Olly Murs – Oh My Goodness

Tim: Anything you want to say before we start this?

Tom: I’ll get my favourite Murs-describing phrase out of the way at the start of this particular post: “swaggering leprechaun cockery”.

Tim: And there it is.

Tom: In fact, I’d advise you not to watch the video. Because as with pretty much all of his singles, it’s a good song. Catchy, danceable, sticky enough to get into your head but not enough to become irritating. It’s really a lovely bit of pop music.

Tim: Agreed – I think it’s great.

Tom: The lyrics don’t actually make sense, do they? “You’ve got me dreaming of a life that anybody else would die for.” That’s the key line from the chorus. And it means… what?

Tim: Erm – maybe that while it’s a life most people really really really want, he only really really wants it and isn’t quite prepared to go to such extremes. That covers it, I think? But you’re right, it doesn’t make all that much sense, especially when he’s talking about how much he wants someone.

Tom: And then there’s the video, in which he makes a prat of himself in a public place and seems to look smug about it. Par for the course.

Tim: I don’t know – here I’m going to be a Murs apologist and say that I think you’re being too harsh.

Tom: That’s a change of direction for you. What’s brought this on?

Tim: After all, making a prat of yourself in a public place is (a) what I did recently, also involving an escalator

Tom: Heh. It was the way it gracefully delivered you to its exit point after you fell over that made me laugh.

Tim: … (b) par for the course with any song about how someone makes the singer crazy, not just Olly, and (c) it fits perfectly with the lyric “I’m going too fast, heart first, my head just can’t slow me down”. I like the video, especially his apparent look of amazement 26 seconds in at the fact that something as big as this shopping centre actually exists.

Tom: Have you been to that new one out near the Olympic Park? Seriously, it’s massive.

Tim: It is. Better not take Olly there, or his eyes might pop out.

Carly Rae Jepsen – Call Me Maybe

Cheery, cheesy, repetitive choruses.

Tim: This is pretty much played non-stop in the Radio 1 offices, apparently, to the joy of some and the annoyance of many. The video, meanwhile, features her being unbelievably shallow and desperate. Fancy a listen?

Tom: Shallow and desperate. There’s a number of jokes I could make there, but I’ll pass.

Tim: The music here is good – very good, in fact, as far as pop music goes, so we needn’t really discuss that, unless you disagree?

Tom: I will say this: I can see why it might be annoying. I can about handle it, but cheery, cheesy, repetitive choruses like that could well start to grate. If I was in a bad mood right now, I’d want this turned the hell off right now. Fortunately, I’m in a good mood, so I like it.

Tim: Excellent. The video it is, then.

The lyrics of the song – I just met you, this is crazy, here’s my number, call me maybe – sort of imply that she feels a hidden connection or something. The video, on the other hand, makes it abundantly clear that she’s thinking “sod any hidden connection rubbish, I want to feel what’s in his pants”.

And you know what I think (apart from what you’re about to say)?

Tom: That’s generally your approach to pulling someone, too?

Tim: Like I said, apart from that. I think, who cares? Because let’s be honest, we don’t get many songs these days that are just “You’re fit, let’s do it” – it’s all about meeting people properly, and getting to know them, and being romantic and all that rubbish. This is much more direct. I like it.

Tom: I’m going to take this opportunity to link to the wonderful “Shut Up And Sleep With Me“, which takes that to pretty much its logical conclusion.

Tim: Another thing I like: the video’s funny. Maybe it’s partly because that with her looks and what’s going on this could easily be a New Girl storyline, but the ending’s good, her increasingly desperate attempts to grab his attention made me smile, and her falling off the car is just fantastic. That’s not normal in a music video, but it should be. Maybe.

Finally, though, I’m disappointed they just had a keyboard for the strings, rather than actual violinists in that garage. That is my only complaint about this song.

Tom: That’s all you want these days, Tim. Sex and violins.

Jessie And The Toy Boys – Petty Theft

“It’s generic Gaga crossed with Katy Perry”

Tom: Our regular Radio Insider, Matt, sends this to us: “It’s generic Gaga crossed with Katy Perry,” he says, “but for some reason I like it.” Can’t say I’ve heard of either Jessie or the Toy Boys before, but previous credits include opening for the Saturdays and, er, ‘inspiring’ a Britney Spears track.

Tom: Matt’s assessment is pretty good – it’s sitting somewhere in between the two Prime Ministers of Pop. The verse is more Gaga, the chorus more Katy Perry – although perhaps a little too close to Teenage Dream.

Tim: I still don’t get what you’ve got against Teenage Dream – I thought (and still think) that’s a fairly decent piece of pop music.

Tom: Teenage Dream is certainly a decent piece of pop – it’s the lack of any real melody in the chorus that gets me, I think. It just seems a bit monotonous. Anyway, Jessie’s track doesn’t suffer from that, and it’s pretty danceable. Pity about the surprise ending, but other than that I’ve got no real complaints.

Tim: Yeah, I’m on roughly the same level there, though I’d take a surprise ending like that over a fade out, say.

Alyssa Reid feat. Jump Smokers – Alone Again

“Haven’t I heard this before?”

Tim: This first appeared in Canada over a year ago, but it’s only fairly recently made waves over here. I’ve Shazammed it (that can be a verb, right?) three times in the past fortnight, which means (a) I’ve got a lousy memory for songs and (b) I think it’s more than a bit good.

Tom: I still say Shazam should give a sarcastic comment when someone goes that.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=witcrLcD3mU

Tom: “Hang on,” I thought, “haven’t I heard this before?” And of course, yes I have: it’s based on Heart’s classic rock track. And I’ve got to say: the original was better.

Tim: You think? Well, maybe. Doesn’t mean we can’t consider this on its own merits though, and I think that this isn’t unlike Emeli Sandé’s one that we did on Wednesday – despite the rock original it could so easily have been a dreary ballad – she could have sung pretty much what Jump Smokers (I’m not sure that’s what his mum calls him, but never mind) is going on about, and again it would have been fine. Radio play, listen to her beautiful voice, get to number 15 or something, and we’re done.

As before, but no. We bring Jump in, and he does his thing, and—I think this is the first time I’ve ever said this—his rapping makes it better.

Tom: Admittedly there is a lot of new material in here, and the modern production helps it sound rather good to my ears, but none of it’s nearly as good as that original chorus. The rap bit does save it from being a more stodgy cover, I’ll agree.

Tim: It does – it gives it a vibe (didn’t know that was a word I’d ever use) that gives the song so much more, along with the clapping and drum beats, and now we’ve got a number 2 hit on our hands, a dance mix that doesn’t sound like a cheap cash-in and a good follow-up (which somewhat weirdly samples this track) that’ll probably appear this side of the Atlantic in the not-too-distant future.

Tom: Ultimately: it’s a good refresh of a very well-known classic track. But I can’t help feeling that the new stuff is being propped up by the old.

Emeli Sandé – Next To Me

Far more to it than a song like this would normally have.

Tim: I’ve been meaning to bring this up for a couple of months now, but never got round to it. Still, better late than never, innit.

Tom: Professional as ever.

Tim: Damn straight, bruv.

Tom: Those first four piano chords did have me half-expecting Look Around You’s “Little Mouse“, but fortunately it went elsewhere very quickly. Instead, well… I reckon it sounds very much like Disney’s not-particularly-showstopping “Colors of the Wind“, but for the life of me I can’t say why.

Tim: I’ll be honest: I can’t hear that at all.

Tom: I think it’s just in the verses, but then again it may just be in my head.

Tim: Well, whether it is or not, this basically has far more to it than a song like this would normally have, and it’s all the better for it. Because it could so easily have been written as a slow, fairly dreary piano ballad, without all the drums and everything, and it would have been ‘fine’. Fits the ‘I’ve got a nice guy’ message, she’s got a good voice, gets airplay, does well. Nothing good, nothing special, but more of a ‘yeah, this’ll do’ type deal. You know, like The Wanted’s latest album.

Tom: Incidentally, The Wanted are doing very well in America right now. First track I heard on the radio during my recent trip to the states? “Glad You Came”. Now there’s something I didn’t expect. Anyway, yes: this could have been very Adele-like.

Tim: But no. You add the drums in, and then the brass, and it becomes so special, so brilliant. Such a celebratory song, about how she’s got this guy and she’s so happy about it, that you can’t help moving to it. Maybe just a tiny bit, or maybe you’ll do what I tend to do when it appears – start jumping about, clapping hands and everything, and if I’m feeling particularly up for it I’ll join in with a couple of the ‘ooooh-oooh’s. Which do you favour?

Tom: I’ll go for singing Disney songs over the top of it, I think.

Madonna feat. MIA and Nicki Minaj – Give Me All Your Lovin’

My brain can’t quite cope with what’s going on in this video.

Tom: My brain can’t quite cope with what’s going on in this video.

Tim: Ah, finally doing this, are we?

Tom: “Finally”? I know it’s been getting radio play, but the formal release date’s this week. And yes, I know that doesn’t really count in the age of downloads, but still.

Tim: Oh, alright then, if we must. I’m not sure what’s in the video, but I’ll bet you anything that’s it’s not as weird as bringing a statue of Jesus to life and then discovering stigmata on your hands.

Tom: Nicki Minaj: yep, I can see her doing the cheerleader getup. Suits her. But that’s MIA, whose image is more hard-ass political than preppy cheerleader. For crying out loud, in her last video she had an all-female veil-wearing Muslim stunt driving team. And now she’s chanting backing vocals and waving pompoms for Madonna?

Tim: Hmm. Normally in this place I’d think of some reason to justify it. But…nope. Can’t come up with one.

Tom: Anyway: the music sounds, well, like an updated version of Madonna. It’s clearly her voice, clearly her sound, but the production is just as clearly from this millennium. It’s never going to be a famous singalong hit in a couple of decades’ time, but it’s pretty damn good.

Tim: Meh, it’s alright. Decent, sure, but it’s not as good as the lead single off a new Madonna album should be.

Tom: But MIA. What… what happened?

Marcus Collins – Seven Nation Army

You can’t cover something that iconic. Can you?

Tom: Oh no. No, no, no. That’ll be pretty much the instinctive reaction from most people here. Who covers something like Seven Nation Army? It… it just is. You can’t cover something that iconic. Can you?

Tim: No. I’ve heard this, and no.

Tom: Really? Because I reckon this is good. Apparently it can be done.

Tim: You really can’t. Or at least, Marcus Collins can’t.

Tom: You really think so? I mean, you’re going to have to work hard to convince me there isn’t some rather strict autotuning on some of it (the end of that first line sounds a bit Cher-like to me), but stylistically I think I actually like it.

Tim: No, you don’t. You think, ‘Ooh, this is interesting. Hmm, yeah, it’s not as bad as I thought it would be, and it’s completely different, so that makes it good.’ But it doesn’t.

Tom: Ooh. Maybe you’re right, there. I still don’t think it’s actively bad, though.

Tim: The problem with this is that it was rushed out – it is by a long way the fastest a non-X Factor winner has a made a single (it was on the radio back in January) – and they thought ‘Hey, Rock Week was one of Marcus’s best results, so let’s get him to cover a rock song.’

Tom: Would I prefer him taking on a different song? Sure. Does that harpsichord-like synth in the background remind me of Disney’s Grim Grinning Ghosts and a hundred other Hallowe’en-type tracks? Yep. Does covering this song in this style make no sense at all? Absolutely.

Tim: No, it makes perfect sense – relative to the others, Rock Week was Marcus’s second best week on X Factor, so this was always going to sell well. It was just a question of choosing the right rock song, and this is well-known, popular and fairly recent, so it’s perfect.

Tom: It’s still a decent cover of an exceptionally good song, though.

Tim: Nope.

Tom: Wait a minute, Tim! I’ve just found this – a cover of Seven Nation Army by a French artist called “Ben, l’oncle Soul”. Does it seem… familiar?

Tim: Bloody hell – that’s…that’s practically identical. Just…wow. Surely someone should be kicking up a fuss somewhere, no?

Tom: They are. Mainly on YouTube. I assume that, behind the scenes, the correct payments have been made – they’re just keeping the original as quiet as they can. Anyway, I stand by my original assertion that this is a brilliant cover. It is. It’s just not Marcus Collins’ cover.

East 17 – I Can’t Get You Off My Mind (Crazy)

No, you haven’t slipped back in time.

Tom: No, you haven’t slipped back in time. It’s actually a new East 17 track. You might be thinking “they kept that reunion quiet”. The trouble is, it’s not a reunion. They haven’t done a Take That and disappeared properly for several years before coming back to a storm of acclaim: various members of the band have been milking the name for a while, and now the three of them that remain involved have decided to try a proper single again.

And I’ll say this: it’s not bad.

Tim: Perhaps not, but they have chosen the Laziest Method Ever™ for a music video, which always annoys me.

Tom: “East 17 Singles” would be a pretty good category for ‘Pointless’. Everyone remembers ‘Stay Another Day’, of course, but that was their only number one. Maybe a few people will remember ‘Let It Rain’. But they don’t have the big genre-spanning catalogue of Barlow’s lot – so most people will be expecting something like their Christmassy ballad.

Tim: Hmm. There was a thing about boybands on TV a couple of weeks back, with interviews with singers, managers, writers, all sorts (incidentally Terry from these guys is still bitter about being known as the Quiet One, because no-one was ever interested in him). One of the general points made (and universally agreed on) was that the worst thing that can happen to a boyband is that they decide they want to be credible, and write their own music, when instead they should realise that much as the lyricists woldn’t be good as singers, they shouldn’t do the writing. This song…somewhat justifies that.

Tom: Judged by those old boy-band standards, it’s terrible, but judged by modern pop… well, apart from the repeat ’til fade, this could be pretty much any indie-pop band. If we’re honest, it’s probably cribbing a bit from ‘Sex on Fire’, and they’ve definitely lost their best vocalist. But it’s not bad.

Tim: It’s not bad – it’s not the East 17 their fans would likely want, though, so it is good?

Tom: Depends if you’re one of their fans. I’d hazard a guess that it’s not going to absolutely light up the charts – but it’s a solid tune, and deserves a bit of attention.

Dappy feat. Brian May – Rockstar

Actually a very good track.

Tom: No, you read that right. Featuring Brian May. What’s even more surprising? This is actually a very good track.

Tim: Well bugger me.

Tom: Blatant use of drugs in the video as well, which would mark it as a very British track even if it wasn’t for the I’m A Celebrity reference in there. There’s no way that’d fly in a mainstream US video.

I have an enormous amount of respect for Brian May. I don’t need to run through his achievements in either music or astrophysics. My question isn’t “why is he slumming it with Dappy” because he’s blatantly not slumming it: this is an absolutely amazing bit of pop music. And no, I didn’t think I’d be saying that.

Tim: It is. Weirdly (actually, probably not weirdly) I’d never thought of Dappy as someone who actually sang – just a hip-hiop rapper who called himself a singer. But here he is, doing just that, and it sounds good.

Tom: Here’s my question: why is Brian May so criminally underused on this track? It’s a full three minutes before you even start to hear that trademark guitar sound. Sure, he might be noodling about in the earlier bits, but unless you’ve got that precise combination of effects that say “THIS IS A ROCK GOD, SHUT UP AND PAY ATTENTION” – the ones you heard when he smashed the grand finale at Reading Festival last year – who’s going to know it?

Tim: Best guess? If he was on there more he’d outshine Dappy just by being him and Dappy being Dappy (bloody hell that’s a a stupid name – how have I not noticed it before?), and Brian May fans would be all over it saying who’s this stupid bloke singing?

Jedward – Waterline

It’s the most anticipated one of the bunch; justly so?

Tim: Well, it’s the most anticipated one of the bunch; justly so? (And apologies for the weird video, but it’s one of the few where YouTube hasn’t knackered the sound quality.)

Tom: All right, I’ll brace myself. They’re annoying; their fans are annoying; the track is…

Tom: …good?! Sorry, I don’t think I typed that in a surprised enough manner. GOOD?!

Tim: Yes. This is basically a Busted reunion, isn’t it, and for that reason alone it is the greatest song in human history.

Tom: Let’s not go quite that far.

Tim: I suppose not – when I hear it, I have to remind myself that it isn’t actually Busted and I’m brought way back down to Earth. Still, it’s bloody good, and vastly better than Lipstick was. And who’d have thought it – Jedward can actually sing properly, it seems, which is something many had only previously suspected.

Tom: The question is: can they sing it live on the night? If they can (and I can’t believe I’m saying this), then I reckon they can win Eurovision with it.

Tim: A bold statement. It could certainly be a hit over here, and on both sides of the Irish Sea, because this is – I’m going to use the comparison again, because it’s nearly impossible not to – genuinely like Busted on top form, and those sort of music tastes really haven’t changed in the past ten years.

Tom: But this isn’t cheesy Europop like yesterday’s – it’s like a modern pop boy band. Which, I suppose, they are. Again: I can’t believe I’m saying that.

Tim: As for your guess of a Eurovision winner? Quite possible – I still think yesterday’s would stand a slightly better chance based on music alone, but this has the name to go with the song, and that counts for a lot.

Right – we’ve been through all five, so I think it’s time we acted as one of the regional juries to complement the Irish televote tonight. We have point allocations of 12, 10, 6, 8 and 4, and mine are thus:

Mariah McCool – 8
Donna MacCaul – 6
Andrew Mann – 4
Una Gibney & David Shannon – 12
Jedward – 10

Yours, please?

Tom: 12 for Jedward, amazingly. 10 for Andrew Mann. 8 for Donna, 6 for Mariah, and 4 for the warblers. It seems that the celebrity haircuts get our vote. How very, very strange.

Tim: Only 4? And they don’t even get names? You’ve changed, man. You’ve changed.

Tom: It’s not a bad track. It just won’t win Eurovision.