Europop – Page 78

Saturday Flashback: Friends – Lyssna Till Ditt Hjärta

“Good grief, that sounds a lot like ABBA.”

Tim: In a couple of days time, we’ll know the performers who’ve made it to next year’s Melodifestivalen; shall we celebrate with another trip to the Best Of?

Tom: Good grief, that sounds a lot like ABBA.

Tim: It really does, yes. The year is 2001, and this stormed to victory, favourite of both jury and viewers, despite a slightly sloppy hand-against-the-waist clapping at the start. And it’s not a bad track, is it?

Tom: It’s not at all, but that’s because it sounds like an ABBA track, even down to the piano. That’s a compliment, by the way: it sounds like a decent ABBA track.

Tim: Immediate hefty introduction, big singalongable chorus (if you fancy an English version, have Listen To Your Heartbeat, the translation that placed 5th at Eurovision) and while a key change might have been welcome, it works well enough for me without one.

Tom: I’m still of the opinion that any song like this works better with a key change, but yes: it’s a good enough melody that it works without one.

Tim: I say jury and viewers, it was also Belgium’s favourite back in 1996, or at least the writers of Belgium’s Eurovision entry for that year certainly thought so, and if you listen to the chorus of that you may think they have a point.

Tom: It’s certainly close, but surely you’d have to be particularly thick to plagiarise a Eurovision song from Eurovision?

Tim: Yes, and given the prolificness of the songwriter involved I’m inclined to doubt it; whether it was or not we’ll actually never know, though, as when the Belgians threatened a court case in 2003, a financial agreement was swiftly agreed.

Tom: I wonder if ABBA thought about doing the same thing.

Kati Wolf – Nyár van!

“Happy and joyous”

Tim: Kati Wolf’s performing in London tonight which’ll be BRILLIANT, so here’s her current track, titled entirely atemporally for us as “It’s Summer!”

Tom: Well, hopefully it’ll do well in Australia.

Tom: That’s a baffling lyric video. You’ve taken a camera and pointed it at her, she’s just not singing. It’s like some kind of bizarre stock footage adventure.

Tim: She’s Hungarian, you may or may not recall, and this is a wonderfully happy track, isn’t it?

Tom: Much more positive than I expected, certainly.

Tim: Lyrically it doesn’t go much beyond the title in terms of themes, though there’s also a “you and me” element with the repeated “te meg én” about how we’ve just been together for a few hours but it feels GREAT. Because this is great, and happy and joyous.

Tom: And, finally, someone who’s followed the old maxim: “don’t bore us, get to the chorus”.

Tim: Starting out with the chorus is always risky because there’s a chance the listener will get bored partway through and wonder if the music will pick up any more at some point; here the answer is absolutely not – even after the middle eight, the final chorus is identical to the opening one.

Tom: Which is a great shame, because it’d be perfect for a key change.

Tim: It would, yes, but I don’t really feel it needs one, because it has a message to get across, about the seasons and how everything’s brilliant, and it does that very well. Very pleasant.

Krisia, Hasan and Ibrahim – Planet of the Children

“Like someone set out to make a song to deliberately annoy me.”

Tom: Well, that’s a horrific title.

Tim: The Junior Eurovision Song Contest doesn’t get broadcast at all in Britain, and if you listen to the random vowel howling of the Italian victor you’ll understand why. If we ignore votes, though, and look at YouTube views, Bulgaria would be the champions, and one of my regrets about the way we write these reviews is that I won’t get to see your face when you watch this.

Tom: I’m already biased against it.

Tim: Now, let’s (try to) put aside any innate irritation we may have about the age of the singer and clear precociousness of the two pianists and focus on the song, because it’s a brilliant power ballad.

Tom: Give me a moment: urgggggh. Nope, not quite enough.

Tim: The vocals are on point (if somewhat nasal), she can handle the big notes impressively well, and the backing behind the chorus is fantastic, and the instrumental middle eight gives us time to reflect on what she’s been warbling about.

Tom: What has she been warbling about, by the way?

Tim: Well, I’m afraid that’s the bad news. I’m guessing your Bulgarian’s not up to much, and that’s probably for the best because you won’t like the lyrics: she starts out by going on about how “I want one day to be a fairy or a superhero” and that she dreams of “a planet of children without hunger and fear, and war…a planet of children, hope, peace, light…the most beautiful dream”.

Tom: Oh for crying out loud. It’s like someone set out to make a song to deliberately annoy me.

Tim: Fortunately, it’s all in Bulgarian so we don’t have to hear any of that.

Die Fantastischen Vier – Und Los

“It’s all a bit baffling, if I’m honest”

Tom: Highlights from the Wikipedia page for the “Fantastic Four”: they were some of the first German rappers, they’ve been going for nearly thirty years, and they’re also the German voices of the penguins from the Madagascar film series.

And I am absolutely unable to tell whether this is tongue-in-cheek German humour, or just… German.

Tim: Going by the ‘charity appeal’ at the beginning for their positivity institute, I’m leaning towards the humour line.

Tom: “Und Los” is literally “And Go”, and the lyrics translate to a general “don’t give up, you’ll be okay” message.

Tim: Well that at least is nice.

Tom: It’s all a bit baffling, if I’m honest, but it’s well-produced baffling, and it’s a rare record that manages to pull off a church organ in its middle eight and not sound more ridiculous than it already is.

Tim: Hmm. I’m not entirely sure I read that sentence in the complimentary manner you intended it (bear in mind that it’s a rare dictator that manages to make all his soldiers wear skulls and not come across as more awful than he already does), but you’re right in that it doesn’t stick out as much as it might in most songs.

Tom: I can’t think of an equivalent English-language act this could be performed by, which is odd, because it seems like we really should have some sort of middle-aged possibly-ironic hip-hop act. Am I missing someone obvious?

Tim: Well, he’s not exclusively hip-hop, but yes. Shame on you.

Tom: Oh, of course. You’re right. You know, I’ve never actually seen the video for– WHAT. THAT’S ACTUALLY GLEN CAMPBELL IN THE VIDEO. HOW DID THEY GET GLEN CAMPBELL INTO THE VIDEO. HOW IS THAT A THING THAT HAPPENED. THEY MUST HAVE FILMED HIM SEPARATELY.

Tim: Umm…

Tom: I’M NOT DONE YET. SERIOUSLY. THIS IS THE MOST ASTONISHING MUSICAL THING I’VE SEEN. HOW DID THEY GET GLEN CAMPBELL? HOW?

Helena Paparizou – One Life

“That’s a bloody excellent chorus, isn’t it?”

Tim: Title track from her really rather excellent (and not just because it contains the 19 out of 5 stars Survivor) most recent album. Listen, do.

Tom: That’s a bloody excellent chorus, isn’t it?

Tim: It really is, and I’ve actually just one criticism: there’s no key change. And my word, that big note shifting up out of the middle eight is properly laying the groundwork for one. And then nothing. I mean, that’s just cruel, really.

Tom: Yep: I was fully expecting that. No idea how they missed that one.

Tim: But other than that, this is wonderful. It’s obviously not a Survivor, but it’s very close. It’s glorious. Hearing the music, I want to get up and celebrate life and all its glories, because it’s one of the most triumphant songs I’ve heard in a long time. It’s brilliant.

Tom: Really? I mean, it sounds like it, sure, but… those lyrics.

Tim: Yes, and let’s talk about the lyrics – I normally stay away from fan lyric videos because of the inevitable typos and mistakes and weird “yes I know I’m breaking the law but I’m admitting it so that must make it alright” descriptions, but here the lyrics are worth paying attention to. From the very first line about crying it’s very clear this is meant to be a depressing song, and by the time we move on to sitting alone and hurting deep inside we could be be feeling downright suicidal. So how on earth does that chime with the music?

Tom: I’m really hoping that’s a rhetorical question and you’re setting up to explain it.

Tim: Well, as it happens: there’s also a Greek version, which makes things a bit clearer – it’s called Μεσημέρια, translating to Noon, and the chorus there has lyrics about seeing the moon coming through the blinds, and how someone will be there for her, and actually everything will be alright. So actually, the music makes perfect sense – just something got very, very lost in translation.

Tom: How does the music in that version sound ‘more Greek’ to me? Is it the stronger harmonies? The seemingly-gated drums? I assume it’s just because I now know it’s Greek and my brain’s filling in gaps, but I swear it sounds more Greek.

Tim: I don’t know, sounds similar to me. But I’m not that bothered about the lyrics – this is a fantastic song, and I love it.

A*Base – Never Gonna Say I’m Sorry

“I want to hear more from them, but not really because of this.”

Tim: Remember A*Teens? ABBA tribute band, made up of teenagers, who had a vague amount of success at the end of the nineties.

Tom: “Vague amount of success” is right, but, yes, I remember them, and I suspect a lot of other folks do.

Tim: Well, it seems it’s not just ABBA that get the A* teenage tribute treatment, because now there’s an Ace of Base on as well, and they kick off, oddly, with one of the more obscure tracks.

Tim: It’s a tricky choice for a tribute act trying to have success: do you go for like for like covers, in the knowledge that if you alter it even slightly there’ll be melodramatic fans screaming OH GOD YOU’VE RUINED MY MEMORIES!!! or do you, to quote Louis Walsh and every single other reality TV judge, ‘really make it your own’, and try to develop a sound of your own?

Tom: I’m always in favour of changing things up: there’s not much point in a like-for-like cover of a modern pop song, particularly when you don’t have a vocalist with a recognisable voice.

Tim: A*Base, it seems, have gone for a mix of the two, though strangely in a ‘worst of both worlds’ sense: changing the song (bit faster, slightly heavier beats, bringing the synths twenty years forward), but still keeping a very Ace of Base sound to it (though admittedly that middle eight exit and first half of the following chorus could safely be called their own).

Tom: Yep, I’ll admit it does sound like Ace of Base brought up to date. And I can get behind that as an idea.

Tim: It’s also peculiar to have started with this – A*Teens kicked off with Mamma Mia, probably the worst possible Pointless answer if ABBA songs ever came up, and which went top 20 in every country it was released in. The original of this, though, didn’t even crack the top 20 in Sweden, and even worse it’s a fairly repetitive and not all that interesting track.

Tom: Right! I’m a little embarrassed to say that I’ve never heard the original of this: it’s not even on their Greatest Hits album. Maybe it was cheaper to license?

Tim: Tactics aside, though, it works: given the source material it’s a good interpretation, what changes they have made have brought it fairly up to date, and it stands up to repeated listening, though possibly not to double digit levels. As an introductory track, then, summary: I want to hear more from them, but not really because of this. I want Life is a Flower, or All That She Wants, or even a Happy Nation, if only to see what they’d do with that.

Tom: I reckon an updated Always Have, Always Will would be interesting: given the backing for that was sampled from Motown songs, there’s a lot of interesting potential ways to bring it up to date, beyond installing a few different synth packs on the producer’s laptop.

Tim: Yes, so let’s hope the project keeps going.

Saturday Flashback: Charlotte Qvale – The Beginning of the End

“I couldn’t bring myself to look away from the video”

Tom: I think I first heard this while boarding a plane back from Norway at the start of this year.

Tim: I found myself quite thirsty just after the video started, but I couldn’t bring myself to look away from the video – it’s lovely, it really is.

Tom: Well, that’s a strange compliment. I can’t work out whether that odd, staccato instrumentation is an actual electric guitar, or a synth. Either way, it’s a brilliant riff, and it’s stuck with me, for some reason.

Tim: The vocals are lovely, the production is suitably deep and layered, and it all combines to make a track that, for me at least, manages to be pleasant and entertaining without getting stuck in my head on repeat.

Tom: Yeah, it is very nice. It reminds me of Still Alive, the theme from the game Mirror’s Edge – not musically, or lyrically, or stylistically, or really in any way to do with the song, but I think it’s because the best way to describe that, too, is ‘lovely’. And this is as well.

Vilma Alina – Hullut Asuu Kallios

“A big triumphant pile of everything”

Tim: BRASS!

Tom: Bloody hell! Where? Get down!

Tim: Well, sometimes anyway, from a Finn who’s been busy on YouTube for a while now and has just been picked up by Universal; here’s her first release.

Tim: What a great track that is, with basically everything up to the musical kitchen sink thrown in there.

Tom: You’re not wrong there.

Tim: The aforementioned brass was the first thing to stick out when the chorus came in, then there were the somewhat shouty and encouraging backing vocals.

Tom: It was the sudden drum and bass-esque percussion that startled me.

Tim: The middle eight throws in a piano, brings back the electro synths from before and at the end it’s a great big triumphant pile of everything, somewhat all over the place but utterly wonderful to listen to.

Tom: Yep, that middle eight is astonishing — it sounds like a completely different song entirely, and it pulls it off brilliantly. This is really, really, rare: something that crosses genres well.

Tim: As for the lyrics, Google reckons the title translates to “Fools living in kallios” so either Kallios is a place or Google doesn’t know it.

Tom: Now, “Kallio” is bit of Helsinki, and Finnish has some very interesting word endings — but it’s defeated my knowledge.

Tim: Well, whatever it is, one repeated line is “I don’t want to love any more”, and that would be depressing if I didn’t interpret that as “…because I’m too busy making this awesome music” so I’ll do that. As I said previously: a big triumphant pile of everything, and I love it.

Conchita Wurst – Heroes

“It comes off as a second-rate version of her Eurovision hit.”

Tim: Despite being thoroughly disapproved of by Russia and my grandfather alike, Conchita’s not going anywhere from her victory six months ago, and has come up with this to prove it.

Tim: A song about how we can all be heroes, just by doing little things to make other people feel better, according to Conchita, though the lyrics imply a more romantic idea; either way, it’s a nice track, with a big chorus.

Tom: Big?

Tim: Well, fairly big – it seems to come in with a massive drop, but that’s in comparison to what’s come before, which is basically nothing.

Tom: I just don’t hear it: there’s no massive drop here, and to me it comes off as a second-rate version of her Eurovision hit. Rise Like a Phoenix was a fairly dull song made much better by the performer, the staging, the context, and the MASSIVE instrumentation: here we’re lacking all of that.

Tim: Hmm. I don’t mind that this time, though – the fact is there’s nothing much there to take attention away from the vocal that’s clamouring for, and deserving of, your considerable attention.

Tom: That’s true: I can’t fault that vocal.

Tim: Because we can be heroes. We can do things for other people. We can improve lives. We can, dammit, BE GREAT PEOPLE. And listening to this track makes me think I should. I probably won’t, because I have to go to work in a few minutes and I’ll probably be grumpy within ten minutes of arriving, but right now is what counts, and right now WE CAN BE HEROES.

Tom: I think David Bowie got there first.

Medina – Når Intet Er Godt Nok

“It’s been a while since we’ve had a song that’s so closely trod the line between BALLAD and BANGER.”

Tim: Or, if you’d prefer a translation from the Danish, ‘When Nothing Is Good Enough’. Because, you see, when nothing is good enough, you just have to write a song about it.

Tom: Yes, and I think a band called Fairground Attraction did, in 1988. You’ll recognise the chorus.

Tim: It’s been a while since we’ve had a song that’s so closely trod the line between BALLAD and BANGER, but here we’ve got a considerable helping of dark emotion in the vocal line and drums, and heavy instruments behind it making me want to get up and jump around a bit. Which is nice, as I like a bit of depth in my songs.

Tom: Half way between ballad and banger is a good description, really, but I feel like it falls into a bit of an awkward middle ground. It’s not quite danceable enough, and not quite ballad-y enough: it’s designed for radio play, not club play, and… that’s okay, I gu — WHOA OKAY I JUST REACHED THE KEY CHANGE. I did not expect that.

Tim: What’s also nice is the length: I believe I’ve mentioned before how three and a half minutes is a very good length for a song, and here it actually seems quite a bit shorter – when the key change comes along I find myself thinking “oh, is it almost over already?” And that works very well as far as the song goes, in fact, because it has me already reaching for the restart button way before the end, just in preparation.

Tom: It didn’t do that for me: to my mind, it’s one of those background songs that doesn’t get remembered. It’s competent, I can’t fault it technically, but it’s just not memorable.

Tim: Oh, probably not, no, but it’s still a lovely track, well executed.