Christie & The Dream Beats – My Boyfriend’s Clothes

“How is a song with chirpy whistling and a vocoder charming?”

Tom: Or, sometimes, “Dream Beats and Christie”. Looks like they’ve settled on the more traditional arrangement, though.

Tim: Yes, and we had a lot of time for this band’s previous track, Wasn’t My Fault, and it’s still on my go to playlist for a pickup track. Here’s their current track.

Tom: How is a song with chirpy whistling and a vocoder charming? I know it’s a subtle vocoder, but still, that’s not meant to be possible.

Tim: And it’s a song like Tuesday’s Ace Wilder track: I like it, it’s good, but damn I wish I could get past trying to remember what song it is that it reminds me of. It’s from the very first vocal line “you should be getting on your plane” except the note for plane jumps up much higher in the song I’m thinking of but ANYWAY.

Tom: One of the choruses from Gwen Stefani’s What You Waiting For? The hook of Nelly’s Dilemma, on the way into the middle eight?

Tim: No, neither of those. But where were we? Oh, yeah, it’s a good track. Doesn’t quite hit the heights of the previous, but it’ll do for a summery whistly track. I particularly like the vocal part of the chorus, with its business-like atmosphere, “this is what I do, I don’t care what you think”. All in all, and particularly if I can get over the soundalike, not bad.

Tom: I mean, it’s not “Wasn’t My Fault”, but I think it’ll be a long time before I hear a big track like that.

Tim: I would like an album from these folk at some point, though.

Imagine Dragons – Whatever It Takes

“It’s like Imagine Dragons vs The Weeknd.”

Tim: This got sent in by an anonymous listener, with no comment, so I’ll add my own: it’s not hugely Imagine Dragons-y.

Tom: No, it’s like Imagine Dragons vs The Weeknd. That verse is a bit like a more energetic of Starboy.

Tim: It’s more electro than anything I’ve heard previously, but fortunately they haven’t lost the ability to produce an absolutely phenomenal chorus – that’s just glorious. The backing in it is stylistically familiar in innumerable anthemic songs by similar bands, and there’s a reason for that: it works very, very well.

Tom: I’m surprised the vocalist didn’t do the thing where he switches to the harmony for one powerful note on the final chorus. Every other trick in the book’s there.

Tim: It may be getting a tad clichéd by now, but I don’t care, because it still brings out the desired feelings in me. The rest of the song: sure, it’s good. But that chorus is next level.

Icona Pop – Girls Girls

“It’s upsettingly tedious.”

Tim: Icona Pop, purveyors of loud brash music, here with a new one. Last track wasn’t so great, but can’t they pull it back?

Tim: Ah. See, you might not have particularly liked their style, but at least you could never accuse them of being boring. This, though – well, it’s upsettingly tedious. The message is one that’s been done hundreds of times over, typically much better, and the music doesn’t have too much going for it either.

Tom: You’re not wrong. Whatever those instruments in the verse are — they sound half way between cowbells and steel drums — they’re almost discordant. And as for that chorus…

Tim: The vocals are as we’d expect, but what the hell is that oooh-ing all about? It’s not following a particularly massive build, but it still feels like a horrible let down, and it goes on for so, so long.

Tom: How is this song less than three minutes? It sounds so much longer. And then it just… ends.

Tim: This – this is just dull. UGH.

Ace Wilder – Dansa i Neon

“Takes a song off a while back, and brings it very, very up to date.”

Tim: Speaking of covers, as we were yesterday, here’s one of a song that Lena Philipsson put in a fairly decent showing with at Melodifestivalen 1987. We had a look at it when it was redone in 2011 as something slightly different, but here’s Ace’s cover of it.

Tim: And that’s a good cover. Takes a song off a while back, and brings it very, very up to date – sounds remarkably modern, with all the vocal sample effects and soft dance beats, though still maintaining enough of the original so that devotees won’t hate it.

Tom: Yep – it sounds, to me, a bit like that Thomas Anders track from a couple of weeks back: old sensibilities, old melody, new production.

Tim: The annoying thing for me, though, is that it sounds familiar. And I don’t think it’s from hearing the original, because I’ve not listened to it that often.

Tom: Remember Modern Talking, that band that Thomas Anders was half of? For me, I keep hearing You’re My Heart. It’s not close, but it’s close enough. For you?

Tim: No. I can be more specific: it’s that descending melody in the middle eight, and it sounds in my head like it might have come from something like a Corrs song – definitely female fronted, but other than that I can’t for the life of me place it. OH WELL, good cover nonetheless.

Steps – Story Of A Heart

“I forgot how much they sounded like ABBA”

Tim: Here’s the second one that Steps have done from their reunion album (still fantastic, every track on it). When I first heard it, I thought “I forgot how much they sounded like ABBA”. Then I realised it was a cover of a Benny Andersson song, and it made sense.

Tom: I mean, that massive YouTube “ABBA” logo kind of gives you a tip-off there, but yes.

Tim: And it’s a good track to cover, it really is – I heard it on the radio yesterday and was absolutely delighted.

Tom: It is. The men don’t have much to do on this track, though, do they? Or is that true for a lot of Steps songs, and I’ve just forgotten it? Anyway, yes, you’re right. It’s a good track.

Tim: However, I do have one criticism: it sounds like it should be faster. The chorus has all the energy of a proper banger, but not quite the speed. So here’s some advice: click that settings cog, and turn the speed up to 1.25x. And oh, it’s so much better, it’s like it’s now the song it was destined to be.

Tom: Bloody hell. You’re right. You’d need to do something good to that percussion to make it work, but yes, that’s an improvement.

Tim: For my money, those few extra bpm take it from good to very very good. And if you want something really really good, well, try this version.

Tim: I’ll be honest, I can think of very few songs that wouldn’t be improved by a 7th Heaven remix.

Tom: They did something good to that percussion.

Saturday Flashback: Erasure – Take A Chance On Me

“There were several interesting choices here.”

Tom: Erasure: synthpop legends. Thirty-two top 40 hits. Four number 1 albums. And “A Little Respect”, which has joined the understated but incredibly lucrative pantheon of “songs most people know”.

But they also had a number one EP, with four Abba covers on it. It was enormously popular, which makes sense given how well Abba write songs, and how well Erasure produce them.

There were several interesting choices here.

Tim: Oh, blimey. That’s…not what I was expecting. Well, the music is, anyway, as it sounds exactly like I’d expect an Erasure cover of this song wou– WOAH that middle eight has hit just as I’m writing these words, and suddenly the video’s no longer the most interesting part of the song. Really quite something, isn’t it?

Tom: I am reliably informed – by Wikipedia – that the middle eight is a “ragga-style toast performed by MC Kinky” who is “the first white female reggae/dancehall MC”, and that there is a list of things that I am utterly unqualified to even speculate about. It is basically the early 90s in musical form, and yes, it’s really quite something.

Tim: It’s not something I’d choose to hear again, nor probably something Benny and that lot had in mind when they wrote it, mind, but still something.

Maja Amcoff – Alltid Som Du Vill

“All the necessary bits are there.”

Tim: Maja’s new off Sweden, and has this to start with, translating as “Always As You Want”, apparently.

Tim: First things first: I’m only slightly keen on this, because while most of it is good, that chorus really does put me off a tad, dropping the melody a bit too much and replacing it with, for my ears, a fairly unpleasant dance beat.

Tom: Yep. This has got a great pre-chorus but, for my money, not much else of note.

Tim: So instead let’s examine this as a debut, and if we leave those complaints aside it’s a decent and promising piece of pop. All the necessary bits are there – strong verses with a good vocal line, a chorus that’s doing exactly what it should be doing with a mix of vocal and a solid hefty beat and rhythm underneath.

Tom: Mm. It ticks all the technical boxes, but I still don’t actually like this track. I suspect that’s down to the composer: the melody just makes me switch off. The production’s good, though, you’re right.

Tim: And once you bring in the middle eight that strips everything back to really show off her voice, it’s a nice demonstration of everything she can do, and it works very well. Despite my own personal misgivings, for a song that wants to say “here I am, this is what I do”, there’s not a lot to criticise it for.

All Time Low feat. Tegan & Sara – Ground Control

“I just remember it being good.”

Tim: I’ve said it before, but I’ll say it again: I do love how our readers know what to send us – just when I’m a bit worried we might be running out of music, someone anonymous sends this in, reporting that “All Time Low have gotten distrinctly less rocky and more synth-poppy this time round.” And yes, yes they have.

Tom: I still can’t hear “All Time Low” without thinking of Bond theme “All Time High“. And yes, that’s the Pulp cover version of it, it’s brilliant. ANYWAY.

Tom: Well, that’s a good album cover right there.

Tim: It’s very pretty isn’t it? I’ve always had a lot of time for All Time Low, and while this completely ditches their standard style that in favour of a vastly more Tegan & Sara vibe, they’ve still got it, producing a really enjoyable song.

Tom: You know how, for yesterday’s song, I let out an audible “urrrgh” at the chorus? Well, this time I said “oh!”. This is good.

Tim: Good, yes, but one thing is strange – I originally wrote there “one of my favourite tracks in a while”, except once the track had finished I wanted to change it. Not because I thought any less of it, it’s still very good, but because I couldn’t really remember it, just a few seconds after it finished.

Tom: Ouch. That’s one of my standard checks for whether something’s a good pop song. And you’re right: I can’t remember it either. I just remember it being good. (Apart from those weird wobbly-synths on the right channel in the verse. One poor decision.)

Tim: I play it again, and it’s great – I honestly don’t think I could fault that chorus even if I wanted to, which I really don’t – so why can’t I remember it afterwards? That’s annoying. It actually really does annoy me, because I want to love this track, and I do – but only when I’m listening to it.

John de Sohn – Hum With Me

“Hum with me? What?”

Tom: I am very skeptical of that title. Hum with me? What?

Tim: I still think back occasionally to the first track of John’s we featured – might be something to do with the video, I think – and remember how several years later it’s still a very good track, and how he hasn’t actually put out a duff one yet. Try this, for example, with all of its tropical fruity goodness (I’m okay with it now, it’s the summer).

Tom: Well, that’s the first duff one. Isn’t it?

Tim: Still not a duff one, though I would say it’s not one of his best. It’s funny – the post-chorus dance bit should be the biggest part of the song, the one that really wants to make me jump up and start thrashing my limbs around, but there seems to be instead a sudden collapse in momentum.

Tom: Yep. I actually let out an ‘urrrrrgh’ sound out loud. that’s one of the most disappointing choruses I’ve heard. Ruins the whole song for me.

Tim: It goes from flowing notes gradually amping up to a staccato top line, with even the drumbeats taking a while to come back in. The rest of it is great, and it’d all be great if it just kept up the movement – but it doesn’t. It’s ridiculous.

Tom: Also — and I realise this is the point of the song — the humming gets really annoying.

Tim: I don’t know, I don’t find the humming so bad – certainly not bad enough to let the song be ruined – but I don’t think I’d quite classify it as duff.

Hanne Leland – You Don’t Own Me

“It’s a shame the verses have to suffer”

Tim: Our reader, Bjørnar, reckons this is “a powehouse synth pop ballad giving me chills. Strong message and catchy chorus.”

Tim: And I’m not really tempted to disagree with him.

Tom: That reminds me a lot of LIGHTS in style, and I mean that as a big compliment. It’s such a similar style, actually, that even after writing this I’m still half-convinced it’s some unreleased material from her. I don’t think I can give this an objective judgment, because it sounds so familiar.

Tim: It may sound familiar, but that could just be because it’s a good style. Now, in most songs the chorus is the stand-out part, but here it really is – I got a bit distracted and when the chorus came along I thought “oh, yes, I forgot that was playing”. That’s not to say the verses are bad, because they’re not at all: they’re very good at doing what they do, conveying a quiet and gentle message that’s just waiting to be amplified.

Tom: There’s still a lot of good work going on with the synths underneath, though — and the vocals are great, too.

Tim: They are. It’s just a bit of a shame, though, that with that structure in mind they have to suffer for the chorus to come in with the effect that it does. I’d suggest turning everything up by 25% or so, but then the chorus might sound too loud, and it’s that contrast that makes the song what it is. I don’t know – either way, I’ll take it.