Mainstream – Page 24

Autograf feat. Lils – You Might Be

“It starts medium, goes through a medium first verse, then hits a medium chorus.”

Tim: For some reason this video has an intro twenty seconds longer than the one in the actual song; basically, don’t let that put you off.

Tom: Well, that is certainly a video. And… hmm. Well, it’s certainly a four-minute music track. I’m not sure what else I can say about it.

Tim: Funny, this one, just in terms of volume and energy. It starts medium, goes through a medium first verse, then hits a medium chorus. Second verse, chorus, middle eight, final chorus – the level’s the same all the way through, pretty much, with no progression anywhere. And yet, while I’d normally hold that against the song for boring me, I have a lot of time for this.

Tom: You know what sells it for me? The pre-chorus, the quiet bit. The rest, I could take and leave, but the vocals there are beautiful, the melody’s interesting, and the sudden silence out of, as you say, all the medium bits… well, that actually got my attention.

Tim: It doesn’t go anywhere novel, or do anything particularly interesting, but it’s got a good melody, good vocals, good production, and often that’s all you need.

Bronnie – High School Sucks

“Hold on. Something’s odd here.”

Tim: A few weeks back, you wrote of female rock soloists that “they’ll always get compared to either Avril Lavigne or Paramore, and it’s difficult for the sound to stand on its own”. Have a listen, and then take a guess where Bronnie, who has recently re-released this track, is from.

Tom: I disliked this based purely on the title, because it sounds like the sort of pandering-too-hard song that gets put into… I don’t know, maybe a knock-off not-Disney-channel teen movie? I’m going to guess she’s Swedish, and this is basically a localised attempt to do High School Musical.

Tim: Wrong – she’s from the Wirral, in north-west England, and I was amazed when I discovered that via her Twitter.

Tom: I also despise the Wirral. And… has she put a fake “Vevo” label on her own thumbnail? Hold on. Something’s odd here. I think she’s unsigned.

Tim: I believe so, yes, and the Wirral’s not that bad, is it? Neither’s this track, though, which is probably what we should be focussing on.

Tom: In which case, I feel a bit guilty being so bolshy about this, because for someone who’s doing pretty much all their own production, this sounds good. The vocals are a bit buried in the mix, and the video’s slightly amateur in how it’s filmed, but they’ve covered it well.

Tim: Couldn’t agree with you more about the vocals, and it seems neither could she – the re-released version is also a re-mastered version, which fixes that.

Tom: Without a huge budget behind it all, I’d expect a lot worse.

Tim: The main thing is what it sounds like, though, because I don’t know the reasoning behind a British person talking about semesters, sounding very, very American, but I can’t imagine it’s accidental. And it’s a shame, as it’s hard enough to stand out in a genre like this, but directly emulating the biggest artist? That surprises me.

Tom: On the other hand, we are talking about it.

Tim: Because it’s a great track – it wouldn’t shock me too much if Avril Lavigne had released this – but I’d love to hear it sounding more natural. Who knows what we could have had? Possibly a whole brand new sound.

Liam Payne feat. Quavo – Strip That Down

“Have they saved the best until last?”

Tom: Is that all of them? I’ve lost track.

Tim: It is, and so the natural question is: have they saved the best until last?

Tim: Hahahahah yeah no.

Tom: Ah, Tesco Value Zayn: months later and not as good.

Tim: “I used to be used to be in 1D/now I’m out free” sums it up, really, in every way.

Tom: For a few seconds, when he’s in the gold jacket in the ludicrous bedroom doing a Meaningful Look at the camera, I was convinced that this was actually a parody.

Tim: Hmm, this could actually work well as a Lonely Island style track. But no. Oh, no.

Tom: The “yeah yeah yeah” sounds like a knock-off Ed Sheeran. The autotuned rap middle eight is unnecessary.

Tim: You say unnecessary, I say just plain offensive. And why has he named himself after a packet of crisps?

Tom: The world that comes to mind for this whole track is…

Tim: Irritating? Pointless?

Tom: Unconvincing.

Luis Fonsi feat. Daddy Yankee – Despacito

“A tad spoiled by Daddy Yankee doing the school register”

Tim: It’s been out a few weeks already, and is already phenomenally successful, but I made a discovery the other day that surprised me. Let’s listen to it first, though – here’s the Bieber-less original.

Tom: Blimey, they filmed in La Perla and made it look beautiful. I mean, it is beautiful, but let’s hope tourists don’t get confused.

Tim: A decent song, nice summer dance track that’ll take over the world, albeit a tad spoiled by Daddy Yankee doing the school register at the beginning and shouting all over the place in the middle.

Tom: You may enjoy this school register. Anyway, yes, the music.

Tim: Haha, I do like that as it happens. But yes, it’ll do – got me excited and dancing around in a bar late last Saturday night anyway, which is a good sign. But, as alluded to earlier, there are multiple versions of this. The standard we have here, the one with Justin Bieber singing some of the lyrics in English.

Tom: Which, let’s be honest, is the only reason the UK’s heard of this at all. Which is a shame, because this is a pretty good latin-pop track, albeit indistinguishable from many others for us dullards who don’t speak Spanish. What else was there?

Tim: An urban version, a god awful dance reworking by Major Lazer, and, most interesting for me, a ‘Versión Pop‘, which is the same as this but with Daddy Yankee removed. Perfect, I thought, I’ll have that. Except: it’s a bit dull. It drags, it’s uninteresting. Somehow, despite making a part of it vaguely unlistenable, Daddy Yankee (can’t believe I’ve typed that name four times now) actually saves it. Who’d have thought it?

Tom: Whoever called in Justin Bieber, apparently.

Kygo & Ellie Goulding – First Time

“Hi, Ellie, I’ve always wanted to work with you…”

Tom: Kygo continues his tour of female pop vocalists – and this time, one with a distinctive voice.

Tom: Somehow, Ellie Goulding singing “ten dollars was a fat stack” in her English accent sounds very wrong. I mean, none of those lyrics are great, but I feel like they gave the wrong track to the wrong singer there.

Tim: Yeah, that stuck out for me as well – almost as if someone else was lined up, they dropped out, and then Kygo went “Hi, Ellie, I’ve always wanted to work with you…”

Tom: I guess this is Kygo doing a more chilled-out sound — there are still his trademarks, like that jingle-bell-like sound that marks the start of the second verse, and a middle eight using resampled vocals from elsewhere in the song. But other than those, this sounds… well, a bit generic, really. I guess chillout dance just isn’t for me.

Tim: The first time I heard this last week I didn’t think much of it; hearing it now, though, I like it quite a bit more. It’s not a classic, and it sure as hell isn’t an It Ain’t Me (that song just keeps growing on me, even now), but it’s a good track. I’ll take it.

Miley Cyrus – Malibu

“It’s no Wrecking Ball. Hell, it’s not even The Climb.”

Tim: We’ve all done it – been through parts of our lives that we now regret, become different people, want to move on.

Tom: And don’t I know it.

Tim: Sadly for Miley, she reckons she’ll never be able to move on from Wrecking Ball, which she apparently now hates because of the video – “I will always be the naked girl on the wrecking ball”. Shame, but there we go. Here’s her new one.

Tim: Now, I get why she might not like the video for Wrecking Ball, but no-one can deny it’s a stunner of a song.

Tom: Yep. The video may have driven its popularity, but it’s still a belter. And, heck, it’s not as if this new video isn’t at least “a bit racy”.

Tim: This, on the other hand, is…nice, and there’s not a lot else to be said for it. It’s good, it’s cheery, it’s lovey dovey, but it’s no Wrecking Ball. Hell, it’s not even The Climb. From a new artist I’d probably say “yeah, I’ll take more of this, let’s wait for her second”; with Miley, there’s more a sense of disappointment, and that makes me sad.

Tom: Agreed. I actually skipped forward to see if it actually went anywhere — and it sort of does, but it’s very much an Album Track, isn’t it? That “dream come true / Malibu” rhyme is disastrous.

Tim: Apparently this is where we are now. BOOO.

Cheat Codes feat. Demi Lovato – No Promises

Tom: The big questions here: who are Cheat Codes, and how on earth did they get Demi Lovato? I don’t actually care, I’m just asking a rhetorical question to provide an introduction to this post.

Tim: Never let it be said we’re not brutally honest.

Tom: WHAT’S MY NAME?

Tim: Yeah, that is quite prevalent, certainly. Any other views?

Tom: …sorry, that’s all I can hear, really.

Tim: Fair enough. Not a bad song, though.

Saturday Flashback: Katrina & The Waves – Love Shine A Light

“And that’s how you do Eurovision.”

Tim: Tonight, the big night, the second biggest night of the year in European music television, and largely very disappointing indeed. Therefore, let’s not finish off with a similarly disappointing reject, but instead celebrate and think of what Eurovision should be, with one of the greatest winners. Ever.

Tim: And that’s how you do Eurovision.

Tom: With a live orchestra, a song that was designed as an anthem for the Samaritans, and one missing shoulder pad.

Tim: And a small ‘woo’ as the main guitar kicks in.

Tom: We’ll be that good again, someday, Tim. Someday.

Tim: Someday.

Niall Horan – Slow Hands

“That’s an improvement.”

Tim: On Friday we wrote about Katy Perry going from a great track to a terrible track. Niall’s debut track, as we’ve already detailed, was utterly atrocious, which leads me, pleasingly, to be able to say that there’s only (wait for it) ONE DIRECTION (hahahahahahah you see it’s funny because he used to– yep– oh, you’ve got– okay, fine) he can go from there.

Tom: Well, like you guessed, that’s an improvement. I don’t think it’s all that good — it’s one of those songs where the middle eight is the best bit, which isn’t a great sign — but at least it’s not a dirge.

Tim: Indeed, and so the question on everybody’s lips is WHY THE HELL wasn’t that the lead single? This Town, deservedly, barely scraped the Top 10; it was beaten comprehensively by James Arthur, for God’s sake. This, on the other hand, is an enjoyable track, with life to it, a funky personality, and a happiness to hear it again.

Tom: I don’t think the phrase “funky personality” has been used outside early-90s episodes of Blind Date, but you’ve got a point there.

Tim: Apparently he wrote about 70 tracks for his new album, so hopefully he took the lesson from last time and will be binning off all the dreadful melty ballads in favour of lively music like this. Come on Niall, do the right thing.

Lea Michele – Run To You

“She has a style, and it works.”

Tim: Lea (off Glee, and Cannonball) has a style, and it works. It is demonstrated by this, and also by all but two of the tracks on her new album.

Tom: Yep, that’s a rejected Adele single right there.

Tim: She has a strong voice, and she knows that. She doesn’t want any big instrumentation to take attention away from it, so beyond a piano line, occasional drumbeats and the odd string section, it’s all her, right up until the closing chorus when we’re all in for the big finish. And my word, does that work.

Tom: It does, and you’re absolutely right about her voice — and she’ll be able to do it live, too — but it’s impossible not to compare this against other Big Vocal Tracks, and I can’t help feeling that the producers should have gone for a big chorus on the first verse. The energy it has just slips away.

Tim: Perhaps, but that almost makes it better when it does come back at the end. And so while it does make for a same-y album, if same-y is this strength of ballads, I really don’t care.