Saturday Flashback: Frederikke Vedel – Jeg har hele tiden vidst det

“What on earth’s going on with the staging?”

Tim: Just having a rummage around my ‘songs we never had time to talk about when they were relevant’ pile, and here’s a reject from Denmark’s 2013 Eurovision selection. Next time I see you, Tom, I’ll give you one whole penny for every second you’re actually able to focus on the singer here; I’m fairly sure I’ll be at most 50p down.

Tom: I mean, it’s a strong outfit she’s wearing, but yes: what on earth’s going on with the staging?

Tim: So initially we’ve got the most intense stare I’ve seen outside of The Demon Headmaster–

Tom: Which is back, by the way.

Tim: –they they go away and start waving around and even when they’re out of focus I’m wondering what they’re up to and why on Earth he’s picked her up, and then he’s briefly doing some sort of breakdance thing for no reason just for a few seconds, because sure. Then we’re constructing a weird fabric prison for them all, which turns out at the end to be more of a protective layer to save her from her backing singers, lunging forward to grab a hold of her. What’s happening? And why? And does the set designer just not want us to listen to the song or something?

Tom: It’s not a bad song: she can clearly belt out the notes, although given that she was beaten by Only Teardrops, it’s fair to say that Denmark made the right choice.

Any other problems with the staging?

Tim: Well, could the guy not have had a quick shave before going on?

Pet Shop Boys feat. Years & Years – Dreamland

“All it’s missing is a double-clap after every four bars.”

Tim: A pairing here that, in hindsight, is notable largely for the fact that it took long to happen – I saw this and thought “yes, of course they’re doing a song together”. BUT, the twenty trillion dollar question: is it any good?

Tom: Oh, listen to those synths! All it’s missing is a double-clap after every four bars. (I’m joking, but also, I did start adding them myself at one point.) You’re right, it’s good, although…

Tim: YES, even if I do want to sing FREAK OUT on top of the chorus.

Tom: Right.

Tim: It does, in fact, sound pretty much exactly what I’d expect a Pet Shop Boys feat. Years & Years song to sound like: nice electro beats, fairly gentle with nothing too heavy but an interesting backing nonetheless, and lyrics that are fairly interesting.

Tom: Along with a really innovating music video.

Tim: I like it – there’s a new album out in January, and this is a decent lead track.

Nea – Some Say

“What.”

Tim: So, I could introduce this by saying that New is the stage name of previously writer-only Linnea Södahl, or that the song is about love that will never be reciprocated, but neither of those things is even vaguely important, relative to what actually happens in the song.

Tom: What.

Tim: So, that is one of the most bizarre things I’ve heard in a long while. Straight sampling: fine. Redoing in a different genre: sure, why not (unless you’re Calum Scott). Doing this to it: again, can be okay (and in fact I’ve feeling this has already happened earlier this year, but I’m damned if can remember the specifics). BUT, what ludicrous set of circumstances would make you think “ooh, Eiffel 65 wrote a melody that everyone associates with late 90s novelty eurodance and it was a big one-off hit, I should use on this ballad I’m writing”?

Tom: It is very, very strange. Maybe it’s targeted at Gen-Z kids who won’t know the original well but might know the melody? After all, that’s basically what Pitbull did with Feel This Moment, albeit in the other direction, and he mostly got away with it.

Tim: Well, mainly because that was just Pitbull being Pitbull, we expect stuff like that. The cynical part of me is wondering if she’s only decided to launch her singing career because every established artist she’s sent it to has given it a hard pass but she was certain it’s a winner; I’m sure as hell not certain it is.

Steve Aoki feat. Backstreet Boys – Let It Be Me

“Way better than I thought it was going to be.”

Tom: Steve Aoki, DJ who isn’t throwing as much cake at people any more. And the Backstreet Boys, who don’t need any introduction. The result is…

Tom: …huh. Way better than I thought it was going to be.

Tim: Hmm, see I’d have put it at ‘roughly what I was expecting’, though I guess either works.

Tom: I think that’s mostly because the main artist and featured credits are the wrong way round here: this is a Backstreet Boys song (and a good one) with a well-remixed chorus and some probably-unnecessary goose-honk synths.

Tim: Maybe, though it’s very much the remix bit that takes the focus – I’d posit that if it were a less well known act providing vocals, this could get away with being an uncredited session singer.

Tom: Good chorus, though.

Matthias Reim – Eiskalt

“It’s really interesting to hear this sort of dramatic, dark effect applied to what is, in the end, still schlager.”

Tom: We’ve talked about Matthias Reim before, Tim, and we seem to settle on the same thing each time: SCHLAGER BANGERS. What’s he got this time?

Tim: Well, throughout my years, Tom, I’ve heard hundreds, probably thousands, of songs that build through the verse and smash into the chorus. And yet, until today I don’t think I’ve ever heard one that could genuinely be described as having a sense of foreboding about it.

Tim: Those opening piano notes, straight out of some sinister ‘hide in the wardrobe, there’s someone creeping around with a knife’ scenarios.

Tom: I’m sure I’ve heard that somewhere before, but all my brain can come up with is Cutting Crew’s Died In Your Arms. It’s really interesting to hear this sort of dramatic, dark effect applied to what is, in the end, still schlager.

Tim: Those beats arrive, upping the tension further. His deep raspy voice with its distinctly serial killer vibe. That heart in the lyric video smashing into pieces. The drums build, he’s approaching the closet, you’re holding your breath, and suddenly WHAM, we break out into a truly fabulous eurodance chorus.

Tom: “Freezing”, in case it wasn’t obvious from context. You’re right though: all electric-guitar, power-chords and heavy percussion. He’s managed it again: BANGER.

Tim: We can breathe, no-one’s trying to murder us, we can have a heck of a time, either throwing our limbs around trying to approximate some sort of rhythm, or just watching that absolutely gorgeous lyric video. Either way, everything is good, and we’ve got our whole lives ahead of us to appreciate it.

Tom: This got more existential than usual. Cracking schlager song, though.

Saturday Flashback: Watermät – Bullit

Tom: I wouldn’t normally send over a deep house song, Tim, but I heard this track from 2014 for the first time, and it stood out to me.

Tim: Any particular reason?

Tom: Because every single individual part of it is irritating, and yet somehow, I like it.

Tom: Who seriously picks synth patches like that? Who decides that a distorted foghorn should try to become the sound of the summer? Who adds a tweeting-bird-car-alarm effect last heard when Dario G remixed Jeff Wayne? Who writes what is basically a two-note melody?

Tim: So, I get your point, and I don’t know how to answer any of your questions with anything other than “well, this guy”, but it was a big song. And it might only be two notes, but it’s a catchy melody nonetheless, and that I still remember five years down the line even though I’ve probably not heard it much since.

Tom: You do? Huh. I missed it somehow. Which rather takes the wind out of my big question — who gets it into the Top 20 in the UK, and to number 2 in Belgium?

Tim: Well, it’s as you said: somehow, you like it. And so did a lot of other people.

September feat. Birgitta Haukdal – Aðeins Nær Þér

“Here’s something pointlessly confusing for you.”

Tim: Here’s something pointlessly confusing for you: a Scandivinavian dance pop act called September that is entirely not the September who did Can’t Get Over and Cry For You and that lot.

Tom: That is a very, very odd choice of name. Did they not Google it?

Tim: This lot are Icelandic rather than Swedish, though, as you can probably guess from the song title, which in English means Only Near You.

Tim: Don’t know much about the context of that title, but hey – it’s primarily a tropical-sounding dance tune with occasional pop nods, so its probably not all that important.

Tom: And some decent string-section synths in there, too. But you’re right: standard tropical dance.

Tim: At least, it should be that. Because this would be so, so much improved if that Galantis-style post-chorus were allowed to take the lead more often. There’d be less of the slightly uninteresting verses, and many more dance beats that everyone can properly enjoy. Because damn, they’re good, and I’d love a whole song of that, although I’d allow the odd vocal here and there to keep the variety.

Tom: For most tracks that come through here, I’d agree with you: but here, I don’t, I think they’ve got the balance about right.

Tim: Basically, I want more of the good stuff and less of the boring stuff. Is that really too much to ask?

Valerie Broussard & Galantis – Roots

“Halfway between a dance-pop song and intro music for a slightly-too-earnest Saturday evening BBC light-entertainment show.”

Tim: For your delectation, a really quite lovely lyric video. And song, now I think about it.

Tim: And that right there is…entirely fine.

Tom: It’s halfway between a dance-pop song and intro music for a slightly-too-earnest Saturday evening BBC light-entertainment show.

Tim: There’s nothing to criticise about it: good melody, decent narrative in the lyrics, nice instrumental work underneath the vocals and a strong beat when we get to the dance post-chorus. It is, in fact, a perfectly serviceable dance tune, with some very good trademark Galantis brass in there. And that’s okay.

Tom: It is! I doubt it’s going to be the song of the summer, but there’s nothing wrong with it.

Tim: Well, yes, though having said that: it’s what I thought the first time I heard it. And then I played it again, and a few other times, as I do when I’m writing these, and now it’s really growing on me – that brass line, for example, with its short repeating notes, sounds lovely. I really like it. So here’s to a grower! It’s great.

Alan Walker, K-391, Tungevaag, Mangoo – PLAY

“ONE HUNDRED PERCENT UNBRIDLED ALAN WALKER”

Tim: Here, a track that, despite being a reworking of one from twenty years back, and having four credited producers, is 100% unbridled Alan Walker. With a VHS filter applied, because we’ve not had enough of those recently.

Tom: You’re not wrong, that is ONE HUNDRED PERCENT UNBRIDLED ALAN WALKER. Not just the synth pads, but the rhythms they’re in, the vocal quality of the singer, and the vocal chop-ups during the middle eight.

Tim: Somehow, I’d never really figured out how a dance track can have multiple names on it – like, it’s one guy at a computer, how does it work? Fortunately, we’ve a video that explains it nicely, and suddenly I’m thinking ‘of course it’s like that, that makes total sense’.

Tom: It involves floaty purple things. Of course it does.

Tim: We’ve three videos so far – this one from Alan and another from each of K and Martin, each telling a slightly separate story about how things started happening – it’s a rather nice thing, not least for, yep, all the floaty purple things.

The tune’s the main part, though, with the main hook coming from Mangoo’s 1999 track Eurodancer, and pretty much everything else being Alan’s trademark beeps and bloops. And, well, you know what I’m going to think about it, because like I said at the top, it’s 100% Alan’s sound. You like Alan, you like the song; you don’t, you don’t. And I do.

Tom: It’s an odd one, isn’t it? He needs to keep his sound fresh and updated, or people will get bored — but if he does that, it doesn’t sound like an Alan Walker Track any more.

Tim: Though actually, one thing from that video: do you reckon Alan ever brings his hood down?

Tom: Never mind that, what kind of a DJ name is “Mangoo”?

Westlife – Dynamite

“Spoiler alert: it’s quite the belter.”

Tim: I’m not quite sure why, but we seem to have got fully into covering Westlife’s comeback, and I guess there’s no reason to stop. Here’s the third track, released a couple of months back, but only now given a video. Spoiler alert: it’s quite the belter.

Tom: You’re raising my expectations, Tim. Now I’m expecting something really good.

Tom: “Belter”? Really? You’re going with “belter”? I wouldn’t th– never mind, I just got to the key change.

Tim: We mentioned on Friday that Alphabet haven’t concerned themselves with what’s modern, and it’s nice that they’re not the only ones. As with the previous two, we’ve Ed Sheeran and long term Westlife collaborator Steve Mac on writing duties, and aside from the ever so slightly tropical sounding beat underneath, this is just as much a classic Westlife track as we had twenty years ago. And for that, I love it.

Tom: For me, the key change is the only “yep, that’s classic Westlife” bit, because the rest is… well, it’s an okay pop song. You’re right that it’s very old school, I’m just not sure it’s an improvement. That said, if it’s what you’re looking for…

Tim: Not only that, mind – there’s the key change as well, and it’s one of my favourite types: you sing one line, BOOM, you sing it again a couple of notes higher. Shayne Ward did it, and now Westlife have joined him. And, obviously, accompanied it with an actual explosion, because of course they have, the song’s called Dynamite, it’d basically be breaking the law not doing that. Good work, lads (though I could maybe have done without that thrusting shot at 3:18).

Tom: I mean, fair play to them, they haven’t faked-up the tour footage, that is basically just bragging “look at us, it’s been decades and we still get arena crowds, what’re you gonna do about it”.

Tim: Album’s finally got a date, by the way: November 15th, so stick that in your calendar please, and maybe even book the day off work. Not saying I have, mind, but, well, maybe.