday Flashback: Marco Borsato – Dromen Zijn Bedrog

“Brilliant, in that 90s sort of way”

Tom: One more from my recent Dutch trip, still off the station that translates to “100% Netherlands Party”, and this time going all the way back to 1994. Frankly, I could send you anything off their playlist, but this one stands out: one of the most popular Dutch-language singles of all time.

Tim: And yet by a singer next to no-one outside the Netherlands will have vaguely heard of. A cruel industry, this.

Tom: I think you’ll be on board from about the time the 90s-synth piano arrives in the intro.

Tom: Listen to that guitar. It’s like they wanted Santana, but couldn’t look outside the Netherlands.

Tim: Well, I think that’s a perfectly acceptable alternative – certainly gets the job done, because that’s really quite the noodling going on there.

Tom: I don’t know how this track simultaneously manages to sound brilliant, in that 90s sort of way, AND yet manage to outstay its welcome a bit at only four minutes long.

Tim: Yeah – I had the exact same reaction. It’s good, and I like it, but I’d have no problems whatsoever chopping out the first middle eight/chorus pairing.

Tom: I am genuinely wondering if there are club nights in the Netherlands that still play this rubbish, because I would totally go to one.

Tim: Oh, Tom.

MY – Skeletons

“We might not be getting an album with a baby on the front anytime soon…”

Tim: We last featured MY a year ago, and you remarked that you couldn’t hear the Nirvana influences that she claimed to have; try this.

Tom: Are we talking about the same Nirvana? Like, the band fronted by a man who shot himself, known for such tracks as “Lithium”?

Tim: Okay, fine, so we might not be getting an album with a baby on the front anytime soon, but this does at least go far enough that, to my ears at least, she’ll avoid the “raucous female = Avril Lavigne clone” line, which no-one ever really comes off well from.

Tom: I mean, sure, but that’s more because she sounds like a regular European pop singer. It’s more Icona Pop than Nirvana.

Tim: Possibly, what with the light dosing of synth lines throughout, and different sounding vocals in the quiet verses, and so basically it’s all different and fine.

Tom: I had to go back and listen again without the preconceptions about grunge, because you completely knocked me for six on that one. It’s… well, it’s an okay pop song I guess?

Tim: Works for me – I rather think it does, really quite well indeed. Nice one.

Saturday Flashback: Frans Duijts – Altijd te laat naar bed

“My happy-work music now“

Tom: I was driving through the Netherlands last week, Tim, and stumbled upon a couple of radio stations that play only Dutch-language music. Sometimes oldies and covers; sometimes just party music.

Tim: Makes sense.

Tom: What I learned is this: there are still parts of Europe where actual FM radio stations will play actual schlager music. Or DJ Otzi. These stations are going to be my happy-work music now.

And of the several songs that I asked my phone to remember (seriously, this got actual airplay in 2017), this one stands out.

Tim: I…I can see why that would have stood out. I mean, the Wesley Klein one is good, but this, oh, this is something else.

Tom: There’s so much going on there. The underprepared hotel corridor fever-dream. The marching band and cheerleaders. His own gold disc. Then there’s the lyrics (which are far more philosophical than you might think).

Tim: Well any song that kicks off talking about evil cats gets a thumbs up from me.

Tom: All it’s missing is a key change (yes, I was surprised there wasn’t one, too.). Once again: this got airplay. On an actual radio station. In 2017.

Tim: Despite a lot of things, it’s good to know that there are parts of the world that are still beautiful.

Tom: The context made this seem much better than it actually is, of course: I had the radio turned up loud, with the windows down, driving my car along a levee in the Netherlands. Even this ridiculous cover, which in hindsight is mostly a disaster, made me grin. I would never have asked for a Dutch rap bit, but in the moment it was perfect.

Widow – Impression

“When it goes OFF, I go ALL IN.”

Tim: Widow’s new, though has had quite the career up until now as a backing singer, and I reckon you’ll like this song, then at one particular point either switch it right off or love it.

Tom: Option one. Blimey that’s a dull chorus.

Tim: I’m in the second group right now – when it goes OFF, I go ALL IN.

Tom: …why? I mean, I see the potential, but there’s really not much going on there.

Tim: I’m not sure it totally matches up with the tone of the lyrics – they go for a sense of grim relief rather than the celebration that post-chorus signals – but it doesn’t put me off in a way that I can imagine it doing some people. And, possibly, me if I was in a slightly different mood. Oh, well, here and now I’ll take it.

Maja Amcoff – Dopamin

“Seven writers credited on this track, and that’s the best they could come up with?”

Tim: Her follow-up to June’s debut, Alltid Som Du Vill, which we reckoned had a decent pre-chorus but a not particularly pleasant instrumental dance chorus. Is that remedied here, though?

Tim: Pleasingly: yes.

Tom: Disagreement: no. Why do you like this?

Tim: Considerably more reliant on your regular physical instruments, and when it does verge into dance beat territory, it’s pretty good – certainly vastly more listenable.

Tom: I just don’t like that instrumental. It doesn’t seem to fit with anything else I can hear – and to be honest, the rest of it doesn’t feel particularly inspiring either.

Tim: It might not fit in brilliantly, or be hugely inspiring – you’re right, there’s a slight disjoint, and there’s not much of a melody – but at least it doesn’t make me want to switch the track off.

Tom: There are seven writers credited on this track, and that’s the best they could come up with?

Tim: I suppose that’s a fair point, but I’ll still happily listen to it a good few times, as there’s nothing else to really complain about. I’ll call it a reassuring follow-up.

Paul Rey – What Good Is Love

“Should there be rules about massive choirs?”

Tim: Well, Tom? What good is love? I ask because Paul Rey off Sweden seems quite keen to find out.

Tom: That is the best chorus I’ve heard in a while. A long while. Normally I would be complaining that there’s nothing else in the song – because there isn’t – but that chorus is so good I don’t care. I couldn’t just remember it afterwards: I was singing along before the song ended.

Tim: It is indeed wonderful, but I have a question: are there rules about when you can use massive choirs? Because part of me thinks there should be, that you ought to somehow earn them and build to them rather than just plonking them in midway through the song with a “let’s liven this up” attitude. Now don’t get me wrong, I like it here, but I’m not sure it should be there right from the first chorus.

Tom: It totally should, because otherwise — huh, yeah, I see where you’re going with this.

Tim: Right? It works, yes, but then it’s got nowhere really to go, or build to. I can’t help wondering if I might prefer it if, say, that first chorus was just him, the second chorus introduced the backing males on his “what good is love when it’s over”, and then the choir crusaded in triumphantly out of the middle eight.

Having said that, of course, if that was the cut we’d got, I might be arguing for the exact opposite right now, and that it should be there from the start. I’d like to try it, though.

Tom: Some songs are growers. The catch with just listening to tracks one or two times before talking about them here is that we don’t know if that’s the case – but in this case it’s the opposite problem.

Tim: Like, a shrinker?

Tom: This is an absolutely brilliant track on first listen, but will I get bored of it, and start to hate that incredibly catchy chorus? Ask me again in a week; in the meantime, this is on my playlist.

Saturday Flashback: Cascada – How Do You Do

“It makes me smile every single time.”

Tim: And now, for no reason whatsoever other than “well duh, why not?”, let’s have some beautifully textbook mid-’00s Eurodance.

Tim: Not a lot to say about it, really – it’s a cover of Roxette’s (rather more successful) original song, and it makes me smile every single time it pops up on my phone.

Tom: There’s a lot to be said for a good cover like this: yes, Cascada could basically be any session singer, and yes, it’s a by-the-numbers remix — but in a style that I grew up with. Now I’m older, I’m aware that “repeating the chorus with one particular Eurodance synth patch” is not an objectively great bit of music: but that doesn’t stop me liking it. And let’s be honest, the talking bit does not fit in this song. But…

Tim: …it has a ludicrous dance beat, lyrics that are great to sing along with, and all in all I just love it. Unapologetically.