Tag: Icona Pop

Icona Pop – All Night

“It has a melody.”

Tim: I think we need to face facts: Icona Pop’s release strategy is all over the place. Girlfriend was plugged as their next single to be released in America, but that seems to have been forgotten about now (though the video got put online at the weekend) and they’re back, in America at least, with this one. It’ll probably arrive here sometime this decade, but who knows.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8NzaKXXlPqw

Tim: I’ve decided I really like Icona Pop now. When I first heard I Love It, I thought it was a bit iffy – maybe too shouty and a bit of a racket. It still is, to some extent, but actually when you put it next to the rest of their output it fits in nicely, just on the heavier end of the scale, and if you’re in the mood (yes, there’s that qualifier) for loud pop they actually fit the bill almost perfectly.

Tom: True: there are some tracks you can only appreciate when you’re in the mood for them. This one’s on the more mainstream side of their output, though — it has a melody — and I’ve got to admit that works for me.

Tim: The songs are well-produced, and they know exactly what they’re doing with them – creating party tracks that are there to be danced to.

Take this, for example. Yes, you could assume that the whole “with love this deep we don’t need no sleep, we could do this all night” is the whole bedtime stuff…

Tom: “Bedtime stuff?” I’m sorry, are you nine years old or something?

Tim: Well, I was trying to keep this family-friendly, but okay: the rumpy-pumpy.

Tom: Anyway, I reckon it’s more about…

Tim: Perhaps partying the night away, throwing your arms all over the place and finally emerging from the club just in time to get a kebab for breakfast? Whichever floats your boat, I guess.

Tom: Personally, I’ll stick with option 1. Particularly if option 2 involves a kebab.

Icona Pop – Girlfriend

“What band hasn’t succeeded in a new country by splitting sales across two tracks?”

Tim: About a decade after it was originally released, I Love It is finally getting a release and gradually building up airplay in the UK.

Tom: A year, to be fair – there have been longer gaps between release and international success. So what’s with the new single?

Tim: Well, it’s the obvious step: put out their follow-up international release. After all, what band hasn’t succeeded in a new country by splitting sales across two tracks?

Tim: And, why mess with a winning formula? Fairly aggressive vocals, excellent production underneath, a great enough tune to get any party going.

Tom: Plus occasional use of “shit”, which seems to be emerging as one of their trademarks.

Tim: To give them their due, it’s a great track, and one I actually prefer to I Love It.

Tom: I still reckon I Love It is the better track — I don’t think they’d have had success if they’d released this first — but it’s a competent followup.

Tim: You’re right – it’s not got the same “listen to us, we here and demand your attention” quality that I Love It has that you’d think would be first and foremost in their minds.

I say “them”, it’s probably more the label’s fault than theirs, as I Love It went down a storm in the US a few months back and so now’s a good time to release this for that market. But why delay the UK one so much (and, while you’re at it, entirely cancel the remix EP)? Such silliness.

Icona Pop – We Got The World

In a similar vein, but largely absent of what we didn’t like.

Tim: Cast your mind back six months, and we weren’t all that keen on I Love It, their last release. For a few reasons.

Tom: And just like last time, I’ve got to add a quick video warning here, for what the BBFC would describe as “occasional, brief nudity”.

Tim: This is in a similar vein to the first, but fortunately is absent of much of what we didn’t like.

Tom: Yep. This is actually a song, and an incredibly positive and unbeat to that as well.

Tim: There’s a much better melody, with less of the plain shouting. Yes, it’s still present, because that’s their style, but it’s in just the right quantity to get the idea across but not outstay their welcome. Most importantly of all, though, it’s got exactly the same enthusiasm for absolutely everything that was there before, and I think it’s brilliant.

Tom: Right. And for once that’s reflected in the video. I want to go back to Vegas. Preferably with them.

Chiddy Bang feat. Icona Pop – Mind Your Manners

…well, now that’ll do very nicely.

Tom: Yesterday, I described Icona Pop’s new single as “not much of a song”. Earlier this year, I reviewed Chiddy Bang’s first single, (I’m) Ray Charles, with the three-word phrase “no you’re not”.

What I’m trying to say is this: on their own, I haven’t liked what I’ve heard from either of these artists. But together…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8GYe7LqTnTE

Tom: …well, now that’ll do very nicely.

Tim: Sort of – from the first second I saw those guys in white holding what might have been on first glance paintball guns, I was hoping there’d be some MASSIVE PAINT MASSACRE. Even though they were cameras. But they could still have been guns as well.

Tom: Both the song and its video seem to be happy but mostly incomprehensible. I don’t really mind that I don’t understand them, though; I’m too busy being caught up in what is a spectacularly infectious tune. Sometimes, simple and repetitive works.

Tim: Yes – unfulfilled video expectations aside, I can’t really fault this. The whole ‘there is no-one like me’ that seems to NEVER STOP just works really for me, and I like it. Would I like it as much without the video? Not quite as much, probably, but I still would.

Tom: By their powers combined: they’ve made a good track.

Icona Pop – I Love It

At least it doesn’t outstay its welcome.

Tom: Bit of moderate swearing in this one, just to warn our reader.

Tim: Prude. But actually, before we get going, I’ll be honest. Writing yesterday’s review, I wasn’t at my best, and felt somewhat lacklustre. But then I happened to come across this again, which appeared a couple of weeks ago, and which I never really got at the time.

Tom: I don’t really get it now.

Tim: Well, I sort of do. I won’t say the obvious, because I don’t, but it is pretty damn good. Why? Well, if I were back at school and that question was in a test and demanded an essay, I’d begin with something like: To answer that question, first we must consider why it is I don’t love it.

Tom: What?

Tim: I’d continue in that vein, blathering on, but basically making the point that what with tune being practically non-existent and the lyrics consisting of a four-line verse, repeating three times…

Tom: (A verse that seems a bit too inspired by the horrible Boom Boom Pow, if you ask me.)

Tim: …a second mini-verse repeated twice and a chorus made of a whole six words, the song barely qualifies to be described as such.

Tom: Only about two and a half minutes as well – at least it doesn’t outstay its welcome too much.

Tim: The thing is: that’s exactly what it should be. It’s not about singing, or making music, or caring about anything. It’s about acting as you would in the scenario set out in that very first line: “I got this feeling on the summer day when you were gone.” To whit, sod everything else, let’s have some fun without the crap boyfriend and shout about it. And that’s it, really.

Tom: Which is all fair enough, but well, it’s still not much of a song.

Tim: No. No it isn’t.