Umlauts

2005-12-19T11:54:00.000-08:00

Those wondering where my end of year round up can wonder no more. It's light-ish on Euro this year, so it doesn't really belong here, and as such, it is here. There'll be the odd repost of things featured on here, but never mind, the waffling is all new, baby.

2005-12-19T11:47:00.000-08:00

A little while back, I can't remember quite where, I enthused about "Isaac" by Madonna, and was wittily, if not devastatingly shot down by it being described as something that would be played at a "bad Greek disco". I wonder if Victoria Xalkiti is getting played at their discos too. I'm quite taken with her hit of a month or so ago called "Telia". I can't help but take the title to its Greek root, or something looking like it, as "telic" means pertaining to an end, and there's a fitting hopelessness to the wanton craving in "Telia", where even though her "heart is beating" and she implores her lover to "keep on singing", and the beat is percolating and jaunty and the vocal is breathy and felt, and the resolution is one of loss and resignation, as best typified by the pre-chorus "My heart is aching" which gives the truth the abnegating chorus only hints at in tone rather than lyrical theme. But it's a great, hooky little pop song too, skittering beats, a sneaking rhythm and a nice pulsing bass underpinning it, and if I'm not entirely sure of the sentiments, I like it more than enough as a meaningless collection of notes and instruments to enthuse.

Victoria Xalkiti - Telia

I have been remiss in not saying anything about the recent Venke Knutson album, I will admit, but I think it's largely because I'm so disappointed with it. The teaser single "Just A Minute" was pleasant but would have been one of the weakest songs had it appeared on her debut, and there's something Not Quite Right about an admittedly very pretty run through of "When The Stars Go Blue" done with World Idol Kurt Nielsen. The album does begin terrifically though, with "A Lot Of Love" sounding like a teen-girl expansion on the trusty literate-rock-pop-guitar template (think a girlier Fountains of Wayne, specifically "Amity Gardens", maybe, no, not The Click Five, you idiots), a tinny keyboard siren over its power-pop chords makes for a fantastic opening (particularly for an opening track), and the chorus is a winner. Venke's very good at vulnerability, even when she's ostensibly in a safe place emotionally - "Down by the water, by the boat" - and physically, but she's at her best when she combines it with a tinge of girlish determination to speak her heart, even when her ESL pop is occasionally clunky. But I love the way the guitars cut out in the second half of the choruses, before chiming adorably during the middle eight, and there's something.. awfully comforting about it. It sounds like a great record to have on as winter fades into spring, so I've missed the boat a bit, but if you're in the Northern Hemisphere, you might as well wait a month or so and then download it.

Sadly, as I intimated above, the rest of the album falls spectacularly short of this song, being as it is mostly inconsequential Nordic Lilith fare (haha, do you see what I did there?), at no other point does the alchemy between girly and confident gell like on here.

Venke Knutson - A Lot Of Love

2005-12-06T00:29:00.000-08:00

Having tried and failed to get a clean version of the #4 in Ukraine, I offer this corrupted radio version which has an annoying voice announcing the name of the station it comes from. But I did want to give y'all a chance of hearing it in full, as it POLARISED the PANEL and as such is CONTROVERSY and that's interesting isn't it?

NiKuz'ma Mogilevskaya - Timennedaesh

Of perhaps even more interests to pop fans is the fact that Vesna Pisarovic has recently "dropped" her new "record", and it is called "Peti" which means "fifth", thankyou Mind Taker, for that wonderful bit of insight, if you're reading please tell me where your blog has gone, I can't get to it, ANYWAY.

What you need to know about this album:

1. Vesna wrote "In The Disco" for Deen, possibly the gayest Eurovision song ever.
2. She also spiced up 2004 with the lovely "Ti Si Kriv" which is on this album, wonderfully.
3. It's quite good.

My favourite song of it is "Ovo Nije Moje Vrijeme", which I love for its extremely odd palette - a bit EE folk, a bit Turkish sashaying strings, a kind of coastal, a pastoral opening (I imagine this is kind of a Croatian coastal equivalent to those homely English country folk sounds), incongruous bleeps, and a bonkers brass bit in the middle and most of all, and those heavily punctuated Slavic bursts of vocal that I love. I mean, I like all of the other bits that combine to make the song, but I love particularly the way Vesna enunciates the alien consonant combinations.

While not knowing enough about the musical heritage of any of the things I write about, I admire that which takes lots of little bits that are comforting and familiar and mixes them up in an unfamiliar, even bizarre way, even though the cocktail probably seems familiar in Croatia. But yes, I'm awfully fond of it, it's strange and lovely. I hear the mountains, I hear the ocean, I hear.. all sorts of exotic things, pardon me, I am being an annoying, overbearing, ignorant tourist here....

Vesna Pisarovic - Ovo Nije Moje Vrijeme

Cross Europe Chart Challenge... of Death! UKRAINE

2005-11-23T05:43:00.000-08:00

Right, well this is a bloody long one. Partially to compensate for my glandular-fever-caused silence. And the fact that we have some new people. But Eastern Europe is interesting, isn't it? Yes, it is.

RW: Rob Willers offered to be my token, confused American, as the other ones have gone missing.
AM: Adrian Murphy is a Popjustice denizen.
AA: Also known as Whitney's Septum, Adem also is responsible for the amazing I'm Always Right.
AK: Andew Khan lives here - and I don't know why I don't have a link yet. My bad. LOOK AT THE PLAYLISTS!
PB: Patrick Blake manages to find Canberra a bit more pop than I did when I lived there.

1. Yulia Savicheva - Esli V Serdce Zhivet Lyubov
EO: 6, CA: 8, AM: 4, SS: 4, SN: 3, IM: 7, MT: 5, BL: 3, RW: 6, PB: 8, AA: 7, AK: 6, JP: 9
ADJUSTED SCORE: 6

EO: You may remember her being danced around by painted men in Eurovision last year and delivering a vulnerable (i.e. out of tune) performance of a frankly dull song, coming 10th or something due to neighbourly love.
AM: She's still got the ropey song, so maybe there are some painted men floating about too...
BL: A limp "angsty" ballad on which Yulia over-emotes. That's not a good sign. Can we get the late night piano and sleazy trumpet their own spin-off?
AA: Yulia is an 18 year old Russian girl whose nickname in her native town is "Matilda". She's done the Eurovision circuit and been singing since she was 4.
PB: It's got pretty instruments! Trumpety thing! Guitar! Piano! I could imagine Kimberley Locke doing this. It's all very radio friendly and darn good. Oooh and a big note bit near the end.
RW: The soft voices and choir ish background singers make it hard to give the song bad marks. The background harmony tends to be very catchy. I could never hit that high note that she does.
EO: Yulia probably couldn't hit that note either.
CA: I actually liked her Eurovision-entry 'I Believe' (even though Yulia sucked live) and checked out some other material of hers. I mostly found boring ballads (with exception from one called 'Korabli' which was rather excellent) but this is really good!
SS: She still sounds like Avril but now tries to sound like Shakira, if that makes sense.
EO: I find the way she sings the word "Lyubov" to be rather unconvincing, frankly.
IM: The opening of this is just lovely, very atmospheric in a generic but pretty way, and I kind of wish it had continued in that vein. But the build to the first chorus is extraordinarily well-handled, and the chorus itself is, if a bit undistinguished, fairly catchy. It's fairly cinematic - I could see this being used in some movie that involves a bunch of plucky underdogs saving the world and learning about the power of friendship or something.
SS: It certainly sounds dated, and in not such a good way, and the chorus is too repetitive, and don't get me started about the sax part! Silly! it's all a bit overdramatic isn't it?
SN: Inoffensive-but-dull verses + completely incongruous chorus (so long piano, hello acoustic guitar!) + utterly baffling trumpet solo and pointless wispy electronica = frustrating and bad. Proven by science!
MT: Kinda average ballad pulled out by a very passionate performance; too bad atasteless sax solo strikes in the middle of the song! I can't get over such a wretched idea, what where they thinking about?
AA: There is much guitar, combined with the promise of a key change: Now, I love a good key change as much as anyone around here. How horrifyingly disappointing it is, then, that it abruptly ends with not even an afterthought that we've all been robbed of an uplifting and euphoric finale.
CA: Ukraine always seems to give away the number one spot to ace songs, so to everyone who's reading this - if you're searching for a good song, go download the number one in Ukraine - you're guaranteed a good pop song.
JP: Anyone who shares their name with a member of t.A.T.u gets bonus points from me. I like how the verses are a poppy ballad, yet the chorus is quite rocky.
AK: She sounds a little perkier than usual in the chorus but it's still quite an average song that the Stock Russian Pop Trumpet Break does nothing to improve.

2. Via Gra - Brillianty
EO: 5, CA: 10, AM: 3, SS: 5, SN: 7, IM: 8, MT: 6, BL: 5, RW: 5, PB: 4, AA: 5, AK: 6, JP: 8
ADJUSTED SCORE: 6

AK: The return of Via Gra couldn't be more exciting for me. Along with Alcazar and Bodies Without Organs, they're probably the best pure-pop group in the world. The initial signs aren't looking too good though. Traditionally the first singles from the new releases have been ridiculously strong but, along with the previous one, Net Nichego...., Brillianty doesn't make the grade.
AA: It is very nice to see Geri Halliwell placing all her concentration into the Ukrainian market. You know, I could probably handle this with a stiff drink in my hands, but it’s 10:45 on a Friday morning and, apparently, I should at least wait until Lunch.
AM: VIA Gra, I think, introduce themselves in a "Call now for instant pleasure" voice. Hurrah. Pity, then, that the song is more damp-fumble-in-Gorky than a hot-night-with-Russian-spy-babe-in-exotic-Vladivostock.
MT: What a name for a band...indeed they sound like they were making music for an old porn movie, only with a vocal track on it. In case of using this for a porn flick of today, use a MIDI version of this.
SS: I like Via Gra. I think they started to decline when the big busty blonde (or was it the brunette?) left the band about a year ago.
AK: The chorus sounds quite good but the group is lacking an iconic lead singer in the mould of the sacked Alyona Vinnitskaya or the wonderful and equally sacked Anna Sedakova. Current head-girl Al'bina Dzhanabaeva doesn't have the same personality or vocal ability and it looks as though they've gone for an overly-busy backing track to try to compensate.
EO: Kind of wanky and jazzy but also kind of cocktail classy pop that doesn't have the melody to match its fabulous backing track. They call themselves "Nu Virgos" outside of Eastern Europe, and had a fairly big hit around a few European countries a few years ago called "Stop Stop Stop" that was rubbish, but they've had better songs. This isn't really one of them.
IM: This doesn't really hit its stride until the chorus when everyone starts singing, but then it sounds wonderful. Especially on the refrain where the horns kick in.
JP: I've heard of Via Gra but this is the first song of theirs I've heard. I like the "ooh"s and it's plentifully poppy, sounding quite like something you'd hear in the Swedish charts.
BL: This chugs along quite pleasantly: however many girls there are in the group trade lines, and the reasonably top-tapping verses and chorus blend together quite seamlessly. But then the Mad Bit strikes, about two-thirds of the way into the song, when the undead Jamie Cullum possesses the tune and it all goes a bit big band.
RW: This song reminds me of something I would hear at a wedding after all the drinks have been consumed. The rainbow of voices makes it sound very well dull. And don’t try to impress me with a few strokes on the piano. It is not working. Tolerable.
PB: Sounds like a big-band version of Hear'Say's "Everybody." It's just twee.
SN: The general mood is one of cheerful downtroddenness, which I like, and it’s in stark contrast to the nifty cabaret/second-rate game show flourishes shoehorned in here and there. Rubbish, ill-fitting coda though, and it’s never good to end on a bad note.
SS: They lost their trash unique Russian Europop stylee it seems and that's a shame, because that's what makes Russian pop work so well!
CA: I really really loved 'Bomba', and this is nearly as good. The chorus is so catchy, and I love how the production is really different from most pop songs floating around at the moment. Wow! This deserves to be number one everywhere! Forever and ever! VIA Gra is probably my new favourite band from Eastern Europe, judging from the two songs I've heard. They're like the Russian version of Girls Aloud.
IM: It's incredibly happy – I'm reminded of the anime theme tunes I've heard. The horns help, of course, but you don't get the kind of effect this refrain has just by using certain instruments, it's good pop songwriting all the way.

3. Valerij Meladze - Inostranets
EO: 10, CA: 8, AM: 5, SS: 8, SN: 9, IM: 7, MT: 7, BL: 2, RW: 2, PB: 10, AA: 9, AK: 8, JP: 9
ADJUSTED SCORE: 8

EO: A hymn, a chant, a dance, a rant. A dense electro-Europopping extravaganza. Genius.
AA: This is what Indecent Obsession would have sounded like if they had been heavy drug users, and tried to recreate Ace Of Base’s “All That She Wants”.
AK: Via Gra producer Konstantin Meladze is evidently saving the best songs for his brother. Despite Valerii's distinctive vocals being buried deep in the mix, it's a fine effort displaying the kind of unconventional, dramatic production that made his girl-group so interesting. It sounds like it could have been intended as a follow-up to their Pritayenia Bolshe Net collaboration.
SS: Now this is good retro! it's SO 90's, I hear some Engima, a bit of Ace of Base , a small pinch of Vangelis and that opera thing, it all goes so well together!
PB: It's Nanne Gronvall meets Maxi Priest and I love it. There is the sound of an elevator bell in it. There's something bleak about this song that, like, you know, like, reflects the Ukraine...and stuff.
MT: Song's fine but the thing that truly makes it for me here is the production; it sounds so huge! Cannot go wrong with stuff as bombastic as the scary bit at the end of the chorus.
IM: “Inostranets” is instantly one of my favourite words, and I don't know (and don't want to know) what it means – my mind is imagining some sort of bizarre super hero team or space program, and that's the way I like it. Luckily the song is ace too, with the kind of lush production that makes the opening 45 seconds near perfect.
AM: This man brings to mind a sort-of Ukrainian X Factor winner. Passable enough singing, with added melodramatic music, chanting and atmospheric guitars. These things make the song infinitely better.
CA: This is my idea of what an ideal Eastern European pop song sounds like. It's just so typically them, somehow. Atmospheric, catchy and deep.
SS: This is dated in a good way, I love that dramtic part with the violins twards the end! You just wait for it to explode.
SN: Scene: Some sort of dark Ukranian forest. A small child skips obliviously through the terrors of the night, as do the rather jaunty drums amongst the Electric Guitar of the Apocalypse. Suddenly old Valerij (dressed as the Big Bad Wolf, perhaps) leaps out from behind a gnarled tree and...I don’t know, eats her or something. Hilariously melodramatic and terrifying in equal parts, but all of it brilliant.
BL: I thought "Saliut, Vera!" was quite nice, but where that was effortless, this track's just terribly labored. It feels like there are too many people singing a chorus that has too many words, for one thing.
RW: Waste of time!
IM: I love the way they bring in the strings while keeping the rhythmic base fairly interesting. They probably don't need the guitar and those strings, but a little overkill never hurt anyone.
EO: Maybe the best thing he's ever done, at least as good as "Saliut, Vera!" or his duet with Via Gra from 2003 whose name I have forgotten.
AM: This could be amazing - if sung by some aging discodivadolly.
JP: The title sounds like a very hi-tech version of the Internet used in outer space. Maybe that is what it they're singing about, I wouldn't know. It's a dramatic male-sung pop song which I can bop along to with no language barrier.

4. NiKuz'ma Mogilevskaya – Timennedaesh
EO: 8, CA: 8, AM: 8, SS: 5, SN: 8, IM: 6, MT: 9, BL: 0, RW: 5, PB: 6, AA: 3, AK: 8, JP: 7
ADJUSTED SCORE: 7

SN: Accordions are trumped only by surf guitars on the novelty instrument food chain.
IM: The intro here is great enough, but when the beat kicks in and the accordion keeps going it's promising; unfortunately soon you can't hear it any more.
CA: Oooh! Electro-pop! Mixed with something that sounds like an accordion! This is what makes the Ukrainian chart so good, the mixture of genres and productions are simply brilliant. Its chorus is also amazingly catchy, even though the voices are slightly disturbing. It makes me wanna dance!
EO: I was about to say that it was a Soviet "Dragostea Din Tei" then I remembered that Moldova was once a Soviet Socialist Republic. Well, it still works for me.
PB: Ah! It starts off like the "Amelie" theme music, and then it goes all O-Zone!
JP: I'm not sure if it's a novelty song or just fun pop music, but I certainly like it.
AK: I was expecting it to go a bit Verka Serduchka from the accordion intro but it develops nicely into a muscular disco-pop anthem worthy of Ruki Vverh. Extremely catchy - i could easily see myself playing it when i DJ. It's amazing how Russian and Ukrainian stars continue to make fundamentally formulaic pop sound so fresh and exciting.
BL: First, one crap singer starts yelling, and then a second crap singer who has something up her nose joins in, as the beat boom-chaka-chakas away behind them. Blah blah blah ta-yeash! Bloo bloo bloo da-yeash! It's a veritable duet of ass.
AA: If sexual assault were a sound, it wouldn’t sound all that different to this number. A guy who sounds like the distant cousin of DJ Bobo, and a girl who is probably one of Marianne Faithfull’s bastard heroin-using-born children, if their voices don’t push you into slitting your wrists, the horrible “melody” will.
AM: Accordions and synths! What the whole world is waiting to hear. This turns into a cool euro-electro-pop song with chanty-type choruses and boys and girls singing. And one girl screaming. I like.
RW: The voices are almost cartoonish. And even though I speak no Ukrainian, this song is stuck in my head. I don’t know if that is good or bad.
MT: It starts with an accordion or something like that, which reminds me of a dance hit from a couple of years ago, sung in French, which name I cannot seem to recall right now. (Maybe In-Grid's "Tu Es Foutu?" - EO). Now, as Popjustice readers know, there aren't that many things out there that sound as pop as an accordion; it was a great start for the french hit, and it's a great start for this one. Then the bassline takes over, cutting the accordion in half, deeper than the sharpest stilletto...and from then on I'm totally sold. So this is how pop on a non-meta level works; the killer accordion and the bassline being the ripped ear in the yard from "Blue Velvet"; you start at a random familiar place like your room or the cybercafé I’m in, but you find this ticket to ride to and get pulled into a completely unexpected, outrageous land where anything goes. And it certainly goes wild; by the time the chorus arrives I find myself too sucked into the music to distinguish it; I can only feel it.
PB: It's a bit like that crazy German guy, Stefan Raab, or that crazy Austrian guy, Alf Poier! Actually, if I had to listen to this on the radio every day, I would get sick of it pretty quick. Actually, I'm sick of it now. It goes on a bit too long. There's something DIRTY about it.
SN: While I have no doubt that this group would piss me off in no uncertain terms if I actually knew anything about them or was forced to listen to them regularly on Ukraine FM (or whatever), this amuses me highly in the same way shiny objects do. Whee!
MT: What is one supposed to make of this, when one cannot stop to think about it and the only think allowed by the body is dancing?

5. Elektro Stance - Black Horse & The Cherry Tree
EO: 4, CA: 2, AM: 3, SS: 2, SN: 4, IM: 5, BL: 10, RW: 1, PB: 9, AA: 10, AK: 7, JP: 6
ADJUSTED SCORE: 5

AM: Elektro! Stance! Love the name. They've electrocuted KT Tunstall.
IM: I would never have guessed that this was a KT Tunstall cover if Edward hadn't told us; in any case, it's certainly better than anything Tunstall is likely to do herself. It's a little too generic for a trance-y cover to attain true bliss, but those “woo-ooh”s are very well used.
EO: KT Tunstall sang it. She's boring. Electro remake adds surprisingly little, retains all boredom.
CA: Boring. Next, please.
SS: Sounds like the never to be released Lasgo remix! I'm actually missing that guitar string beat thing from the original, it makes it all even more monotonic than it was in the first place
AM: Actually, in retrospect, it's just a crap remix, really, isn't it? My change of (elektro-)stance comes as they have failed to do anything good with the "no, no" bits.
JP: What a strange cover. I can't decide if it works or not, or in fact whether it's KT singing or someone else who is doing an extremely good impression.
SN: Pointless dance covers of timeless classics I can forgive, because it’s a little bit fun to read the often-illiterate rantings that gush from both the pro and anti camps in various forums worldwide. What I can NOT forgive is the pointless rejigging of a song that was hardly memorable to begin with.
BL: Come on. How is this even a fair fight? If an electro style cover of a KT Tunstall song that ends up sounding like the best record Girls Aloud never made doesn't win this Chart Challenge, I will go off and join a troop of performing monkeys. Or make my fellow panelists do so. Imagine taking the bassline of the Pet Shop Boys' "Flamboyant"; turn it up, speed it up, toughen it up; borrow some girls from Richard X and make them shout "two, three, four!" at opportune times; and then get a woman who has her country growls down pat to fiercely rattle off a Tunstall lyric that in this context suddenly sounds like Alison Goldfrapp's wettest dream. Well, what you imagined will still not be as good as this track, unless you are Elektro Stance. And if you are, I would like to meet you. The only way this could be better is if the line I misheard the first time I played this – "Colin Farrell on my back" – was the real lyric (sadly, it's actually "I fell in fear on my back"). I don't know why this is only #5. I don't care if it's because it has already been to #1, or on its way there; this should be at the top of this or any other chart forever and forever, and then probably for one more year after that.
EO: Ordinarily I would edit such a long screed down but it's so spectacularly out of step with everyone else it had to be reproduced in full.
PB: What a beat. Horses are so big right now aren't they, what with Goldfrapp and Madonna and such. And cherry trees are underrated outside of Japan, so this song is just great. That bass just makes me want to go to the toilet.
AA: Clever electro pop – probably the best song in this top 10 as well.
AK: My God, that's hilarious. Hats off to anyone that can make the abysmal KT Tunstall sound half-way listenable. Extremely well-done Italo-disco, as close to a club stormer as is possible with such unpromising starting material. It's bound to be a huge hit across Europe.

6. Aviator - Podarok
EO: 4, CA: 2, AM: 6, SS: 9, SN: 5, IM: 3, MT: 4, BL: 3, RW: 7, PB: 4, AA: 7, AK: 5, JP: 7
ADJUSTED SCORE: 5

AM: Aviator are a serious band. I can tell this by the opening bars which scream "serious band".
BL: I'm trying to find something nice to say about this inoffensive but unremarkable song in case Aviator turns out to be a hot boy band that I want to run the fanclub for. But all I've got is: "I quite like the way the strummy guitars and synths come together to end the song."
RW: It’s the Ukrainian Ricky Martin! I bet this singer is sexy. I can tell in the voice. And I know voices.
SS: When this started I expected in to go with a beat dance beat twards the chorus, but it seems to be a simple pop track with a guitar. I like simple pop tracks with a guitar, and this also has synths here and there to top it all!
SN: The Rhodes organ promises soulfulness. Perhaps this will be enjoyable, I say to myself! Then it’s whisked away at the 40-second mark to be replaced by the inevitable acoustic guitar and identikit drum programming and I proceed to curse Aviator for being so misleading.
CA: What's up with the synth sound in the beginning? It's very annoying. I like how it "morphs" into an acoustic song, but the melody isn't really getting to me.
AK: The intro reminded me a little of Marc Almond's version of Like A Prayer -it's a shame it fails to take off in a similar manner. It's a pleasant but instantly forgettable bit of fluff.
AA: You know, I’ve been telling my cousin for years he’d make a great Ukrainian pop/folk singer. Obviously produced in his basement, but it’s quite nice to see he’s finally taken my advice.
PB: It's pleasant, and I can imagine the video would have the "Aviators" flying around in litle Cessnas over the countryside. Smiling, and such.
AM: It skitters along in a nice fashion, with an Acoustics+ sound and some nice foreign-boy-singing. It would be a nice movie soundtrack, or the soundtrack to a few quiet drinks in a Kyiv bar.
IM: I don't know why, but I expected something more rockin' from a band called Aviator. Instead the dreaded acoustic guitar, signifier of blandness, shows up and the guy and his duet partner proceed to sing a cheap knock off of Iraklij's “Kaplia Absenta” , only without the dancefloor smoothness or sense of anguish.
JP: Wow, this is really Eurovision. I'm not sure how well it would do as it's a lot less mad than the other songs so far, but I quite like it.

7. Pinoccio - T'es Pas Cap
EO: 2, CA: 9, AM: 7, SS: 1, SN: 5, IM: 1, MT: 8, BL: 0, RW: 6, PB: 7, AA: 0, AK: 3, JP: 7
ADJUSTED SCORE: 4

JP: I seem to remember hearing about this doing well in France and it seems to be in French too. The backing music is quite annoying.
SN: The “Funfair of Horrors” theme they’re going for is quite good, but I really think it’s time to make those child labour laws more stringent.
BL: I think I'll go get my tubes tied tomorrow. Fucking children.
AK: I have an exceptionally high tolerance for novelty techno pop but even my nerves were tested with this one. In-Grid for six-year-olds is preferable to the Crazy Frog but i'd be perfectly happy never to hear it again.
RW: Is the kid singing 12? It is catchy and oddly entertaining. Nah nah nah nah nah nah nah nah nah nah nah nah! Down with child labour!
MT: Is this how pop sings in the post-Schnappi world? You won't get any complaints from me if this the way things are gonna be from now on.
CA: Is this the new Schnappi or something? I'm noticing it's charting in a lot of countries. The intro is infectious! Sorry but I love this. At least as long as it stays outside my country. So until then I think it's brilliant. Sorry again.
IM: This is a heartless-sounding “Schnappi” clone, and thus needs to be shot. It starts with a quasi-calliope that lets you know immediately how bad this will get, and I think the “cute” kid is a guy this time, but it's nightmarish in any case.
AM: I loved the intro to this, nice electro-pop-esque sound. Now it's Amy Diamond! Or a boy-version (I think). He's saying a lot about Té Cap. Oh! It's French. It's taken a verse and a chorus for me to realise this. Yay. I see me drunk in an Euro-disco 'Somewhere in Europe' tonight dancing like a tit to this.
MT: What I hear here is a very good grasp on what pop with no aspirations of meta should be: a killer keyboard line, weird instrumentation with no special purpose out of making me wonder in the first place (is that a castanet what I hear in the background?) and casting plain amazement on me in the second place (how did they think of that!).
PB: I'm annoyed I don't know what "cap" means or stands for. It isn't in my 1.8kg French dictionary. What ever it is, you're not it. French kids are too cute to hate.
IM: I've had to fight the urge to scream “YOU'RE NOT A REAL BOY AND YOU NEVER WILL BE!” every time I've listened to this.
AA: Oh. No. You. DON’T. What exactly is going on here? And could someone explain why Jordy – nearly 12 years on – does not sound any different than he did on his first single way back in 1993, "Dur Dur D'etre Bebe (It's So Tough to Be a Baby)”?
EO: One of the trials of editing this is that often, my brilliant gag is also used by one of the panel, and I allow them to have it, as I get to rewrite and they don't. On this occasion, it is my pleasure to be able to say: T'es Pas crap (Okay, not brilliant, but accurate).

8. Russkie DJ - Brilliantovaia Ruka
EO: 0, CA: 5, AM: 8, SS: 0, SN: 3, IM: 3, MT: 7, BL: 0, RW: 4, PB: 5, AA: 3, AK: 3, JP: 4
ADJUSTED SCORE: 3

CA: I'm not sure what to make of this.
EO: What exactly is this? Dance? Novelty? I can't really put my finger on it. I just know that I dislike it. It reminds this video I see on the Russian music channel we have, it has Santa with this sort of music, babbling some rubbish above it, is this Santa too I wonder?
SN: How do you review something that’s just a bunch of soundbites gathered from the mixing-room floor and spliced together by the work experience boy as opposed to any sort of structured entity? It’s like reading a book that’s had its pages ripped out and strewn around the house.
AM: Crap dance music meets crap folk music in a much-better-than-Mark-McCabe way. It's the kind of absurdly amazing rubbish I would love to hear as I bop my way down in a Kyiv nightspot.
JP: Two songs in one top ten with the word "brilliant"? This one, however, is not that brilliant. It's very busy, sounding like a cartoon theme tune and a football song combined.
MT: Sounds like fun to me but I can't help feeling I'm missing a lot of the joke here, even the most obvious ones!
SS: And am I the only one waiting for them to scream DUVAIJ DUVAIJ DUVAIJ DUVAIJ, Scooter stylee?
IM: The middle is an incoherent, whirring mishmash; the opening features someone sounding like a more laid back of the guy who opens CapaRezza's great “Guida Me”, and the end layers on more annoying self-shout outs than should be possible outside of rap mixtapes.
AM: It's got making-no-sense-even-in-Ukrainian talky-shouty-bits.
SN: There are atoms of brilliance to be found amongst the insanity, but this just has the net effect of pissing me off.
CA: I'm beginning to think that the Ukrainian chart is a circus in disguise.
PB: Well this is just mad. They sure know how to have fun don't they. If I knew what they were saying it would probably be even more funny. It's just all over the shop.
AK: I can imagine the video of "hilariously" speeded-up bits of 1970s Soviet sit-coms in my head as i type. Threatens to turn listenable when it starts ripping off Faltermeyer near the end but never quite makes it. It's a poor man's version of DJ Grib and DJ Grib was rubbish to begin with.
AA: It’s like having too much ketamine and trying to watch Sesame Street – great in theory but disastrous in action. Even Benny Benassi would be ashamed.
BL: You remember the climactic scene in that Hitchcockian suspense movie where the good guy and bad guy have it out in a crowded fairground? They pursue each other in a vaguely homoerotic dance of danger, pushing the poor cotton candy seller out of the way, until they finally end up on a merry-go-round for the final tussle. A gun rears its ugly head; our hero manages to push a young kid off his horsey and out of danger just in the nick of time. Everybody panics and screams as the gunshot ricochets wildly and somehow causes the merry-go-round to malfunction. No getting off now! Faster and faster the carousel goes, utterly out-of-control, while the music also speeds up into AN UNBEARABLE FRENZY. This song would be perfect for the comedy version of that scene.

9. Irina Bilyk – Navsegda
EO: 3, CA: 4, AM: 6, SS: 6, SN: 6, IM: 5, MT: 2, BL: 6, RW: 2, PB: 2, AA: 2, AK: 5, JP: 4
ADJUSTED SCORE: 4

SS: Oh a ballad. I was waiting for one. I like the piano when the chorus builds, but that's the only strong point it has, the rest of the song is a bit average.
BL: This mid-tempo ballad is devoid of shrieking moppets and carny clowns,so it already has a headstart on some of our other candidates.
JP: A girly song which is bearable, but gets quite boring as it doesn't seem to go anywhere.
MT: Lame lame average ballad, I suppose every chart in the world has a couple of this ones (Katie Melua, anyone?)
AK: Again, pleasant but forgettable. Does nothing to distinguish itself from a million other records released every year. Destined to end up as filler on a Soyuz compilation.
IM: This whole song has the same kind of feel as the intro to the Yulia Savicheva song at #1; but it never takes off and it's also not quite as soothing as that song was at first. It's pleasant, but nothing more.
CA: It's better than the new Jo O'Meara one, but still quite boring.
EO: There are sections of this that are really very pretty indeed, but not enough of them; perennially sounding like killing time before a good bit that never really comes.
AM: Passable ballady type, it has a nice chorus which helps. And ooh-wee-ooh-wee synthesiser (?) bit which is a teeny bit out of place.
SN: Being sung in a foreign language can do songs a lot of favours. Perhaps it’s easier to focus on the emotion behind the (undoubtedly terrible “moon/June” lyrics favoured by this genre of AM-radio ballad) lyrics and see that this girl is hurting, or at least is doing a mighty good job of sounding like she is. Which lifts this from “dull” to “dull but bearable,” which is an achievement in itself.
BL: I especially like that bit once we're there, where Irina leads the instrumentation: "la la lee lee noo noo" she sings (note: only a rough
approximation), and the piano follows ascendingly, deng-deng-deng-deng-deng, a beat behind. I enjoy as well the "oooh-ooh-oooh" synth sound that ends each chorus. To sum up, for those joining us late: nice bit into the chorus, nice bit in the chorus, nice bit out of the chorus. You're
welcome.
AM: Oh, there's some drums near the end. They were unexpected.

10. Valeriya – Klyuchiki
EO: 7, CA: 7, AM: 5, SS: 7, SN: 6, IM: 4, MT: 6, BL: 4, RW: 2, PB: 6 AA: 9, AK: 6, JP: 5
ADJUSTED SCORE: 6

AK: I'm starting to lose hope that she'll ever recapture the brilliant form of the Glaza Tsveta Neba album but she's a reliable source of undemanding, fairly amusing pop.
EO: Endearing, unchallenging, lighter than air and about as fulfilling. But good for its duration, which, in a consumer culture, is more than enough for a transient chart hit.
MT: Valeriya sounds kinda like an Argentinian singer with huge fake boobs called Laura Miller.
CA: Ooh! More pop circus! With this being the last song on the chart and everything I can must say that the Ukrainian chart is highly underrated. It's more fun than the German, Swedish and UK top 10s added together. No James Blunt, no hip-hop what so ever, lots of catchy electro and four songs that sounds like they're taken straight from a merry-go-around. What more can you ask for?
SS: Oooh I was waiting for a song that reminded me of Ruslana!
IM: The wailing backing vocals that start the song are a nice touch, and the lead singer has a voice that reminds me both of Shakira and of Ruslana at times (a definite plus).
AA: This is “top banana”. A chorus that’s more infectious than Chicken Pox, it’s such a pity I cannot understand what she’s on about. My mother, bless her heart, would simply adore this. I would definitely vote for Gloria Estefan to maybe attempt a Spanglish version too… could you JUST imagine? No? Well, no, neither could we.
AM: Warbling! This opens with some unbeatable warbling. You can't get enough warbling in post-Eastern bloc music.
SN: Pedestrian verses, which just seem to drag for hours, even though in reality it’s probably only seconds.
AM: The chorus itself is catchy and bouncy enough, the woman singing is either a leggy model or a mail-order-bride type. I can't help but feel a better dance beat behind this would make it Top 5.
SN: Nice sing-songy bridge, quite a serviceable chorus, um…it’s alright, I guess, though it doesn’t appear to be making any serviceable impact on any areas of my brain.
JP: I love the beginning of this song, but the song itself is a little disappointing. The beginning is the most (or only) dramatic bit.
IM: Note that in the chorus those backing vocals do most of the heavy lifting, though; a little interesting texture in your singing does not a good performance make. This could have been good, but it never really comes together.
SS: Send this to Eurovision Ukraine!
PB: PB: Oooh this was starts off with some impressive chanting and pretty wind instrument and Eastern sounding twangy instument. Then it gets rather average and like a sub-standard Swedish non-Melodifestivalen entrant all the way through. Then right near the end the chanting comes back and it's wonderful. Like those Estonian teachers! Not as good as Ruslana.
MT: It starts the way one of those horrible midtempos by Sting would start, but she does a good job of building a bit of drama towards the chorus so I suppose I should like this; and since I’m such a predictable chap, I do have fonds feelings for this in my heart.

54 points. And here, then, is Valerij Meladze's song, EASILY the best song this round - BAH to the rest of the panel, it's not even close, you guys! I will also post #4, which came second, but, I am kind of looking for a good MP3 of it. I have one with a radio watermark over the top of it, annoyingly. Watch the skies, people.

Valerij Meladze - Inostranets

What's top 10 in Ukraine at the moment?

2005-11-21T23:13:00.000-08:00

Well, this. [MP3 Montage]

Well it's a Ukrainian top 10, the most official looking one doesn't seem to have updated in a bit, so this is just.. well, I've long given up on the concept of officialness and objectivity.

Cross-Europe Chart Challenge post extravaganza on this coming in the next day or so, along with (gasp) the two highest scoring songs. Yes, #5 IS really an Italo-dance cover of THAT song.

Moon Taxi - Moonwalk

2005-11-05T01:31:00.000-08:00

(Yes, I know I said I'd post lots of things. I haven't. I'm not very sorry because I am busy. I promise, or is it, I threaten, I will have my think-piece on UK chart pop, with specific reference to the differing paths of various writing and production groups up at some point).

ANYWAY. Rather than mothball while I'm busy, I share. I'm not sure where this comes from, but I know it's done fairly well in Estonia and Latvia and Russia, so could be from any of those. And very great this is. Oh sure, the elements when boiled down to their components are so cliched as to make me feel a little embarrassed for liking and posting, but when put together, oh, it's quite good.

For a start, it's not happy, which you'd expect. Like the t.A.T.u. song "Cosmos"/"Kosmos", the space theme is kind of bleak, and if you don't get the hint from the vaguely searching (if not spacy) vocals, you'll get it when you get some shuddery sampled guitar underneath the verse. But oh, that's not why you listen. You listen for the tinkly piano, the Benny Bennassi-lite squelch/fart bass, the backing vocals in the break in the middle, the radio transmissions, and oh the general air of loneliness that can only be fully expressed with a preposterous (over)extended metaphor.

Reminds me a bit of a less manic version of Cascade's "I Need A Miracle", but also, there's another moderately big dance Eurohit from the last two years the chorus melody is very reminiscent of. Anyone who points out what it is will get.. my eternal love!

[MP3]
(and yes, sorry, posts will be at a trickle until December)

The Cardigans - Overload

2005-10-18T22:53:00.000-07:00

Having admitted to themselves, possibly, that they will never ever top "Lovefool", a song they don't even like particularly, repeated changes in direction have paid off pretty well for The Cardigans, artistically, and at least in Scandinavia, commercially.

So the fact that their new album is very much in the same vein as their last could be a bad thing, but they've refined the formula. As such, "Overload" is in the running to be probably the second best song they've ever done (well, it's a close run thing with "Paralyzed" and "Lead Me Into The Night" for my money, but anyway). I'm fascinated by Nina Persson's delivery, how she manages to take what is on paper for the most part a hugely romantic lyric, pace it as a slow dance, which is also kind of romantic, and sing it as if she's just had the stuffing beaten completely out of her - ennuied, bruised and helpless, despite the fact that she's a pretty girl in a successful band who in real life surely wouldn't have to put up with any shit from a beau.

It's good acting. And it's a wonderful song. The slightly incongruous middle section is what fascinates me the most. The music almost cuts out before being replaced by some comparatively charging guitars while Nina sings "I'm hot, baby don't burn your finger", and where, say, Robyn would have sung that line as some kind of salacious come-on (viz Konichiwa Bitches), it's rueful and lamenting, and leaves me wondering if she's not more worried about hurting someone than being hurt herself.

She resignedly requests her paramour "Dance me home", after having declared that "True love is to dance" - but she's only learning. It's the sound of a woman pouring herself out of the frying pan into the fire, but it wouldn't be if it weren't such a sterling, felt vocal performance, which make the backing seem almost inconsequential. But it's worth listening for that too, the mix of the sweet and sour has returned, and if you throw in a music box or a flute to add to the arrangement in your head, you can almost believe that this is the same band that once did saccharine but lovingly sarcastic songs like Carnival and Hey! Get Out Of My Way.

I heartily recommend the album, which is out in Europe this week.
[MP3]

Laam - Petit Souer

2005-10-18T22:43:00.001-07:00

I am totally loving this track at the moment. I am equally thrown by the way that the opening suggests it's going to be some kind of Francophone Whitney-esque ballad, and then it insteads turns into a Francophone Whitney-esque 80s dance-R&B stormer. Dig those cascading, sashaying swings over the second verse that return in stabbing format in the chorus! Sway your shoulders! Scramble to your French-English dictionary to find out what "souer" means (could someone do this? Babelfish draws a blank)! And love the way the song completely dies at the end, pulling off the hackneyed but sometimes effective slower-more-minimalist-tapering-wavering version of the big chorus with aplomb. I have no idea why the French still can get away with this sort of thing (see also Kayliah's single from earlier in the year) when I can't stand it from the U.S., even given my traditional dégoût for French as a language.
[MP3]

(Big thankyou to the lovely anonymous person who has pointed out the title is in fact "Petit Soeur", and who did so without mocking my appalling typing and worse ignorance.)

2005-10-12T05:10:00.000-07:00

More substantial post on this tomorrow, but I just have to say, on the subject of the now-CD-quality rip of "Biology" by Girls Aloud...

FUCK ME THIS IS GOOD.

2005-10-06T05:59:00.000-07:00

Not that you should need any further encouragement, but if you are in the UK and even remotely on the fence, buy the Rachel Stevens album. This is why. My import copy will take a while to arrive, so enjoy yours.

2005-10-05T20:00:00.000-07:00

I wrote a post the other night but I lost it in a blackout. How preposterous. Anyway, then.

Simone Cristicchi - Ombrellino

I don't think I've done a very good job selling this man to my minuscule audience, but I've got this post and a full-length review going up on Stylus next week, and I will do so eventually. The title means "umbrellas", you know. I'm absolutely fascinated by the art of pastiche, and Simone simply does this brilliantly; he does swing, rap, gorgeous balladry, samba on his album, well that is to say he approximates them and does them in a way that's different to what you would expect and seems utterly unique. On this song, the reference points are probably the more psychedelic end of 1960s pop in the guitar solo and the crowd-chanted chorus, and the more pure pop end of the same decade in the melody. I'm specifically thinking of what The Monkees would sound like if they'd come out in the 1990s (no, I don't mean it sounds like Supergrass either). It's not quite the best song on the album, but it's certainly the most infectious, immediate good-time pop song on there, which makes it more appropriate than my current favourite which is a folksy half-ballad thing. I've said before that I love the sound of Italian being sung, but I don't seem to like a lot of Italian pop (last year I only really liked three things: Gabry Ponte, Luca Dirisio, Paolo Meneguzzi; all three had quality singles), and I find the Italian chart a curiosity; Blue are the biggest thing ever there, and they like Jentina. And The Servant! Which is kind of bizarre. The language barrier will preclude this ever crossing over, much as it did with the amazing Caparezza LP from last year, but you owe it to yourself to investigate deeper; the man's a unique talent.

Reflex - Tantsy

You would already know that "Tantsy" means "Dance", and if you didn't, you should pay attention to more Ruslana. English-speaking artists don't generally call their songs "Dance", now, do they? Except Shaznay Lewis, and look what happened to her. You'd already know that my tolerance for squeaky Slavonic vocalising is extraordinarily high, and what would otherwise be irritating to right-thinking listeners - here, some fantastic whistling - is the star attraction in my head. But aside from all that, it's a pretty thumping, rapid-fire and exceedingly dated (in a good way) little Eurodance stormer with a section that threatens to turn into a rap near the end, but mercifully doesn't, it just blasts on with striking effiency and only a slight dip in relentlessness. And whistling! Genius.

West End Girls - Domino Dancing

This has been knocking around on my wishlist for a while, and it popped up last night, after Popjustice went on about it. But here it is downloadable! There aren't enough Pet Shop Boys covers, I can think of artists who've done "West End Girls" (East 17) and "Jealousy" (Dubstar), but that's about all, unless you count that dreadful tribute album that came out a while back (Momus doing "So Hard", put it away, please). So the promise of a duo who do nothing but cover their songs is a fantastic idea. And where better to start than one of their most unfairly maligned creations? What I always loved about "Domino Dancing" was how it seemed to predict exactly what video game soundtracks would sound like in the very late 80s and early 90s. Yes, I go on about this an awful lot, but bear with me. So, by sounding like that very same subgenre of music, this seems like a perfectly natural progression, almost a direct descendent sonically, while being a faithful melodic representation. All the distinct touches have evolved into a slightly knowing, but likeably twitchy Swede-pop cover. It's amazing how much a different voice changes Neil Tennant's lyrics at time, here these girls don't sound old enough to know what the song was ostensibly about, but the slightly lost, wary feeling of the original remains even amongst the carefree punchy backdrop. No doubt, the Swedes cut to the melodic heart of whatever they do and make it work.

More pop, two updates in one month, whatever next.

2005-09-22T19:21:00.000-07:00

Skyrabin - Xaj Bude Tak Yak Xochesh Ty

Interesting conversation with Chris of SoS fame about why the Ukrainian charts are so great. I still don't know why, but apparently Alexander Bard thinks it, and that's a man you can trust, isn't it? Anyway, I spotted Skryabin in their top 10, liked the single, and thought I'd sample the album, and buried toward the end of it, found this absolute gem.

I'm not entire sure if it's folk-rock, a Ukrainian New Order, but I love those keyboard wails, and the way that the female backing vocals become louder and more prominent throughout as the track goes on. And listen a few times, because the voice that sounds annoying at first really gets under your skin. I am actually going to say something more about this in a bit and update the entry, so consider this a work in progress (though not Work In Progress, as they're not good.).

Hind - Give Me A Sign

Listen to it and try not to think about Eurovision 2005 with all those blend-of-east-and-west songs. For Hind have been doing this for a while, indeed, their 2003 hit "Summer All Over Again" was almost great - the arrogantly lush production nearly made up for a relatively slight tune, but on this, they've absolutely blown Javine, Helena, that Albanian lass, and everyone else out of the water with this dense, exciting song. It's belted out diva-style, the very last line of the chorus would be worthy of Beyonce - it's absolutely a snip to think of this as a fabulous Euro-R&B song given fabulous pop heft with the Arabic and Eastern European lilt without once seeming forced.

And the emotion. Pure and believable! A final chorus that explodes out of the tinny speakers on my work computer. And yet, a kind of inner deadness, like none of it matters after it's over - "Shout out the words with no fear!", and there is none, even though the drama suggest that's all it should be. I've said many times that great pop should be great theatre too, and you can almost visualise elephants, bastard princes, hot sand, sword-fights and betrayal while this plays. A hodge-podge in the absolute best way.

And, lastly, my favourite song of the month:

Simone Cristicchi - Studentessa Universitaria

The point being that you should always listen to Dom Passantino, who was completely right about Simone's first single, which I only liked at the time, but now love. But I'm getting in first on his magnificent second. Acoustic bubblegum in feel, but with some variety of beating heart to provide emotional affect.

Does anyone know that quote that goes something like French being a language to do business in, Italian to cook in, and Spanish to make love in? Or something like that? I read it somewhere. Because I've decided that Italian is officially the language to be slightly rueful and lamenting in. Well, unless you're Gabry Ponte or Caparezza.

Apparently about being in love with a depressed university student, and certainly the only pop single in recent memory to feature the word "jurisprudence", the language is, as ever, no impediment to the sheer degree of felt-ness that Simone crams into this story. It's not as light-hearted as "Vorrei Cantare Come Biagio" - even in another language wit and whimsy can come across loud and clear - was, in fact, the strummed, lolling guitars are perilously close to beanie-wearing tosser buskers, but the sheer euphony of the half-Italo-rap in the verses (Caparezza is a vague reference point, if only because they both have black curly hair), and the enunciation on the syllables in the chorus place the exact right amount of emotional hit on the subject. And that chorus melody, god, something about it tears me up ever so slightly inside. She's pathetic, and he loves her. His portrait of her sounds both sympathetic but ever so slightly damning at the same time. She waits for her philosophy class, her father sends her money, she takes photocopies, she mopes, you identify ever so slightly with both narrator and subject.

I mean, it's practically folk rap isn't it? That's an accordion, isn't it? That's your heart breaking ever so slightly now, isn't it? Caparezza's wordplay, Tyler James' strut, only successul, and the attraction to doomed girls worthy of Jarvis Cocker. Officially my new favourite pop star on the entire planet.

Later, my thoughts on Shelley Poole and some Pay-TV album tracks.

On the stereo in Casa Umlauts at the moment.

2005-09-12T19:03:00.000-07:00

Since I no longer care about being up-to-date, or with it, these are simply the last three songs I listened to.

Linda Bengtzing - Diamanter

Thankyou, Patrick, for forcing me to listen to this, though of course I only had to be forced to do so once. It gains immediate points for the intriguing string beginning which hints that it might be a ballad, but a good one, before completely shattering that illusion with the requisite big Swedish beats and the big Swedish hooks. Certainly it helps if you've already surrendered to the gigantic collective charms of Shirley Clamp, Lena Ph and company. Oh, and it's in Swedish, but it doesn't matter. Love the 80s pop-rock (that is to say, female singers in the 80s whose producers said "Let's give this a bit of a rock feel, rather than actually making a rock song) touches in the verses, and the shamelessly expansive choruses with the supremely confident, infatuated delivery Linda musters to take it into the stratosphere. Basically, listen to it and be stupidly happy.

Texas - Can't Resist

Oh, it wouldn't be exaggerating the matter to say that I've disagreed with Popjustice quite a bit recently (i.e. "Don't Play Nice" > "Wake Me Up", the Goldfrapp album isn't all that, and the Kaiser Chiefs, REALLY NOW!), but for all of you who snickered when he said that this track from their forthcoming album, pencilled in as the third single, was a Xenomania classic, commence eating your words NOW, because liking, or at least grudgingly respecting Texas is now mandatory, or will be soon. If "Summer Son" had had the guiding hand of Brian Higgins to take it exactly where you wanted it to go, basically. Sharleen Spiteri is actually rubbish at conveying desire or recklessness or passion, but she's pretty good at doing resignedly helpless, and when the song's called "Can't Resist", that's what it's all about.

I love the chorus's repetitious verbosity. I love the breakdown in the middle where some comparatively less treated guitars provide a ghostly backdrop for the narrative's tender-trapped lament. I like the chorus which is nimble without the slightly ill-fitting attempts to "break free" that Texas tried on still-quite-good single "Getaway".

T & F vs Moltosugo featuring Moony - De Fact

Well, it's just gone into spring here, so I'm finally properly in the mood for this. Moony, you'd of course remember from DB Boulevarde's "Point of View" and her own minor classic "Dove", and every sound out of her mouth basically is pure Venetian disco heaven emanating from the down-top of a car down the coast. I mean, in essence, it doesn't matter that lyrically, it's half rubbish about a DJ who can spin all night, and half generic love, her voice soars over both incongruous halves with most of the same effect, bringing a sun-kissed romanticism that is often left out of this kind of thing. In essence, if it sounds like love when she sings about the coolest track, why not stuff that into the mix too?

Sonically, this is a bit fantastic, too, the purest kind of ear confection - crisp, danceable beats, nothing jarring or squalling to kill the feelgood and that voice, I've gone on about it before, though never on a blog, but the way she holds those notes with this amazing degree of warmth - it's a magic thing. I just wish she'd get more regularly fantastic material to do it on - surely this woman will make the next great disco single, maybe the last.

More t.A.T.u. album gubbins

2005-08-28T02:27:00.000-07:00

I wrote a long post about two leaked album tracks and my computer died, so here I go (impossible?) again.

"Dangerous and Moving", is, in its Russian incarnation, the first single released in Russia. It appears twice on the album, firstly, the intro is track 1, and that's repeated along with the rest of the song proper at the end of the album. It's notable in that its lyrics read like a mantra of defeat. "Not Gonna Get Us" indicated the chase, this almost is a concession of defeat:

Obscales and signs, perilous and looming
Dangerous and moving, dangerous and moving

Some of the techno and torch has been toned down, the unstoppable charge forward remains, but it's still somewhat subdued. It's built upon a very 90s synth-trance keyboard line - that style is still very popular in Eastern Europe - and some slightly more modern beats, but underneath that, there are some "actual" instruments that give the song's defeatism away. When the big synths are playing, they're running and making ground and getting away. When they cut out, it's as if the protesters, the chasers and the naysayers are getting close and the story's going to end. Which is appropriate for an album closer or a cliffhanger, no?

Even for t.A.T.u. the vocals are particularly strangulated and urgent, even when set against such an abrasive backing as they are here. The closest sonic relative of the non-techno parts of this song would be Garbage's "You Look So Fine", well, its outro anyway, particularly in the sludgy guitars that coat the whole thing in death three minutes in, and there's a thematic link - in both songs, even as the lyrics declare that everything's going to continue against the struggle, the music, the melody indicates that it's a hopeless cause. Lena and Yulia can get past every obstacle thrown at them in their narrative (and this is a fantastic continuation of their script), but there will always be more, and there's an air of futility in the struggle, particularly as the song fades out bleakly. It's a definite winner.

Also a winner is track three, "Cosmos (Outer Space)" which starts out sounding like "30 Minutes" off the first album, but develops into a muscular, bassy prowl, with some fantastic growled vocals. I could easily be confusing the t.A.T.u. lasses' attempts to get around unnatural English sounds with passion. Like "30 Minutes" and also "Clowns", the lyrics are gibberish - rudimentary ESL rhymes ("fly away/time machine" indeed), but it's extraordinarily felt gibberish all the same. This song was originally only going to be in Russian, and a lot of the fansites seemed surprised it's popped up as an English version.

The flow reminds me a bit of "We Didn't Start The Fire" of all things. It's delivered with more than enough charm to make even ME who doubted how many permutations of the running away from the nebulous people trying to break up our duo would be workable as pop songs, realise that, given that the essence of tATu isn't lesbianism, it's rebellion and forbidden love, the concept can certainly go on forever.

It culminates, splendidly, with a delightfully meaningless chorus:

Our home forever is outer space!
Let's dance on endless seas - outer space!
New hope, new destinies - outer space!
Forever we'll be in outer space, outer space!

It's definitely the most rock song they've ever done, definitely the "heaviest", as useless a measure as that is, but the vocal training Yulia's had has really paid off - she's screaming beautifully here.

The anticipation for the rest of the songs is massive in Casa EO.

t.A.T.u. - Cosmos (Outer Space)

Quick!

2005-08-27T22:35:00.000-07:00

Go here now and hope it's still up for download because "Crazy", the new single by Andy Bell, best known as half of Erasure is a complete mindfucking stunner of the highest calibre.

It's one of these things, the word "disco" in the purest sense of the word (forgetting things like say, "Dove" or "Groovejet") hasn't been made in years, so what hack critics (hi!) mean when they say it isn't what it really is, but it's still a useful term because usage dictates definition in lexicography. Anyway, disco lately seems to have been swept up with glam. And punk. Not the much more obvious (and well-visited) bed-fellow of synth-pop. And that's what "Crazy" does. It is simply the most propulsive dance pop single I've heard this year. That bass line is dirty, throbbing and almost certainly 100% fake.

Andy's vocals - he hasn't sounded this good in years - are astonishingly emotive; uplifting and passionate. His little dramatic inflections and ad-libs are fantastic, and the strength of his voice is incredibly nuanced and rich. Synth strings come into your ear as sirens during the chorus before sweeping across much like Andy's Erasure partner Vince had a hand in it - he didn't, but he is doing one of the remixes - and basically, every ingredient necessary is present and correct.

For starters, that chorus is a gigantic fuck-off massive thing, yelled at top volume as if its words are the most important message communicable. It's got lyrical hooks everywhere that will function as clarion calls to, and on, the dancefloor if you're lucky enough to hear it near one ("When you put your hand in my hand/I go down and I go crazy for you" chief amongst them - you've got to hear it to understand, mind). There's a constant ebb between euphoria and tension. It's lovestruck, giddy and yet still cautious. It's a great pop song for the kids, made by a 40-year old man, and that thudding beat may as well be the sound of Jimmy Somerville collapsing with sheer jealousy.

It's exceptional pop music, and I don't think I've heard very many better in 2005 - I'll wait a week before declaring it the best song of the year, but the odds are very much pointing to it at present.

2005-08-24T20:02:00.000-07:00

Some pop then? Why, yes, I think so. Despite, or because, I'm half-Polish, I tend to get a bit down on Polish pop. Frankly, it's rubbish. As I mentioned a while back, I downloaded the entirety of one of their radio top 10s (they don't have a real chart) and either 9 or 10 of them were ballads. We all know ballads are shit, don't we? Yes, indeed.

But Marta Wisniewska, aka Mandaryna probably doesn't do many ballads! Her single of last year "Here I Go Again" was a monster (left off my top 100 list because I forgot about it, as I am a complete pillock), and her new album features a song called "You Give Love A Bad Name" that I am REALLY HOPING will be a Bon Jovi cover. But since I haven't heard the album yet, and I've never written about the single "Ev'ry Night" yet, I thought I would say something.

Mandaryna - Ev'ry Night

It sort of reminds me a bit of Lena PH's smashing Laura Branigan pastiche "Delirium", so between this and the Royal Giglos remix of "Self Control", it's a shame Ms B isn't still alive to relaunch as this particular branch of pop would basically be completely suited to her and most of the crop of teeny and twenty performers are boring, so let's have a proper diva for once.

What I find most effective about "Ev'ry Night" is how deceptive its tempo is. If you took away the straightforwardly bopping groove, it would be almost ambient trip-hop in the verses. Well not quite, the melodic line is far too nimble for that, but I did a channel mix on it, and it almost floated through the speakers as a result. Of course, much of this generic (yeah right, people aren't making ENOUGH of this stuff) dance lives or dies on its chorus, and Mandaryna's got a good one, she breathes softly under it - I love the backing vocal arrangement on this - lending it a sense of cyclical complexity the simple hook wouldn't otherwise have. Love it.

Mleko - Kto Dogoni Psa

More Eastern European hip-hop, because I like it. And yes, they seem to be Polish as well.No, they're not interchangeable, this one is different. Spy-movie guitars, for a start, that sound effect I've always referred to as the "magnetic field" noise for want of knowing its actual name, and, the piece de resistance, CHILDREN CHANTING THE CHORUS. So if you've opened your heart to Schnappi at any point (for the record: liked it first few times I heard it but that was LAST YEAR, so a bit over it), there's really absolutely no excuse to not listen to this at least once. No wait, I've realised what it sounds like, it sounds like "Under The Gun" by Supreme Beings Of Leisure with rapping on it. He looks like this, sadly. But given how complex Eastern European languages sound spoken to those who don't speak them, rapping always sounds about five times more impressive still.

Okay, there's my ethnic heritage salvaged for this month.

Irina - Ala Sano Mitaan

Everyone knows the only time guitars are acceptable are when you have a pop girl singing in front of them, and you may wonder how a blog that calls itself Umlauts hasn't managed to work out how to get them to display properly (looks fine on my screen when I type 'em, but fucks up when I post 'em), so you'll just have to imagine that all the As in the first and third words have diacritical marks above them. Irina has been peddling her simple but effective schtick around Finland for some time now, check out earlier single "Vastaukset" for a milder example, but this is one of those lovely full-throttle things where you have a verse, and then a MASSIVE chorus, and then wait, you're wrong, that MASSIVE chorus is only really a pre-chorus, because there's an even bigger yowled EXTRA chorus waiting at the end with extra impassionedness and extra volume, crunchier guitars, more spastic flashes of keyboard, and then a middle-eight where Irina does some Gwen Stefani-esque vocal chord flailing (you know that vocal gurning she did on all the quiet bits of No Doubt hits - that exact effect), and it's all generally pretty smashing. I haven't found out if she's got an album, but I want it badly.

So, this TATU single then.

2005-08-12T02:40:00.000-07:00

"All About Us" shows us a t.A.T.u. no longer bonded together physically like moths to flame and iron filings to a magnet, but more psychologically bound - the urgent "If they hurt you, they hurt me too" suggests Lena and Katina as a kind of unitary entity. No longer staring at people trapped behind a fence (of their own prejudice), blowing up carousels in jealousy or running for their lives, it's more like the lesbianism is a way of fulfilling a deep psychological requirement of companionship and allegiance rather than a physical. A tight, inseparable unit where the tie is unbreakable and it probably only vaguely goes into the realm of the sexual if the listener insists on that interpretation.

Sonically, it's a fantastic statement of intent that adds some Swedish lilt to its bleak Russian frost. Personality-wise, t.A.T.u. are absolutely at the top of their games, inhabiting this amazing narrative, even if the words, at their purely denotative level are completely banal, with sheer force and determination. The back story of fake lesbianism actually gives this distinctly non-sexual song a useful context. If anything, it establishes Lena and Yulia more like a friendship that crosses into the sexual incidentally rather than deliberately or even consistently. Inseparable, at least on record, if not in reality, if you can understand. The teenage girls will, and they know more than twenty-something amateur critics.

The middle section is absolutely arctic with chill, but that chorus has wings once you get over its relative lack of parent-disobeying, rebelling sturm und dreng. The us-against-them of "Not Gonna Get Us" is the nearest thing thematically, the musical drama seems to be most closely related to "Show Me Love", and if your first listen indicates it's a lame duck, give it another. You'll find the way each repetition of "it's all about us" has slightly different intonations, which reminds you of the amazing break after the first chorus in the still-astonishing epic of "All The Things She Said".

It's great pop. It plays with their history, while not being controlled by it. As with the Sugababes' new one, this is a pop group at the height of their powers on a personality/thematic level, and as such quality of the material almost doesn't matter. But the material's extremely good, so we all win.

Breathtaking.

Back to the Baltics...

2005-08-03T07:53:00.000-07:00

Enamoured of these two tracks at the moment. Can't log into my regular webspace at the moment, but while I have more contributors than readers, YSI shall suffice.

I don't know anything about Neplagiat or St1m (yes, a 1, I'm sure), but I do know that Po Novoj! by Neplagiat featuring St1m is a quite enjoyable little bit of Latvian pop-rap. The interplay between the vocalists is cute, the melody is intensely hummable, the words are nonsense, I don't care. It reminds me of Pikku G, actually, so I initially thought it might be Estonian, but it does appear to be from Latvia.

Neplagiat - Po Novoj!

Actually from Estonia are B-Jeans, who on the strength of this song appear to be some kind of alternate-universe Baltic Ladytron, except poppier. There are vague textural similarities, anyway, at least if you're not talking about the new Ladytron album. There's definitely a bit more lightness in this, a fairly joyous (if somewhat sterile) and mostly meaningless (even in Estonian) chorus and the treated-so-they-sound-distant vocals give it an air of detached electro-cool. This stuff just doesn't travel, but it really ought to.

B-Jeans - Ei Saa

Cross-Europe Chart Challenge... of Death: RUSSIA

2005-07-31T02:31:00.000-07:00

On we go. Nine "new" songs, lots to say about them. Welcome to the man known only as Brittle Lemon (BL), recovering ex-blogger who's been "starting" a music blog for about five months now.

If you're playing the Umlauts Drinking Game at home, I suggest you take a drink every time something is praised by comparing it to Girls Aloud. You'll be incapable of driving or operating heavy machinery by the time the last song comes on.

1. BRATIA GRIMM - Resnitsy
EO: 6, IM: 6, BL: 2, SN: 5, MT: 0, DV: 2. Adjusted score: 3

JP: This sounds a bit like Lonely No More by Rob Thomas played backwards! It's quite an improvement, actually.
EO: Fairly revolting in theory, but in practice a harmless pop song with guitars. Actually, the guitars are good, I like the crispness and density of the riff and rhythm - that goes for the vocals too, but the tune doesn't do anything for me. A little bit of Spain in this one, seemingly, but I'd suggest the wrong bit of Spain on this occasion (i.e. the ones that listen to indie rock), even if it does improve on subsequent listens. A very strange kind of earworm indeed, though.
DV: Is the Mellotron sound in the non-chorus supossed to give the track a Nigel Godrich-ish, Coldplay-ish sound? I hope that's not the reason why this lumpen track is at Number 1.
IM: Bizarrely enough, this reminds me very strongly of some of the little Quebecois rock I’ve had a chance to hear – similarly lush and fairly detailed production, similar odd touches like the brief funk bass, similarly strong pop-rockin’ chorus, and I can’t understand a damn word in either.
BL: Since I know nothing about The Russian Pop, it would seem that I could approach this task without any preconceptions. And that was true here – for 30 entire seconds, after which I got a definite mental picture of what the singer is like. Namely, with fly-swatter hair that he swings around while in the impassioned throes of performing this song, perhaps?
MT: It begins in the worst possible way: some abysmal guitar lines that bring to my mind thoughts like "destroy all fenders" or "never send a sessionist to do a man's job". And just when you were thinking things couldn't get
much worse... suprise! A brief but still quite shameful BASS SOLO. Yes, I've just written the word "bass" followed by "solo".
EO: The bass solo is probably not a good idea, but it's not quite Red Hot Chili Peppers-bad now.
BL: This is like a second-rate Rasmus song, and Rasmus isn’t that rated by me to begin with. The chiming keyboards are sort of nice when they’re loud enough, which is exactly one time. Bratia can certainly roll his Rs, though, so he has that going for him.
MT: I'm gonna make someone pay for this.

2. A'STUDIO - Uletaju
EO: 4, IM: 5, BL: 3, SN: 4, MT: 4, DV: 8. Adjusted score: 5

DV: This is kind of like a post-Evanescence goth rock song (cleverly) patent leathered as a cheesy ballad, metal power chords brought to the back, added "na na nas", etc. And better than it sounds.
SN: Na na na na na na…I didn't realise Russian was so easy! Oh wait, there we go. Now that I've found out Russian is more complex than I had originally given it for, I'm not sure what this girl is singing about, but I imagine it's about "going under" or hate in some way, shape or form. Blah.
MT: In typical "slow, romantic song" fashion, the verses are quite weak; unnecessary steps we have to follow till we get to the chorus, which, yes meets the ISO standard of profficency for euro singles, though it doesn't exactly aim for the skies.
BL: Simultaneously desperate and half-hearted. On the one hand, it works really, really hard to please, like some demented aural equivalent of Sally Field, throwing everything but the kitchen-sink at you. But because there are so many tricks and bits in it, it all ends up sounding a little disjointed and uncommitted
IM: The bit where the backing briefly shudders is great – it needs to happen more often. The female vocalist is really giving it her all, but she’s saddled with what sounds like a pretty standard ballad. The percussion is neat, and the singer really sells it, but this is a little lackluster.
EO: The way the singer bellows out the title - that's some good stick. But it's just a little without hooks.
MT: It's also propelled by a late 90's, nu-metal sounding electric guitar that reminds me of Triple X, but I'm still undecided wether that's a good or a bad thing.
JP: This only proves that warbly girl ballads are just as rubbish in Russia as everywhere else.
BL: The singer has a close brush with, but never fully submits to the vocoder; there are some quieter vocal bits on the verses (the best parts), but lots of tormented shouting; and then there are those na-na-na-na-nas that sound like they might have been grafted on from some other, not necessarily better, song. Exhausting. Listening to this is a bit of a work-out, in a slightly smelly gym.

3. DMITRIY MALIKOV - S Chistogo Lista
EO: 7, IM: 5, BL: 5, SN: 6, MT: 6, DV: 9. Adjusted score: 7

BL: This guy is much more googleable (kudos), and I’m glad he is. From one website I learn that Dmitriy once commemorated his mid-career crisis thusly: “he cut off his trademark long hair, and then appeared with a bottle of whiskey, smoking a cigarette and wearing nothing but underwear in his new video.” As someone for whom that sequence of events is simply called “Thursdays,” I am charmed by how easily scandalized the Russians supposedly are. This song isn’t terrible, but it would be improved if it too appeared next to a bottle of whiskey. The bassline needs to gallop more, while that keyboard riff might at any moment get repossessed by an 80s techno act. But at least Dmitriy sings quite nicely and mostly devoid of the kind of desperation that the vocalists charting above him evince.
DV: The Abba-esque intro is designed to make europop fans smile with recognition. Then it gets better –and has an arresting key change. Is it just the margaritas, or does the singer sound a little like Neil Tennant? Gorgeous.
EO: The best intro of any song on the chart by some distance, and disappointingly muted aside from those fabulous few seconds, though they are least repeated a few times. Perhaps some degree less than the sum of its parts.
SN: Starts off rather excitingly, like a piece of potassium dropped in water, what with those sonic flashes and uber-distorted synths all over the place. However, you can only watch potassium in water for so long before it fizzles out and you start looking around for a Bunsen burner to play with.
IM: Did he just mention Putin? A nice slice of faintly trance-y dancepop, the backing is a bit pro forma (i.e. I feel like I’ve heard it dozens of times before) but the vocals are nice. The thought of political content remains intriguing.

4. CHAY VDVOEM - Ti Ne Odna On Ne Odin
EO: 6, IM: 7, BL: 6, SN: 7, MT: 3, DV: 5. Adjusted score: 6

IM: The bassline reminds me of most of the anime soundtrack music I’ve heard, and the singer briefly sounds, at the start of the track, like it might be Gruff Rhys, but this is mostly just straightforward catchy, danceable pop. Just because I don’t have much to say about it doesn’t mean I don’t enjoy it, though.
MT: A nifty synth line (is it me or everyone seems to be writing the music one would like Vince Clarke to be doing?) plus some nice use of vocoder. You can't go wrong with a vocoder if you believe in it.
EO: The previous song had an Abba-esque intro, and this one sounds like Erasure, who did an EP cal... oh you know how these circular reference things end. Compared to Dmitriy, this does more with more modest melodic and backing elements, but they're really very modest indeed.
JP: This is quite Eurovision-esque, although more like the old-style cheesy boyband Eurovision entries than the new all-singing, all-dancing, all-brace-pinging diva types.
BL: The clipped strummy guitars at the start led me, for just a split second, to entertain fantasies that this would turn into a Russian Basement Jaxx track. Instead, there’s a tinkly piano bit and then it’s more like Gazebo. That’s not a bad thing, but the Bingo-Bango-I-Love-Chopin! hybrid would have been great, wouldn’t it?
SN: Jesus, more vaguely Latino stuff that Ricky Martin was peddling 500 years ago. Granted, this has a deliciously melancholic piano line that imbues the whole thing with a strangely inappropriate sadness that Senor Martin and his leather pants could only dream of conjuring up, so I'll go easy on it just this one.
MT: All these songs sound really cool the first time because there's something that stands out in all of them. This one got me with the nice little keyboard line that opens the song, though the sad truth is that the rest of the song doesn't live up to that promise. I'm sure they/he meant well, but the road to Pitchfork is paved with good intentions.
BL: This is perfectly serviceable and nice, though not, I suspect, something I’ll necessarily remember six months down the road. But the hits get better as the numbers get, um, bigger, don’t they? Let’s see what’s next.

5. FRISKE ZHANNA - Gde-to Leto
EO: 8, IM: 5, BL: 7, SN: 8, MT: 9, DV: 5. Adjusted score: 8

MT: Some day, someone should write about the influence of "La Isla Bonita" in modern music. This one doesn't sound that similar, but it certainly FEELS like it.
SN: I really wanted to dislike this one. Sub-par early Ace of Base-esque production values, chord progressions that have been around since J.S. Bach started fiddling around on his well-tempered clavier...but then along comes the brilliant call-and-response chorus and it turns out that even I, with my eternal crankiness, have to smile.
EO: I earlier described this as a bit of unchallenging Europop, but it's really not. It's actually very pretty, albeit dressed up in some fine, tarty going-out clothes. But at the same time, a little bit doomed!
MT: It would be really hard for me to resist this song's many appeals (not that I tried too hard) because it pretty much sums up a lot of the things I like about europop: the synths, the sense of drama, the huge build up which end up leading to choruses of a fifty storey high melancholy, it's all here.
BL: This flirts with being crap, but pulls it out of the fire. Like the #3 song, this has a “catchy” keyboard thingy that’s kind of Kon Kan-like, but it’s bouncy and seemingly more self-aware of its cheese content. My total inability to speak Russian doesn’t prevent me from knowing that this is a lyrical ode to the star of My So-Called Life. Too few pop songs are, really. You can also imagine Friske doing some sort of elaborate finger dance to this, which is always a plus.
DV: What a waste of a fabolous intro! And not about Jared Leto, sadly.
MT: And I also found this very engaging because it sounds like "cumbia", but not the kind Michelangelo Matos plugged here, no, no, no, no. There's another, better kind of cumbia, often disdainfully qualified as "romántica", which sounds like a primitive (and maybe cheap) spiritual twin of this kind of single, melancholic but danceable and certainly the closest thing we ever had to true non imported pop down here in Argentina. I was going to write a lot more but I really should get myself my own blog instead of stealing Edward's space (Please do both - EO). I'd better just say I loved it and just leave it at that.

6. GLYUKOZA - Yura
EO: 4, IM: 2, BL: 7, SN: 9, MT: 8, DV: 10. Adjusted score: 7

MT: I'm a sucker for spy movie/surf guitars, and this sounds like surf from the pre-Xenomania days, it even has that "underwater" feeling and the lovely kitsch atmosphere of Dick Dale's recordings. Plus, I bet Diego's gonna love this because it sounds a lot like Las Ketchup and he's always been a huge fan of the gals.
EO: I thought I hated this at first, then I realised it sounded a bit like the original Moonbaby version of Lene/Girls Aloud's "Here We Go" in that spy-movie-cum-teen-pop style, and it all started to make a little bit more sense. A sadly quite weak chorus drags it down.
DV: What the hell is this? This is kind of like a Buggles song as played by Siberian rockabilly nomads. With strapped Casios. I love it to death even though I suspect that the day I actually see what those Glyukoza guys do look like I'll probably feel funny. (After a Google search) Damn. Is that a girl?
EO: Yes, it's a girl. A fit girl, at that.
BL: The singer sounds like she was asked to do her vocal from the other room, perhaps while wearing scuba gear. Which is strange – well, for many reasons, but not least because she really has no need to keep her distance from this song. It’s quite good, even if the production is a bit dodgy.
IM: Gah, the vocals are so nasal - they just completely ruin anything good about the track. The backing would need to be awesome to compensate for Ms. Pinched Nose, and it’s not.
JP: Not just rubbish but really weird too. Sounds almost like yodellin
SN: Yet another song to add to my "this is brilliant thanks in no small part to the surf guitar but I'd die of embarrassment if anyone ever caught me listening to it because it's really rather tacky isn't it" list. Possibly the best thing the B52s never did.
BL: If you write an English lyric for this, and scribble a note saying “hey man KEEP the surfesque guitars, but make them more TWANGY and WITH WOOSHES. Also: DOPER beats,” you would be a bit of a tool, but you could then send this to Xenomania and have them turn this into track 7 of the next Girls Aloud album. And it might be slightly awesome. I therefore have to give this marks for potential.
IM: Given the uniform strength of the rest of this top ten, “Yura” is a surprise and a disappointment. Is there a novelty factor we don’t get or something?

8. ZHASMIN - Indijskoje Disko
EO: 9, IM: 8, BL: 1, SN: 8, MT: 8, DV: 6. Adjusted score: 7

IM: Tell me the title translates as “Indie Disco“. Because it should.
DV: I assume we all thought this meant "Indie Disco" and wished it was a russian take on The Killers but done with a lovely unpretentiousness that prompted us to say "oooh, this is what I wish The Killers were doing more often". It is not. So I put a Melody Club record instead.
EO: The title actually translates as Indian Disco. But "bizarre, incongruously-sampling shuddering but delightful disco" would also have worked, to my mind.
MT: Completely self-aware of being a disco song, and pretty much enjoying it and showing enough aplomb to pull the trick out, kinda reminds me of Light Years-era Kylie (which, by the way, is the kind of album one could think
of as a shelter from the "macho-isation of disco")
SN: Question: why try and shoehorn an already-overused Indian sample into a song that is about as Indian as you might expect a Russian disco song to be (that is, Not Very) and stands well enough on its own anyway?
BL: This is a delightful hodgepodge of different cultures and sounds, except for the “delightful” part.
JP: Sounds like a very low rate Russian version of Kylie. Their Lisa Scott-Lee, perhaps!
BL: How is it possible that the way Zhasmin sings the first few lines makes me think that she is doing a naff technopop number in Chinese? Who is Jimmy, and why does he desire the pickled Indian relish known as achar? Even the breakdown at the 2:08 mark, when the guitar-sitar from the start returns, and people shout stuff in the background, cannot quite overcome the insipid beat and monotonously repetitive, monotonously repetitive, monotonously repetitive melody.
SN: Points off for Cruelty To Samples, but it's still quite good.

9. IRAKLIJ - Kaplia Absenta
EO: 9, IM: 7, BL: 9, SN: 5, MT: 3, DV: 5. Adjusted score: 7

EO: If it doesn't quite deliver on being an out-and-out club stormer (even in the punchier remix), or a perfectly felt disco moment of pensive insight, it does quite well enough at being an uneasy mix of both, although it does strike me that I would have preferred this sung by the backing vocalists, perhaps. A perfectly fine bit of Russian house-pop that channels enough of the bluer registers to give pause for thought while one dances in one's chair.
IM: Oh, this is niiice – the same sort of smooth housey glide as Juliet’s ”Avalon“, but with even more of the emphasis placed on the pop single side of the charts/dancefloor equation. It’s not quite as good as “Avalon”, but it’s not too far off in quality either.
MT: A guitar line ripped off from "Music sounds better with you" (which is probably ripped off from some other place I don't know), average chorus, a singer sounding like he doesn't care that much about the song, and if even he doesn't care, then why should I do it?
BL: This has a filtered house beat, and even a Stardusty wah-wah type guitar sound; ergo, it instantly seems brilliant. (It reminds me a teensy bit of that fab Dimension X track that inaugurated this very blog.) The loopy nature of that groove makes the record sound melancholic and hypnotic; there is a very drowning-sorrows-lost-in-music-but-also-trying-to-break-free feel about it.
EO: Filter-house is often so euphoric and infectious that the ability to affect emotions in the other direction hasn't been fully explored yet - but this song (along with the aforementioned Dimension X) fills that void somewhat. Excellent.
SN: For a country that brought the world t.A.T.u. and the blonde one from Captain Planet, I expected something with a bit more grunt.
JP: Is this guy actually singing in his sleep?

10. SMASH!! - Mechta
EO: 8, IM: 6, BL: 8, SN: 10, MT: 0, DV: 7. Adjusted score: 7
SN: Much like Girls Aloud's "Wake Me Up" (which bludgeons the same four bars into your brain throughout verse, middle eight and chorus), or Ciara's "Oh" (which, harmony-wise, is effectively conflict, resolution, conflict, resolution ad infinitum), this song highlights the effectiveness of looping a really good idea, in this case the wistful guitar motif. It drives the song forward, refusing to let you go, dragging you in and down, until you're as tortured as the presumably tortured vocalist and just want the hurt to end. Absolutely brilliant, and I'm going to put it on again.
IM: I wasn’t expecting a song by SMASH!! To start with an acoustic guitar, but sure enough this is a ballad, although it does also have a backbeat. The chorus is the best part by a big margin – the guy’s voice sounds better multiplied and it’s got a pretty good melody. The guitar always sounds like it’s winding down, which adds to the melancholy feel.
BL: The melody of the chorus, which is basically sung to the tune of the plucked riff, gets a little repetitive; but the double-tracked vocals and the way they vary and go up a notch when they sing the last line of the chorus the first time, helps to counter that.
JP: Considering this band have 2 exclamation marks in their name, you might expect them to be at least a tiny bit exciting. Maybe they're being ironic?
MT: I can't help hating anything that reminds me of bossa nova.
EO: Thoughts on listen one: well, it's a bit simpering, but it seems heartfelt enough, and the earnestness does have an uncanny way of drilling into the brain at inappropriate moments and the overall effect is that what seems timid and weak is actually affecting and effective if not exactly exciting and as a result it kind of works.
BL: Those guitar pluckings are very Balearic; if you extract and stick them onto a record with more synth lines that everyone always describes as “washing” over a record, then Afterlife would be very happy to have the track. (Yes, all I do is pick out the good bits from songs and imagine what they might be like in someone else’s songs. Hi, I’m Puff Daddy.)
EO: Five listens later, I actually kind of really like this.
BL: in a chart that’s a little too full of (or at least began with) songs that are too sledgehammery, this seems lovely in a subtler way. Which is funny, given that it’s made by a band whose name has two too many exclamation points. But there you go.

The total score for Russia is 57, which seems low given how much quality was on offer, but such tends to happen when nobody can agree on what the quality actually is and there isn't a clear-across-the-board winner. Oh well, I thought it was good, anyway. Surely that counts for something.

The highest scoring song is Gde-to Leto but I posted that a couple of weeks ago. So, what came 2nd and 3rd? Why, that would be an exact tie between Glyukoza and Zhasmin. So we'll have both, then.

Glyukoza - Yura
Zhasmin - Indijskoje Disko

Prelude to the Russian Top 10

2005-07-30T05:55:00.000-07:00

Well, a Russian Top 10 anyway. I was told that basically they pull it out of their (collective) arse anyway, and this just happens to be the one I use. The following YSI link will give you a lowish but listenable quality file containing 30 second snippets from the nine songs in the top 10 that aren't by the Blackeyedgoddamnpeas. To give you something to read while you read the Cross Europe Chart Challenge of Death Panel's expert appraisals when they go up tomorrow. You'll get one of them in full, as is tradition.

http://s22.yousendit.com/d.aspx?id=1XH4RARE4YV7T3N2XX8DPZAVSM

So, how would you like some Ukrainian rap?

2005-07-28T02:37:00.000-07:00

It might be quite good you know, because Ni, ja ne tu kohav by Tartak and Svitiaz is not bad at all.

The video is apparently here, but I haven't looked at it yet - one must sign up for something or other. What I have considered is the MP3, which is here, and very good it is too. Being no expert on rap in general or any specific issues as far as flow goes when in the Ukrainian language, I come to this with no expectations and still leave on the fence as to whether the delivery is any good. Yet, the whole affair gets the benefit of the doubt, and a thumbs up, on two criteria:

Firstly, the chorus is rather singalong catchy if you can get your mouth around the syllables, which I can't. Secondly, the production is rapid-fire, guitars like machine guns and an absolutely sublime section at about 2:40 in wherein whoever is responsible has just decided to throw absolutely every effect they had been working on around the time of production in, a piano tinkle, a cheesy electric guitar, and oh, that chorus again.

Life changing? Hardly. Infectious? Well, if it were only intelligible, but it's hugely enjoyable. I like it quite a lot, in keeping with my current fixation towards Eastern Europe which for the moment seems completely justified.

2005-07-26T05:14:00.000-07:00

I've been a bad blogger, yes. Kudos to Mind Taker for keeping things vaguely going around this "joint". I've been intermittently sick, busy and uninspired, but that should change! Russian top 10 being examined soon, I found the song I had been missing, so ballots are out and it shall be done.

Shall I post some MP3s? Yes, I think I shall.

One of my favoured delights from last year was Mirage (La Luna) by Paps'n'Skar, a maddeningly catchy little number that reminded me of a less manic Junior Senior. They have a newer song that is basically the exact same thing and absolutely no worse for it. I know a lot of people liked it too, so let's have round two. Oh, it's got some differences - it has a lovely tinkly piano bit in the middle that's all a bit incongruous and some quite charming plonky acoustic guitar, but the beat may as well be the same, the same keyboard settings are retained and if there's a purpose above making something to make me stupidly happy, it's not apparent. Fortunately, this is more than sufficient.

Paps'n'Skar - Vieni Con Me

I was reminded of how quite good M2M where by Abby recently, and you should probably remember too. What you may not know is that Marion Raven, the younger one (I think) has a single doing the business around the world at the moment. She's gone a bit Avril Lavigne on us, and it's not bad at all. It's Top 10 in Norway and apparently doing quite well in a few other places. There's some genuine feedback in it and her yowling and yelping is highly endearing, as far as this kind of mall-punk-pop goes. She can sing rather well, actually.

Marion Raven - Break You

A bumper YSI bag of Croatian pop!

2005-07-25T14:45:00.000-07:00

Svadbas - Treblebass

Since I associate Svadbas with moody post-trip-hop/post-rock/post-whatever dirge, I was pleasantly surprised to learn that not only they've put out a single that sounds like nothing else they did so far, but is also probably my favourite Croatian single of the year so far! "Treblebass" is a bit like Girls Aloud - less brash maybe, but just as playful and trigger happy in its pick'n'mix pop assault: a flamenco guitar here, slightly surf-y guitar there, and a Russian-flavoured singalong chorus. It is completely ace, and I urge everyone to hear it!

Colonia - Time

Colonia - Padaju domine

The mighty Colonia only gets better with time, and their new album "Najbolje od svega" is typically awesome: an almost non-stop tapestry of top tunes, masterfully produced and all over the place genre-wise. So I couldn't resist sharing a few gems with y'all. "Time" is their first song originally written in English (last year they did an English version of their monster hit "Za tvoje snene oci" - which in literal translation means "For Your Dreamy Eyes", but in the international-market version became "A Little Bit of Uh La La" so I, uh, didn't bother tracking it down); it's very Swedish sounding. Also, very very good! "Padaju domine" continues Colonia's tradition of schaffel tunes, and it's the finest piece of Colonia-schaffel so far: imperious, tightly muscular and deeply melancholic, high on windswept melodrama... simply, glorious.

And while we're on the subject of Russian pop...

2005-06-29T12:31:00.000-07:00

I don't travel around the world much, but at least I have friends who do! And I am especially grateful when they come back with a, say, CD of top pop smashes from the lands they visited. So then - props to Kresimir for "Samie slivki radioefira 2", a compilation of Russian pop hits from last summer that I played to death, er, last summer. And - props to Nikola, who's recently given me Russian teen pop sensation Angina's eponymous '04 album.

In mainland Europe poptrance has died a slow death, and has seemingly been replaced by irritating Boogie Pimps/Royal Gigolos-aping crap. But fear not - because poptrance is alive and kicking in Russia! Angina's take is of the girly, giddy variety, full of fluffy Korgs and candy hooks. The only thing I'm missing is those huge oceanic breakdowns with snare-rolls and swelling arpeggiators that come with Trance Proper. (You might say that I'm being unfair 'coz Angina's tunes are too bubblegummy for such concerns, and you might say I'm plain lazy 'coz I'm not arsed enough to hunt down extended club mixes of her tunes, which probably do exist out there somewhere. But! I've been spoiled long time ago by Fragma's peerless "Toca" album (the only poptrance album you need to own, really) which managed to pack it all in - the tunes, the beats, the ballearic bliss, the raver build-ups, the endless melodrama - within radio-friendly edits.)

But it's just a minor grumble - Angina's best stuff is pretty and catchy enough on its own. Here are a few album tracks for your enjoyment, YSI-style:

Angina - Sinie glaza

Angina - Dlja tebja

(if anyone wants me to post more Russian pop on this blog, just leave a comment or two!)

2005-06-29T01:49:00.000-07:00

I'm sorry! I've been awfully crap not updating in two weeks. I choose to blame exhaustion, a sense of laziness due to having no necessary work, a bit of annoyance that a lot of what I had been sampling had been crap (SHAME ON YOU, POLAND. Ten ballads in one radio top 10 = UNACCEPTABLE), and the fact that I was going to send out the Russian Top 10 for appraisal but I couldn't find two of the songs. Also, I've been watching far too much tennis and doing other writing for various other things, some of it distinctly non-musical.

I have been massively excited about the Alexis Strum album sampler though. Considering she just let Rachel Stevens have Nothing Good About This Goodbye, you'd assume that she's packing some good stuff away for herself, and she is.

The single Bad Haircut, now I've heard it in full at a decent quality is a gem, but I think I am even more enamoured of the second track - Heart And Mind. It sounds to me like a smarter version of Girls Aloud's I Say A Prayer For You, except with this squelching, funky farting synth bass all over the shop that just sounds amazing. Oh and there's a stately, gorgeous ballad on the sampler as well that is also wonderful.

Also, just because I couldn't get all the Russian Top 10, doesn't mean you don't get to hear the best of it. This was my favourite song off it, Gde-to Leto by the amusingly-named Friske Zhanna. Or is it Zhanna Friske? I can't remember, honestly. A fine piece of unchallenging Europop. Just this once, eh?

2005-06-15T22:50:00.000-07:00

OK, instead of boring top 10 Norwegian songs nobody liked, here's some Norwegian album track action:

Anneli Drecker - Desire
If you caught my Stycast (see below) you'd have heard one song from Anneli's album "Frolic", and the single You Don't Have To Change is terrific, but so's this. The sometime Bel Canto singer basically goes a bit mental like an electrosleaze goddess, but it's still ethereal and lovely, so you get a bit of both worlds.

Lene Marlin - Eyes Closed
Since I sent out chart ballots, the first single from the Second Greatest Norwegian called Lene Ever's album has debuted quite high, but I'm rather more fond of this album track. It's got guitars in it, and is not rubbish, but it also has a lot more oomph than the average Lene Marlin song, as she's got a good ear for a hook, but she tends to hide it underneath dull, but worthy pretty songs.

The delayed Chart Challenge of Death! NORWAY

2005-06-15T22:25:00.000-07:00

I was going to apologise for the tardiness, then I realised I owe you all nothing. Hah! Or something. Here we go again, to the country that people are saying is the new Sweden, in that lots of great pop music is coming from there. Bertine Zetlitz, Annie, Anneli Drecker - hmm, something to that. But you'd be hard pressed to guess from their top 10:

1. JORUN STIANSEN - This Is The Night
EO: 5, AG: 7, SN: 4, SS: 3, IM: 1, GD: 6, JP: 7. ADJUSTED SCORE: 5

EO: Jorun was a Norwegian Idol contestant, and to get to where she is, one of the songs she sang was "Scared" by Venke Knutson, the 22nd Best Pop Single of 2004. I love Venke Knutson. When is her new single coming out? It'll be better than this.
JP: Any friend of Venke's is a friend of mine! Sadly this sounds more like a typical Idol debut single (particularly Michelle McManus - ew!) combined with LeAnn Rimes, but she could be one to watch with future material.
SS: What is it with Pop Idol winning songs having to feature the word "night"? The most typical ballad bullshit in Pop
Idol history!
GD: Like most of those songs, it ticks many of the right boxes - nice tune, lovely voice, pretty singalong chorus;
but also, like most, it just seems to lack a little soul, and because of that, I struggle to find much to say about it.
AG: Have you noticed all Idol songs are about the magic of the moment, the spirit of the journey, seizing the moment, and in the video clip you can imagine the singer on a stage, spinning, as they start before an empty stage, and then a crowd fills in at some point? Nothing wrong with that, carpe diem and all that, and this is cool enough for brownie points, I'd just like someone to have a song along the lines of "I'd seize the day, but I really can't be bothered, I'd rather sit and watch TV tonight"
SN: I don't know why I continue to get so excited about the Idol franchise and all of its offspring when all I get in return is drudgery like this. Go and listen to some Kelly Clarkson, then we'll talk.
SS: Oh and what is it about the Norwegian Idols all being damn ugly? Is that like a must thing you need in order to win? Did Kurt Nilsson start a new trend of sympathy votes? Even Kjartan was better.
IM: It’s strangely comforting to know that foreign charts, just like our Canadian one, often has the best songs lower on the charts and a piece of crap at #1. Like this generically sweeping, “emotional” ballad in English, that I’m willing to bet plenty of Norwegian teenagers hate just as much as I do.

2. SCHNAPPI - Schnappi
EO: 5, AG: 5, SN: 9, SS: 10, IM: 9, GD: 9, JP: 1. ADJUSTED SCORE: 7

SS: This is how novelty should be done. I'll start with the history of Schnappi, aka Joy Gruttmann who wrote it all herself 4 years ago when she was an ickle 4 years old, her aunt Iris put on some children's compilation , last summer a couple of German radio DJs played it as some kind of a joke, the demand got high and the rest is history!
IM: I don’t think I can grade it on the same scale as the rest of these songs. I mean, it’s a little girl singing (adorably) about a crocodile! The backing sounds like it cost $3.99, which is perfect, and the song is short enough. I really don’t know. Somebody fetch me a ten-sided die!
GD: To mark it according to its musical qualities would mean being guilty of taking it more seriously than it takes itself.
EO: What was funny when it was a little girl and her silly novelty song in Germany six months ago is decidedly not funny anymore. It's still kind of adorable though.
SN: I'm finding it cute and delightful at the moment, but expect me to be calling for Schnappi the crocodile's skinning and conversion into a charming handbag/purse ensemble in a matter of months.
GD: I'm very much of the opinion that novelty records are a good thing, for two main reasons: Firstly, they annoy the fuck out of music snobs: oh how we all laughed when the Crazy Frog kept Coldplay, the world's most earnest band, off number one in the UK. And witness dull Ultravox fans still moaning about Joe Dolce's Shaddup You Face keeping "Vienna" off number one, even though that was OVER 20 YEARS AGO. Secondly, as a chart obsessive, novelty records keep the charts in the news. With singles charts under threat from falling sales, anything that keeps that charts in the news and gets people buying singles has got to be a good thing. So I heartily approve of this record. And in fact, it's actually quite a classic of the genre: you'd have to be a real miserable old fart not to find little Joy Gruttman sweet, although I could imagine it gets horribly irritating after a few listens.
JP: This song is sweeping Europe and I recently heard it on a UK radio show, which was extremely frightening I must say. Luckily it doesn't seem to have caught on quite yet, but I will be planning my holiday to avoid it and hopefully wherever I go will already be over this bizarre craze. Even better would be if it does a DJ Bobo and completely passes the UK by. I shall be praying to the Gods of pop (the Backstreet Boys will do, since they have got quite beardy of late) every night from now on.

3. SANDRA - I Morgen
EO: 4, AG: 6, SN: 2, SS: 8, IM: 8, GD: 2, JP: 3. ADJUSTED SCORE: 5

JP: Well I never thought I'd be hearing "Tomorrow" in Norwegian in the style of J-Lo - that is just one of the many perks of being a Euro-pop fan!
GD: I must admit I find it hard to listen to this without thinking of the scene from Serial Mom where the annoying old lady gets bludgeoned to death with a leg of lamb by Kathleen Turner to a soundtrack of "Tomorrow".
SS: Anyway Sandra Lynh Haugen has the best Norwigian Idol song since Kurt Nilsen's 'My Street'. What an achivement! Would have been a 9 if she'd lost the rappers.
SN: I was the rehearsal pianist for my high school's production of Annie. Even the girl we put in a red clown wig did a more convincing job of this song than Sandra, and she did it without the help of some unconvincing Norwegian rent-a-rapper. Hopefully by "Tomorrow" (ha! See what I did?) this song will have ejected itself from my life as quickly as it entered.
AG: For whatever reason, this reminded me of the collaboration between Shaggy and Merryl Bainbridge, where the good female part that's nice and jaunty and sample based is ruined by a tedious male part. Sadly, songs from Annie always remind of a disastrous attempt to put on a play in Grade 5, and I don't want to be reminded of THAT at this stage of life...
GD: Sandra's singing is so sickly sweet it sound slike she's been gargling golden syrup.
EO: A little too cute for these ears. Also, Annie is shit, tell a friend.
IM: I quite like Sandra’s singing and the backing is great, especially the piano. Rapping dude doesn’t do much for me, but he’s not really the focal point and thus is bearable. Sandra probably wouldn’t have been any more exciting on the verses, and at least she gets the chorus. And the Norwegian guy does suddenly say the phrase “rap game” during one verse, which unaccountably cracks my shit up.

4. RAVI & DJ LOV - E-ore
EO: 4, AG: 3, SN: 5, SS: 5, IM: 3, GD: 9, JP: 1. ADJUSTED SCORE: 5

EO: Opens with the sound of a cow being molested, possibly, and some dead classy piano, at wihch point some whistling comes in and actually doesn't improve things, but acts as a harbinger of doom as the rap comes in and makes it incredibly boring.
SN: Actually, it all goes base over apex with its run-of-the-millness pretty quickly, doesn't it. Could have done with more cow.
JP: European rap songs can be brilliant and hilarious, but they can also be completely dull and pointless. Sadly, this song fits the latter category quite perfectly.
IM: I had such hopes this would be cool, since it’s named after Eeyore from the Winnie the Pooh stories (isn’t it?), and a Norwegian rap song about a suicidally depressed stuffed donkey had to be awesome, right? Sadly, it’s just kind of limp. I can’t remember what the chorus sounds like, and that’s only the most obvious sign of trouble here.
GD: Ravi drawls in a part-sung, part-rapped, and part-spoken manner over a lovely, stuttering classical piano backing, and shows quite how different a language can sound between different people - while Sandra's Norwegian was somooth, this is much rougher round the edges, and all the better for it. The personalities of the performers really come through on this, and the piano has a real uplifting quality. Lovely.
SS: Now the melody to this starts rather nicely, but then he starts rapping and doesn't change the tune through the whole song! Now I might be missing something out here, but this surely MUST be novelty, right? I don't think anyone in their right minds would release such a thing seriously? At least the chorus had some tune, and I love that 'b-b-b-baby baby' part, hilarious! Their previous song (whatever it was called and that had almost the same melody) was better actually.

5. BLACK EYED PEAS - Don't Phunk With My Heart
EO: 0, AG: 0, SN: 2, SS: 6, IM: 1, GD: 7, JP: 7. ADJUSTED SCORE: 3

AG: Na na na na, don't phunk with my chart...damn, too late...
IM: Just as shit as every other Black Eyed Peas song.

6. GAVIN DEGRAW - I Don't Wanna Be
EO: 3, AG: 1, SN: 8, SS: 4, IM: 3, GD: 4, JP: 10. ADJUSTED SCORE: 5

EO: Male singer-songwriters, please no. May this song's tapering around the world's chart cease here.
SS: Maroon 5 has created a big new wave of bland middle of the road pop songs.
IM: Isn’t this the “Chariot” guy? “Chariot” sucked.
AG: Oh so frustratingly vague Mr Quick on Degraw? What do you not want to be? A lampshade? A small kitten? There's a lot of things I don't wanna be, I just choose not to inflict my list on you!
SN: Much like Daniel Powter, Gavin Degraw does a nice line in pretty boy soft rock, complete with "I/you/they don't understand" lyrics and looking good in a beanie. Too edgy for those who love Michael Buble perhaps, but the world needs its rebels.
JP: I can't say enough nice things about Gavin, because I am a massive fan. he is great and if you don't like him, frankly, you are a loser! (She doesn't really mean that, pop fans - EO)

7. WIGWAM - In My Dreams
EO: 8, AG: 4, SN: 9, SS: 8, IM: 4, GD: 9, JP: 5. ADJUSTED SCORE: 7

EO: The most immediate song from this year's contest, but not the best, which is probably why it only came 9th. A lovable, loving homage to music fortunately no longer being made.
JP: Wigwam were fun for a few minutes. Sadly those minutes passed by several weeks ago and they are now quite rubbish, but they do get extra points for letting me reminisce about Eurovision. Only 11 months til the next one!
SN: This song always makes me think of Ultimate Comedy Band and perennial "Worst Songs Ever" list favourites Europe and The Final Countdown. And I loved that song. So I suppose I can say, by induction, that I love this song too. I played this on the sound system at home and, after initially mistaking it for a lost Bon Jovi classic, my flatmate loves it too.
SS: Well it's a good pop song really, their performance at the Eurovision Semi really disapointed me, but they improved on the final night and got Norway in the top 10 again.
GD: How can any pop fan not fail to love a chorus that big? With lyrics that are just crying out to be sung along to. This is just pure, unadulterated fun, and there's not enough of that in the charts.
IM: I’m sorry, this is a very competent execution of the form, but some childhood incidents have left me with a powerful allergy to this kind of hair metal. It’s not you, Wigwam, it’s me.

8. BACKSTREET BOYS - Incomplete
EO: 7, AG: 7, SN: 5, SS: 3, IM: 6, GD: 8, JP: 10. ADJUSTED SCORE: 7

AG: Am I the only person who liked them better when they were dressed in Halloween costumes? And is "empty spaces fill me up with holes" the worst non Coldplay lyric of the year?
IM: I must be getting tolerant in my old age – I can’t really bring myself to hate this lackluster power ballad.
EO: Lush and overblown and ridiculous. Poor Nick Carter's looking awfully rough these days. I thought it was AJ that had the substance dependency problem, but look at Nick! Sounds a bit like Bryan Adams if you listen not very carefully, but still rather good. "Climbing The Walls" would get a 10 obviously, so let's hope they release that next.
GD: For someone who loves his pop, boy bands have strangely never really done it for me. Except for one: the Backstreet Boys. And this single has reminded me how much the charts have missed their presence. This is marvellous.
SN: Geez guys, what's with the sunglasses? Blinded by your own seriousness and musical worth?
SS: A bland ballad that doesn't go anywhere, hell it even sounds like Brian McFadden, and that certinaly is NOT a good thing.

9. GWEN STEFANI - Hollaback Girl
EO: 9, AG: 9, SN: 10, SS: 7, IM: 4, GD: 3, JP: 10. ADJUSTED SCORE: 8

AG: Her shit is bananas, and her bananas are shit, which is why she's a singer, not a greengrocer...
GD: Just imagine how much better a place the world would be with "Bubble Pop Electric" frothing gaily out of radios across the land instead of this mediocre tripe.

10. AKON - Lonely
EO: 7, AG: 2, SN: 4, SS: 7, IM: 7, GD: 0, JP: 0. ADJUSTED SCORE: 4

SS: Is Bobby Vinton still alive? If not he's probably turning in his grave. I'm not that fussed on Akon, but a song this isn't really all that bad I must admit, well maybe liking Scooter I'm used to the chipmunk voice, which is most definitley the essential part of the song.
SN: I enjoy the sample from this song immensely. Much like the work of Moby. What Akon has done with it, however, leaves a lot to be desired and I end up frustrated and bored. Much like the work of Moby.
EO: I can't do it, I cannot hate this song. The bit at the end is properly fantastic, and even if Akon really ruins what is otherwise quite a good use of a fantastic sample, I find it vaguely touching, especially the "come on home" bit - real emotion, kind of, not really, actually. I still don't really like it, but it's certainly nowhere near as horrifying as overreacting people would have you believe. Get one sense of poptimism, peeps.
IM: I still love the odd droning, drained-of-affect quality of Akon’s voice, especially on the chorus.
JP: If it wasn't for the Crazy Frog, this would be the most hateful song of the year so far. I think Akon owes that frog quite a lot, really.
GD: Repeated exposure to this record has made me understand how people can become serial killers. Am I allowed to give a negative score?

Hmf. Well, the highest scoring song is Wigwam, and everyone already has that, surely. I'll find something else Norwegian and post it a bit later... how's that sound? 56 points for Norway, for once, less than they scored at Eurovision.

Regular transmission resuming...

2005-06-15T21:18:00.000-07:00

Hello. I have been interstate all week, so no posts.
But before I left, I did a Stycast for Stylus, which if you're quick, you might still be able to hear. Go here and scroll down to "Around the World in 80kbps". Note that I picked the songs and wrote the text but I didn't speak, because every time I try to record my voice, the P sounds get distorted, and it's kind of hard to discuss pop without using the letter P.

Norwegian chart challenge coming up in an hour or so.

Noizmakaz - Miski Muu Ei Loe

2005-06-08T09:49:00.000-07:00

You will, I hope, forgive my indulgence. I talk about this song not because it's really great, even though I do like it, or because I think you, the reader, will like it, because I bet you won't.

No, I talk about it because I want Google to pick it up and bring some people who know about this song to recommend me some Estonian hip-hop! Yes, that's right, Estonian hip-hop. When our friends in Estland aren't producing amazing girl-bands, they're producing hip-hop that's a bit like Finnish hip-hop but even more playful. I loved Toe Tag's single Deja Vu from last year and want to hear more things in that vein.

This song, currently in the Estonian top 10, was my favourite thing in there by some distance. I like its cheap but charming sticks-banged-together percussion. I think the shouted chorus is a teensy bit clumsy, but the flow in the verses and the occasional stops is pretty endearing and, rather, it doesn't sound that far away from Caparezza in places (though not as mental and astonishing) despite being cut from a completely different linguistic branch.

It's infectious enough, though, and I'm utterly convinced that treasures lay within this genre. There was a blog started last year that was going to catalogue the breadth and depth of Estonian pop, but it stopped soon after it started. SOMEONE, please take up this crucial project. Please?

Noizmakaz - Miski Muu Ei Loe

The Cross Europe Chart Challenge... of Death! THE NETHERLANDS

2005-06-01T23:34:00.000-07:00

Well, this has been a long time coming. I would like to shirk responsibility and blame the weather, my research proposal and the general rubbishness of most of last week's Dutch top 10. The panel largely agrees, but have been particularly verbose in doing so.

Contributing this time, but not last time:

KS: Koen, who is Dutch and knows this stuff. His blog is in Dutch but is named after a Delgados lyric, so visit him anyway.
GD: Geoff, who doesn't have a website, but a message-board stalwart.
MT: Miguel from Argentina once mounted an airtight case that Girls Aloud are better than the Beatles and who has a new blog but I've lost the address.
SS: Shahaf, also no website, but probably has a more encyclopaedic knowledge of pop than anyone else in Israel.

Daniel Powter (5) got reviewed last round, so let's ignore him (thank goodness, say I) and look at what wasn't.

1. Guus Meeuwis - Geef Mij Je Angst
EO: 5, SN: 7, AG: 0, MJ: 3, JP: 1, IM: 0, KS: 5, GD: 9, SS: 7
ADJUSTED SCORE: 4

KS: Rather dull cover version of recently deceased André Hazes. It's hard to convey to foreigners what Hazes meant over here. Some say he was a pub singer who got lucky, a literature professor I know says he is a singer-songwriter on a par with Dylan and Springsteen. His funeral service was held in a football stadium that seats 50.000, and broadcast live on Dutch TV. Whatever Hazes is, Guus Meeuwis is none of these things. He's a none-too-technical singer who seems to strike a chord with people. Old people, mostly, like my mum.
GD: Try as I might, I find it hard to arouse my normal English cynicism when it comes to this. Maybe it's because it appeals to my nostalgic sensibilities becaise Guus Meeuwis was number one in Holland with his first single when I briefly lived over there 10 years ago.
SS: Guus Meeuwis is well familiar to me, as a one hit wonder that is, whenever I see his name all I can think of is his 1996 smash 'Het Is En Nacht', which even shockingly toped the charts here in Israel.
IM: A stultifying solo piano ballad that sounds like it rivals Celine Dion in the emoting stakes. Utterly devoid of interest. Why is it number one?
MJ: Sounds for all the world like one of the ballads from Grease 2--you know, if Michael had been an exhange student from the Netherlands instead of Sandy's cousin from Australia.
EO: A nice line in dignified restraint, which makes it better than Coldplay any day.
SN: I applaud the producers for not caving in to the presumably skull-crushing pressure of chucking in a studio orchestra and majestic gong bashes, and the whole thing ends up being surprisingly elegant and refined, if not a little sterile.
AG: Strings! A gospel choir! A dance remix! Do something! - but then, the music overcomes even me, for it is impossible to survive "Je Angst" and stay awake at the same time. Way to go Guus.

2. Kane - Something To Say
EO: 4. SN: 3, AG: 0, MJ: 2, JP: 3, IM: 7, KS: 1, GD: 1, MT: 0, SS: 8
ADJUSTED SCORE: 2

MJ: And that something is, "Listen to it very closely or you'll miss the inconsequential chorus amidst all of the Killers-by-numbers racket."
GD: They've said it now. Hopefully they'll now shut up and go away. This truly is bland, uninspired, mid-atlantic rock at its worst. They don't even sound that inspired by it themselves so god know how they hope to convince us.
KS: Oh, they do this U2 stadium rock thing pretty well, I guess. Not that I would want to listen to it, ever ever again.
MT: What the world was waiting for...crappy generic dad rock is here! Oh yeah, now I realise dad rock has already been here for a while. Well, in that case, let me reprhase: What the world was waiting for...crappy generic grandad rock is here!
AG: Sadly NOT the 7 foot tall wrestler, who walks through hell, fire and brimstone, but a band who have walked through hell, fire and the "how to sound like a Dutch Stereophonics" play book.
SN: You mean that every country in the world has its own multitude of faceless guitar bands that clog up commerical radio and the upper echelons of the charts?
IM: This song doesn’t really work for me until two minutes in, where Kane stops fussing around with what might otherwise be a power ballad and just hits the button marked “Ludicrous Speed”. As long as this is ridiculously overblown it’s great – it’s the quiet bits in between that induce wincing.
SS: I see them more as the Dutch Coldplay rather than the Dutch U2, not because they sound like them, but because they always milk around the same formula and don't really develop musically. I loved "Rain Down On Me" (Original + Remix), so this part 2 of the song is satisfying for me, I love it how he takes it so emotionally, when the lyrics are actually a bit naff.
EO: Ooh, this sounds like it's going to be a bit like Idlewild back when they were good. But it doesn't. Good driving rhythm, though.
AG: The kind of band and song your Mum (not my Mum, she's cool!) would nod along to in the car, and proclaim some modern bands were "hip". You would then smack your head and say "God mum! You are SO embarrassing!" - and you would be right.
JP: You'll be pleased but probably most of all surprised to hear that Kane did once make a really good song. It was a duet with Anouk who you may remember from last week, and it was much better than "Lost" as well. It was called "My Best Wasn't Good Enough, involving lots of shouting of "tick tock tick tock" and very much deserving of you all to hear it immediately. This song, however, is Kane's usual snooze-rock and best avoided.

3. Krezip - Out Of My Bed
EO: 6, SN: 6, AG: 9, MJ: 2, JP: 8, IM: 6, KS: 4, GD: 2, SS: 4
ADJUSTED SCORE: 5

SS: So Krezip have gone teenage-angst rock? I'm not really convienced to be honest. It's a bit like if Natalie Imbruglia were to go Fiona Apple. It just doesn't really work.
GD: Skater Boi was all the Avril Lavigine I ever needed. So I can really do without a cheap third-rate Dutch version.
KS: It's pretty cool that both the number 1 and the number three artists are from my hometown, but sadly both songs do nothing for me. This song goes for the whole sassy Lavigne/Simpson vibe, but sass is exactly what this band has always missed.
SN: Ashlee Studt-Lavigne rolls out of bed, looking appropriately alternative and surly. Next to her lies a skinny youth with floppy black hair and a facial piercing of some sort. "Hit the road, Jack (or Bartholomeus or whatever)," she says, picking up her guitar and striking some appropriately bad-arse power chords. Jack/Bartholomeus vows to stop dating girls who list Liz Phair as an influence.
JP: This is great! A young Michelle Branch would be more than happy with it.
AG: The video clip is amazing, as she hooks a big arsed hook to her lazy benny boyfriends bed, the other end to her Thunderbird, and then drags his bed out of his house, through the wall, and into a concrete block, while humming a jaunty Stacy Orrico cheery tune.
EO: You know, there were about four really good songs on the Amy Studt album, this one sounds a bit like "Under The Thumb" but it's altogether more clumsy and forced but there's something vaguely endearing about it.
IM: My girlfriend walks into the room. “Hey, what was that song you were listening to, with the female vocalist?” I cue it up, explain it’s from the Dutch Top Ten. Her response: “It sounds like Lindsay Lohan”. I cannot deny the extreme justice of her remarks.
MT: Girls, I have to admit that those nice
hi-octane full blown pop songs like "Sk8ter Boi" or "Just Like a Pill" you make sometimes are really hard to resist, and I've grown to like you. So today I'd like to give you a very useful piece of advice: mid-tempos like "Complicated" or this "Out of My Bed" thing NEVER work.
EO: I rate songs like these on a scale based on how poorly they compare to Ashlee Simpson's "Lala", which really is the best rock single of the 00s.
MJ: I hate the lazy "Yeah yeah yeah" bits near the bridge, and the whole thing is so Avril-esque and instantly forgettable that it's really not worth a score.
KS: I'd trust them to feed my cat while I'm on holiday next week though.

4. Snoop Dogg - Signs
EO: 4, SN: 7, AG: 0, MJ: 10, JP: 7, IM: 8, KS: 8, GD: 7, SS: 5
ADJUSTED SCORE: 7

EO: Overrated. Disco isn't supposed to be smooth.
SS: It's a bit too retro, isn't it?
MJ: I don't even know how to process the mindsets of people who hate on this song--no one no one NO ONE can match Snoop for delivery, and we must give snaps to anyone who got JT to say "Fuck" on record and in his gorgeous falsetto.
IM: When a man is tired of Snoop telling Timberlake “you ain’t no G”, that man is tired of life. Particular when the backing is so poptastic.
EO: JC Chasez didn't need to say "fuck" to be cool. If Justin starts singing songs about wanking, I'm going into hiding, though.
SN: Could probably benefit from having Gwen Stefani bellowing about her shit at some point.

6. Racoon - Happy Family
EO: 2, SN: 8, AG: 1, MJ: 3, JP: 2, IM: 2, KS: 1, GD: 0, MT: 6, SS: 1
ADJUSTED SCORE: 2

EO: Jaunty, and has a whistle. This is going to be terrific. Except...
KS: The Raccoon's singer's thick accent spoils everything before I've even made up my mind about the song.
SS: This song is so 1993 it's disgusting, even the silly chorus can't save it.
GD: I think I'm actually allergic to this sort of thing. I couldn't listen to it the whole way through. Urgh. It's all so derivative.
JP: I liked this song much more when I thought it was real racoons singing. Even cartoon racoons would be better than the reality, which turns out to be a bunch of ugly old men.
SN: Racoons are apparently highly adept at knocking over garbage bins, opening jars and the like in order to scavenge whatever scraps people deemed appropriate to throw out. These Racoons in question appear to be gnawing on the remains of the Barenaked Ladies. One band's scraps are another's three-course meal, apparently.
MT: I tried for a few seconds and my mind had to shut itself not to get lobotomized. And I'd rather keep liking this song, thank you very much.
MJ: If lead singer dude (who sounds like the guy from Live) would just lay off the lyrical heaviness, this could be a real treat. It's jaunty and summery and cutesy (but not enough to make me gag), but when the chorus hits and you realize that it's just a bit of whine-rock-unplugged, the bloom is off the rose. I appreciate its brevity, though--so many bands could take a lesson from that.
IM: So what we have here is someone marrying an acoustic version of Green Day’s music with the lyrical prowess of one of Staind’s old “I hate my family” screeds. Oscar Wilde’s line about seriousness being the only refuge of the shallow has never rung more true.
EO: Annoying voice, horrible lyrics, dreadful chorus - whingeing AND attempts at profundity. That spells awful.
AG: "It would be great if we could have a cup of everything!" says the head Racoon. I don't think that's a good thing to be promoting. In fact, rather than writing a song, what you've done is write the theme song to a jaunty Scouse sitcom from the 1980s written by Carla Lane. I think the Grandad would have bad eyesight, and live in the lof...er...don't mind me, the song has finished now...

7. Ali B - Leipe Mocro Flavour
EO: 7, SN: 7, AG: 0, MJ: 2, JP: 3, IM: 7, KS: 7, GD: 3, SS: 9
ADJUSTED SCORE: 5

GD: Ooo. Dutch Rap. I see it's moved on a little bit since the days of DJ Sven & MC Miker G's seminal "Holiday Rap". But not by very much.
JP: This guy appears to be the Dutch Kenzie.
KS: Dutch hiphop (esp. 'Nederhop', the Dutch-langauge variety) has gotten better and better in recent years (very much opposed to Dutch rock music in that respect). Ali B's pop take on the genre took some time to win me over, but this is pretty classy.
SS: I like Dutch Hip-Hop, strange as it may sound I think the language really fits this kind of music. And this is a real fun song, catchy and the melody flows really good, real summery Eurorap tune!
EO: This isn't bad, nicely bubble-gum backing, but Ali B doesn't have the sense of playfulness in his flow to pull it off. Also, he does that annoying voice thing Eminem does when he tries to make one of his heavy-handed lines seem funnier than it is.
IM: The way it almost sounds comprehensible but not quite, even the way it sounds much phlegmier than English; all are kind of neat. But the real appeal is universal; I’m a sucker for quasi-reggae piano and neat sliding synth beeps.
SS: Maybe it because I don't understand what they're singing about, but I'd take this anyday over recent shit than 50 Cent or Lil' Jon bullshit.
JP: It's typical European rap ie. sounds like American rap from 5 years ago (perhaps early Eminem) with even less comprehensible lyrics. It is quite bouncy though.
MJ: When you don't speak the language, it's hard to make a judgment about some hip-hop tracks. This could be "Fuck tha Police," or it could be "Ice Ice Baby." I'm leaning toward the latter, despite the decidedly non-Dutch insertions of "muthafucker."
SN: I think I like foreign rap music because I really have no clue what's going on. This one is particularly good because it has one of those Chingrish titles I love so much, with a familiar word seemingly thrown in for the hell of it. Super fun happy joy!
AG: Oddly, this week Gloria Jeans have started seeing Leipe Mocro Flavour coffee with cream and sprinkles. The girl behind the counter who sold me it said, quote, "yo bitch! Roll with the coffee! Bitchin! Wicked! Fly girl in full effex!", to which I said "why are you sounding like the Dutch Joel Turner and the Modern Day Poets?" but she just handed me my coffee, which was crap, tasted funny, and made me want to be a bogan. I went back to Vanilla Ninja flavour the next day, to be safe. (For the benefit of non-Australians, Joel Turner and the Modern Day Poets are the worst thing to happen to music ever - EO)
GD: This is flat, lifeless, and monotonous throughout, like some
of the worst rap from the 80s. Although he does get bonus points for
giving me the first laugh of the top 10 for rhyming Microfoon with the quaint Dutch town of Bergen op Zoom.

8. Dr Kucho - Can't Stop Playing
EO: 3, SN: 3, AG: 2, MJ: 3, JP: 0, IM: 6, KS: 5, GD: 5, MT: 6, SS: 8
ADJUSTED SCORE: 4

JP: This is SO rubbish! I think Holland is one country where dance/club music is (in general) even more rubbish than the UK.
KS: Nothing to see here people, move along.
MT: A nice funky beat, which sounds a little bit dated, yes, that doesn't make it any less fun. Not a huge lot of fun, but a bit.
AG: Video clip with an amusing comedy dog, I suspect.
SN: I put it to you that this man...drumroll please...isn't even a real doctor!
AG: Unlike Dr Alban, who is a real dentist.
GD: Certainly wouldn't get me running onto the dancefloor but wouldn't have me fleeing to the bar either. A little bit repetitive, but that's par for the course with this sort of thing.
SS: Am I the only one who thinks it's actually "Disco's Revenge" by Gusto under a different beat? well I know it isn't but it reminds me of it.
IM: A fine example of the form, albeit one haunted by the sneaking suspicion that its place on the charts could be filled by a multitude of other songs.
EO: You know those bits that are like the bits between exciting, fun bits in dance singles? This song is nothing but those boring parts of dance singles laid end to end.
AG: Who says dance music is dead! Not the Dutch! Crazy cats! Pass the glowstick!
SN: Doesn't he know that it'll fall off if you don't stop playing?

9. Joss Stone - Spoiled
EO: 0, SN: 7, AG: 0, MJ: 4, JP: 2, IM: 2, KS: 4, GD: 5, MT: 2, SS: 0
ADJUSTED SCORE: 2

EO: I hate her so much it defies rational explanation. Even the fact that she slaughtered the sacred cow that is The White Stripes can't make me like her.
GD: The fact that my main memory of seeing her Glastonbury is that she was taller than I imagined she would be rather than the music says it all really. Waste of a good voice.
JP: We all know Joss is annoying and overrated, so is she wise to admit to being spoiled as well?
AG: Joss, mate, you don't make songs, you make mood music. You are played in bad restaurants by people trying to set "the mood" so you don't notice your hit on the bread, or "sensitive" blokes trying to cop a feel. Your role in life was taken once by Macy Gray. Have you considered a Dr Kucho remix?
IM: I know her voice is supposed to be all amazing and faux-authentic and shit, but to me it just sounds like a slightly huskier Amanda Marshall. And no disrespect to Marshall, but the only difference between her and Stone’s respective brands of pop is that Stone is that much more in hock to the past. This is not a good thing.
MT: I really don't know that much about english soul, but I'd love to and i'm sure it's something that's not far away in the queue of things I owe to myself. I've always been curious, since the first time I felt there had to be a connection between Dusty Springfield and Siobhan Donaghy, a feeling of loneliness and resignation that comes from accepting that, by singing an afro-american music style when they certainly weren't neither afro nor american, they could only become exiles in their own land.Well, spoiled or not, there's just nothing of it in Joss.

10. Kus - Lekker Ding
EO: 9, SN: 5, AG: 7, MJ: 6, JP: 7, IM: 8, KS: 9, GD: 8, SS: 9
ADJUSTED SCORE: 8

GD: It has a sauciness that almost seems English is its faux-coyness, and is great fun for it. I suspect no self-respecting 9 year old Dutch girl is complete without having having this as their ringtone this week, and I suspect playgrounds across Holland are a happier place for it.
IM: Every so often you hear a sound in a song that makes you want to type in all-caps “MY GOD I LOVE THAT SOUND”. The synth stabs that start off “Lekker Ding” (or as I think of it now, “La La Lekker”) qualify. See what I did there?
EO: Bold, joyous, brassy and infectious, if a bit empty. Not that it matters a whit.
AG: There's a vague Diana Ross in the 80s thing going on here, I don't know if anyone thought that. And the tiniest Mama Mia debt.
SN: This started off with such promise. Tambourine jingles, squidgy synthesiser noises, an appropriately wacky name, a rather good-natured Motown feel, and then...nothing.
IM: Kus are some sort of Dutch girl group that could be their analogue for anything from Girls Aloud to... I don’t know, Phil Collins or something, but on this basis I’d place them closer to Girls Aloud.
AG: It's OK, but by the standards of the Dutch charts this week, it's a veritable "No Good Advice".
SS: If not for the heavy Dutch accent I would have thought this is another Swedish pop treat, it is a treat though!
KS: One of these songs that bring out the sun. Almost perfect execution of all elements needed for this kind of mid-tempo euro-pop to be good. Little extras are the helium-pitched voice toward the end and the lovely lyrics about the best friend's brother turning out to be HOT.
JP: The "la la lekker" sounds like it should be from an advert, although I don't even want to speculate what it might be advertising.
SS: A quick lesson in Hebrew : Kus (×›×•×¡) is the Hebrew word in slang to the female genitals.
MJ: Did you know that in some states here in the southern U.S., it's illegal to get your ding lekkered?
IM: It’s a great song, and not just for that sound (oh, and smut fans: the title translates to “Nice Thing”).
GD: A rather frothy little pop number, where they sing
about giving their best friend's little brother his first kiss at a
party (Kus = Kiss; Lekker Ding = A Hottie).
JP: It's a nice little pop song which would have done well in Eurovision, especially since the chorus really wants to be Mamma Mia.
MJ: I like the Casio-sounding synths here, and the lead singer hits some lovely sweet notes on the build-up to the chorus. The bridge is a little too short, and I wish the guitar-esque effects got dropped into the mix sooner, but i's hard to dislike this track. It makes me think of the Cheeky Girls--you know, from their "difficult, mature, and confessional" second album in some parallel universe.

And, despite the general mediocrity - resulting in a low low score of 44 for The Netherlands, Kus have scored 8 and as such are worthy of being posted. You are probably going to sit there and think "ARGH! What does that la la lekker bit sound like?". Well, I know, and I'm not going to tell you. Unless you ask really nicely.

Kus - Lekker Ding

Kayliah - Quand Une Fille Est Love

2005-05-30T07:25:00.000-07:00

I'd like to think of this as a teaser for an upcoming "think piece" that'll be popping up on here some time during the future, largely on the topic of why obsessive pop nuts often are rather intolerant of R&B. No, I'm not writing it. Because I'm a teensy bit guilty of it myself.

And yet, along struts Kayliah, doing her woahs and her overemoting and because she does it in French, she gets a free pass. I'm not usually that enamoured of French as a language, so it's not the tongue. It might be the tin-clanging percussion. It might be the minimal, but definitely detectable bottom in the song - just enough bass to give it kick without dominating the song. It might be the vaguest hint of trembling in the chorus where Kayliah's steadied delivery in the verses becomes that little bit less confident as she's back-pasted into harmonising with herself.

It could be any of those things, or none of them. There's an attention to detail that it shares with its US cousins, indeed, but a great degree of subtlety at play - there's no chance Kayliah is going to bombastically throw the hook out of play by resorting to gigantic over-held notes and needless melisma, but she uses most of the bearable, even laudable, tricks out of the big bag of R&B persuasion.

Must be because it's catchy.

Valerij Meladze - Saliut, Vera!

2005-05-28T04:47:00.000-07:00

I'm having a really bad week. Trains, planes, disappointment, work ethic down, self-esteem non-existant. But for a brief, shining movement, I was saved. Saved by an Eastern European man (who's pretty ugly), seemingly stuck halfway between a crooner and a pop singer, a tone as bold as brass and a tune that rouses something inside of me despite being as shallow as a wading pool.

I first noticed Valerij a while ago when he did a duet with (I think) Ukrainian girl-group Via Gra, who had to change their name in some territories for obvious reasons (NB this post may be full of factual inaccuracies), but he has really caught my ear with this song, which stood out a mile amongst the various songs I took with me on my so-far very disappointing weekend jaunt.

Saliut, Vera! is a bit of a swinging, swaying monster. Strings dance all over the place. A pre-chorus comes sweeping into view, nicely disguised as a chorus itself, before the proper chorus tosses it aside and begs "Forget that, listen to me", and hooks, and they go on for miles. When I say crooner above, I really mean it in the sense of an adherent to a cheesy, overdone style of pop theatrics that's usually a complete turn off, but this song is a great bit of theatre.

I think what elevates this somewhat above a lot of the other similar stuff is that it's quite a bit more kinetic and flowing. The beat is crisp and smooth. The pace is hurried, but not urgent. The drama is more of the flag-raising, praising kind rather than the tortured excesses of dying or unrequited love and there's something vaguely comforting and uplifting and humorous about the whole affair that makes me adore it despite its faintly detectable air of cheapness and corniness.

Saliut!

A few words about that new Rachel Stevens single, then

2005-05-25T19:07:00.000-07:00

I won't post an MP3 (Argentinian cough S Club site cough cough), but I have a few things that need to be said about this.

1. How wonderful is it that we're living in an age where throbbing electro-pop that sounds a little bit like DURAN DURAN melodically is considered an absolute dead-cert for chart success to mitigate for the relative failure (Number 10) of one of the best electro-pop singles of the decade? It's like we're being completely spoiled here!

2. The 1-minute clip that was going around last week was good, but the whole song would be nothing without the whooshing, rocketship-taking off break in the middle with the ooh-ooh-oohs over the top of it. We already knew Rachel knows punctum, but here, the delicious moments are all courtesy of the backing track, which is a novel change in direction.

3. When you consider all the names behind this - people associated with quality pop for the thinking poptimist cum fascist, and the presence of people obsessed with shifting units, it really must be thought that this is the sort of stuff that IS going to be a commercial force fairly soon if not precisely at this point in time. Doomsayers may feel free to speculate what third-generation-Xerox-copies of this will be horrible and clog the top 5 six months hence from the end of this sentence.

4. "So Good" as meta-pop. No, no, no. It's not bloody meta-pop. Putting "meta" in front of everything is just as bad as using "action" as a verb. STOP IT. Ditto all the people smirking about "stand the test of time" because it's Rachel Stevens and she's not a proper artist and nobody will remember her in 10 years time. Not all pop songs are about the singer's bloody life. Allusions to the wondrousness and resilience of self are no more meta-pop than when some R&B singer goes on and on about how sexy he/she is and how gigantic their knob/tits is/are. I could go on and on about how the best songs like this work because you can read them both as discrete pop-texts or enclosed narratives AS WELL AS statements about "the biz" but then I realised that I would be vigorously advocating Aimee Mann, whose last record was really disappointing, and not half as good as this Rachel Stevens album is going to be.

Someone leak "Crazy Boyz" now, please? I've got some French R&B and some industrial J-Pop to listen to while I wait, but I'm getting impatient.

Nancy Ajram - Seher Oyouno (Yaay)

2005-05-23T08:36:00.000-07:00

Hello, my name is Mind Taker. This is my introductory post to Umlauts - cheers to the lovely Edward O for inviting me to spread the gospel of europop!

Since the last summer, everytime I'd switch to the Persian Music Channel (PMC), I did it hoping I would stumble upon this gorgeous tune. And I would stumble upon it only too rarely. And only recently I've discovered who's the performer behind it and what's the tune called, so I'll celebrate by sharing this vital information with you all!

Nancy is the Lebanese Britney, kinda. She may not be as risque compared to our westerner standards, but she's had to fend off accusations that she's "a seductive singer who uses provocative moves to attract fans". She's banned from performing in Morocco since her last concert there resulted in "incidents of sexual harassment, theft, excessive alcohol consumption resulting in violence, in addition to a number of reported cases of people fainting". She's only 22, and already has four albums under her belt; with her wealth amounting up to 37 million dollars, she's the eighth richest Arab singer.

Now, Umlauts is a europop blog. Why am I bigging up Asian pop here? Well, it's because "Yaay" presents an utterly wonderful Arabic twist on the St Etienne/Kylie/Rachel continuum: sleek metropolitan pop, as joyous as it is melancholic. You can find an mp3 (not astonishingly high quality, but good enough) on this page.

The Cross-Europe Chart Challenge of Death: BELGIUM

2005-05-22T06:41:00.000-07:00

Right. It's been a while, so I shall remind you of the "rules". Fifteen European countries have their top 10 evaluated. Ballots are sent out to people. In theory, they'd be experts in pop, but in practice they're also people I know or read.

These people have never submitted ballots before:

AG is Alyson Guard of the unstoppably mardy CFB Goes Pop.
IM is Ian Mathers from Stylus and also Fractionals.
MJ is Max Jones from Lots of Co, who is the panel's token US citizen.
MA is Mike Atkinson, better known as Troubled Diva, the most popular panelist around.

Back from "the olden days" are me (EO), Kate Gladman (KG), Andries P (AP), Scott Nash (SN) and Jessica Popper (JP).

Their scores and comments are recorded. Rather than giving a straight average, I scale it slightly, as songs simply don't average less than 1.5 or more than 8.5 very often, so the final score is usually slightly higher than the average. And any song that gets zero or ten from half of the panel gets that score no matter what. This feature pretty much picks up exactly where it left off six months ago... so here we go...

1. STAR ACADEMY - Fame
EO: 5, AG: 2, IM: 8, KG: 2, AP: 3, MJ: 2, SN: 8, JP: 6, MA: 5. ADJUSTED SCORE: 5

MA: Not having bothered to research the subject, I think I can safely presume that this features the finalists of the Belgian version of the musical TV talent show which we in the UK know as Fame Academy.
IM: Well, it’s “Fame”, and you can’t fuck up “Fame”, especially when it’s being sung by a whole crowd of unknowns with decent voices. Except for the way “the” is sometimes pronounced “deh”, I don’t know if I could have told you this wasn’t from America.
SN: Hi-NRG beats! Disco strings! Key changes! Hair metal electric guitar! Unnecessarily complex keyboard lines! No-I-can-sound-more-impassioned-than-you vocal performances!
AG: No one has ever questioned "Fame" have they? I'm gonna live forever? People will see me and cry? I'm gonna learn how to fly? What kind of super zombie killer flying mutants does this song want on earth? Shame on YOU Star Academy for promoting this super race of tear causing people who look at people, make them sad and fly away!
MJ: Too many different voices and too much reliance on the horrible squealing guitar key on the synthesizer.
AP: This kind of cheap karaoke cover is two steps back for Flemish reality TV spin-offs, and by extension, mankind.
JP: Look at it this way: if they have to do a song together, chances are anything original they're given to perform is not going to be anywhere near as good as Fame.
SN: This song is just one big exclamation mark, isn't it! I'm going to go and stare at something sparkly now! Yay!
IM: A perfectly good rendition of a great song.
JP: It will the please the fans and that's its whole purpose.
MA: Let's just say that in order to appreciate this competent but anonymous straight-down-the-line cover version, you probably had to be there. Still, their mothers must be proud
AP: Minus marks because my pet hate entrant, the prissy roly-poly Michael, fails to pronounce the ‘th’ in his line.

2. LAURA LYNN - Je Hebt Me 1000 Maal Belogen
EO: 9, AG: 9, IM: 6, KG: 7, AP: 7, MJ: 8, SN: 7, JP: 9, MA: 9. ADJUSTED SCORE: 9

JP: A Google for Laura-Lynn would lead you to think that she is in fact a country singer from Nashville, but as you can probably guess from the song title you would be very wrong. The other thing I have learned from this song is that Belgians don't just speak French and Flemish, they also speak Dutch, the language which this song is in. I suppose I should also mention the small matter of it being entirely fantastic!
AP: I know that by all applicable laws issued and enforced by the Taste Police I should hate this, but I just can’t bring myself to it.
EO: Best use of the "popcorn" noise in pop in a very, very, long time, buried stabs and a lovely bubblegum melody. A fantastic collection of SOUNDS if nothing else, but a strong tune too. Oh oh oh, reminds me a bit of the title track of Spray's excellent "Living In Neon" elpee. If you're interested, the original was by Andrea Berg, and was titled "Du Hast Mich Tausendmal Belogen" - take THAT to your preferred file sharing application.
MJ: Sounds enough like ABBA (okay, Agnetha solo) to make me smile!
MA: Honestly, this is fantastic: Schlager pop with a muted 80s Italo-disco beat, heavy on the echo chambers, and overlain with pleasingly scrunchy vocals. Nice to see that "Jenseits Von Eden" orchestrated synth stab making a comeback, as well.
IM: The backgrounds are intricate and ornate in a way that my ears instantly identify as European, but North America could learn a lesson in maximalism from this sort of thing.
AG: It's Eurovision tastic! You can put your hands in the air like you just don't care! I'm concerned she wants A THOUSAND Maal Belogens (hog!) and if you do a google image search for Laura Lynn, there's a guy with a hula hoop through his nose! WHAT DO YOU WANT PEOPLE! Magic.
IM: My poor, unilingual ears could swear she’s singing “you have to die sometimes” during the chorus, but the part I really love is the part that sounds like heavily digitally smooted out musical explosions in the background every so often.
AP: Is it the ‘trailer park’ side of my musical pallet, the one which also cherishes Portuguese Eurovision entries and the second Vengaboys album? Is it a premature sense of nostalgia, harking back to the days when more Flemish chart hits sounded like this, somewhere around 1990? Or is it just the fact it’s a darn catchy tune, if pretty much identical to the German original save for the vocals and language? Questions, questions!
KG: This sounds like a Christmas song, and a bloody good one, too. (And the great thing for me is that Laura Lynn comes just before Lara Fabian in my iTunes library, so at least it leads up to something great, i.e. a wailing rendition of “Je T’aime” by yours truly.)
MA: Now, I might not know much Flemish, but I'm fairly certain that this translates as "You have lied to me 1000 times." In which case, I find myself suddenly wanting to enrol in Flemish night classes, just so that I can join in with this at chucking out time at one of those tiny little sing-song bars (you know, the ones with tartan upholstery and copper pots hanging from the ceiling), drunkenly wagging my finger along with the massed ranks of betrayed housewives in a shared moment of "see yer in court, yer bash-tard!" solidarity.

3. WILL SMITH - Switch
EO: 1, AG: 4, KG: 4, AP: 5, MJ: 3, SN: 7, JP: 3, MA: 4. ADJUSTED SCORE: 4

AG: To quote my Mum: "35 year old multimillionaires shouldn't wear baseball caps and slap the booty"
AP: I preferred “Yo Home To Bel Air”. It oozed about as much street cred too.
JP: My sister loves this song but when I asked her why so I could write it here she just ignored me. Will Smith makes your sister ignore you - don't buy his music!

4. 50 CENT - Candy Shop
EO: 0, AG: 0, KG: 2, AP: 1, MJ: 7, SN: 0, JP: 0, MA: 2. ADJUSTED SCORE: 0 (half-panel rule)

KG: I’m sure the only way Fiddy could find his way to the Candy Shop is if Eminem was holding his hand.
MA: "Hoopla!" says young Armand, looking smart in his straw boater and sailor suit. "Hoopla for Monsieur Cinquante Cents, and his jolie chanson about les bon-bons! J'aime bien les bon-bons! Maman, donne-moi cinq Euros pour le CD single!" Mothers of Belgium: for the sake of the children, I urge you to educate yourselves, toot sweet.
AP: FACT: this ‘song’ is up to 24% more bearable if you imagine ‘Fiddy’ ~~singing~~ ~~rapping~~ half-mumbling it dressed in Shirley Temple gear with ribbons, shiny shoes and a big lollipop, in lieu of his usual ‘bling bling’ attire. Go on, give it a try.

5. DANIEL POWTER - Bad Day
EO: 5, AG: 1, IM: 7, KG: 3, AP: 7, MJ: 3, SN: 9, JP: 7, MA: 1. ADJUSTED SCORE: 5

MJ: Daniel Powter is really David Gray under a pseudonym, right? He's not? Oh--well that would have at least made the backstory here interesting.
EO: I was going to say that someone needs to give Daniel a shag, as he sounds so miserable, but he'd probably just do another whining song about it. Lovely piano, though.
MA: If I were being charitable, then I would liken this piano-led, expansively arranged, lighters-in-the-air ballad to something Robbie Williams might have put out around 1998. But as that would be to dignify this wretched piece of garbage by association, I shall refrain. Robbie deserves better.
AP: Now then, this seems to be lauded left, right and centre in the music press as some sort of modern singer/songwriter classic, while I tend to see it as more of an ‘05 equivalent of Meja’s “All ‘Bout the Money”, i.e. pleasant enough, inoffensive radio fodder that is omnipresent for a bit, upon which the singer most probably fucks back off into anonymity forever more (except to randomly feature on Ricky Martin duets, which comes down to the same basically).
KG: I had a bad four minutes listening to this song. And I’ll never get those four minutes back. And they were long minutes.
AG: Daniel imagines he's Robbie Williams fronting Train, he sees himself in the video clip wearing faded denim in a field, or wandering around a moody train station clenching his fist earnestly. Meanwhile me, as his manager, is stage side yelling "WHAT ABOUT OUR GIMMICK WHERE YOU DO NOTHING BUT POUT POWTER! STOP LOOKING EARNEST! NO SMILING! JUST POUT!" – alas, our mutual ideas are unlikely to ever meet in the middle.
JP: I've been listening to Daniel Powter's album this morning and it seems that Bad Day is rather deceptive. Although it seems to be quite popular, it's nothing special and rather predictable, and this comes from me as a fan of this type of music in general. However, the album really is very good. He sounds like a mixture of Christian Walz and Gavin Degraw which is a winning combination and extremely high praise from me.
IM: This reminds me of someone, and I have a feeling it’s someone I don’t like as much as I like “Bad Day”, nonsensical lyrics aside (“the camera don’t lie”? I’d like one of these spooky emotion-sensing camera, please!).
SN: Now, I know what you're thinking: this sounds JUST like something Ronan Keating or Brian McFadden or someone else equally noxious would sing. But it MOST CERTAINLY CAN'T BE, because I actually like (well, love) this song, what with its slow swing and comfortingly inane lyrics. And buddy, I don't listen to crap music. Now excuse me, I'm going to put on some Phil Collins.
AP: The jury’s not out on Mr Powter’s appearance though: the bare-headed shots of him in the video make me go all ‘Oooooooh’, but once the woolly hat comes on, it’s all of a sudden: ‘TWAT!!’

6. ZORNIK - Scared Of Yourself
EO: 7, AG: 7, IM: 3, KG: 5, AP: 8, MJ: 7, SN: 4, JP: 6, MA: 1. ADJUSTED SCORE: 5

MA: Sweet baby Jesus, that's one fucking horrendous set of pipes that Master Zornik has got on him: a coarse, flat, toneless, graceless bellow, that wouldn't disgrace a water buffalo.
AG: It's Duran Duran as remixed by Fragma in a top secret laboratory, and it's got the spare vocoder from Cher's Believe - it's more a montage song than a solid gold dancefloor song, but it's going to soundtrack a lot of pashing in the clubs of Lierse, and that's a very good thing!
EO: It's weird, I like the remix of this song except for the vocals, which seem fine on the original version.
AP: Last year’s original sounds a bit like Placebo after completing a ‘Pop Hook Songwriting 2.0’ masterclass, with extra toppings of cheese. The Peter Luts remix takes the Thin White Duke mix of Starsailor’s “Four to the Floor” and expands, well, very little on the concept.
SN: Once again, a perfectly decent song has the tune and charm remixed, nay, obliterated out of it by some dickhead who should have known better.
MA: Musically, this lumberingly reduces Euro-dance down to its basest building-block elements, rather as Oasis's "Lyla" has managed to do for classic rock. It's barely musical. It's quite shockingly bad. Never again will I complain about the state of the UK Top 40. I never knew we had it so good.
MJ: Growing on me--even the original incarnation was quite nice to listen to. I prefer the remix, though, because it moves it into full Darren Hayes territory with the fusion of the beats and the melancholy. Darren's voice totally destroys this guy, thugh. Is this Zornik fellow also a coyly self-denying homosexual?
IM: I love those grainy particulate synths that underlie this track (and a million others), but the vocals are badly melodramatic. Maybe if he didn’t stretch out that third word in every line to infinity this would be more tolerable, but as it is this pop trance at its worst.
KG: With a name like Zornik I was expecting some sort of hamster-eating death metal outfit, but they look quite nice. I notice, however, that they played a gig on Saturday 21st of May, so they clearly didn't have any plans to watch the Eurovision.

7. MARIO - Let ME Love You
EO: 5, AG: 1, KG: 5, AP: 9, MJ: 3, SN: 0, JP: 8, MA: 6. ADJUSTED SCORE: 5

AP: Oh, has there ever been a bigger discrepancy between how a song sounds like on paper (i.e. wannabe Usher warbles blatantly manufactured ‘soul’ ditty that attempts just that little too hard to be “Sexual Healing”), and how it actually sounds (i.e. still quite endearing, after all those radio and video plays)?
SN: To call this mediocre would be a disservice to every Jennifer Lopez movie ever made.
JP: I'm not a fan of r'n'b music and it's usually the big hits that annoy me most, but I inexplicably love this one. I'm not even slightly bored of it yet! Perhaps I need to see a doctor.
MA: Why does the presence of this ubiquitous internaional mega-hit not surprise me? I shall now go and stare wistfully through a window-pane, whilst pondering this further.

8. ANOUK - Lost
EO: 5, AG: 2, IM: 4, KG: 7, AP: 6, MJ: 0, SN: 5, JP: 8, MA: 2. ADJUSTED SCORE: 4

AG: Look, this isn't my cup of blood, considering it's pretty much Toni Childs backed by a local chamber orchestra, but I can imagine people would find it pleasant, I just think it's missing a heart. Presumably, that's whats lost.
MA: Ooh, acoustic arpeggiated triplets! How "classic"!
MJ: Total shit--literally painful to listen to. Everything--the phrasing, the arrangement, the lyrics--smacks of a sub-par Shakira ballad. Truly awful. Killing-a-dead-cat-slowly awful.
AP: In one of my previous anoraky Flemish chart write-ups on SingleEurope.com, I wrote that this is “set to be another firm favourite with legions of teenage girls and gay men all over Holland and Flanders”. Now, heaven knows my taste has scarily much in common with said particular demographics, but this drama-queeny campfire ballad does very little for me for some reason or other. Nor do Anouk’s ever-inflating boobs in her videos.
SN: This is a lazy song, lazily sung, with lazy lyrics and a lazy structure (build and fade...yep, that's about it), so I'm going to make a lazy comparison: pleasant enough in a meandering Toni Childs/Tori Amos kind of way.
MA: And then there's that whole business with the dreadful extended free-form worldless moaning session towards the end, which aims for the searing intensity of something like Pink Floyd's "Great Gig In The Sky", but ends up sounding like a spoilt two year-old grizzling on because her mother wouldn't buy her an ice-cream. Woeful stuff indeed.
IM: It’s weird that she sings “your voice makes my skin crawl” like it’s a compliment, but I’m more than willing to attribute both that and the seemingly extreme level of drama in “Lost” to the fact that my sensibilities are not yet calibrated to the wider world of pop.
JP: I'm a huge Anouk fan but this is not her best. Listen to "Girl" for Anouk at her upbeat, feisty best. However, you must find the video for this - I won't spoil it for you but it's quite interesting!
KG: Anouk combines her gorgeous Beth Orton-esque vocals with a few surprisingly well-done clichés, such as your standard guitar arpeggios and lines like ‘If roses are meant to be red and violets to be blue, why isn’t my heart meant for you?’; an eternal question indeed.
EO: Being felt is often necessary, but not sufficient.
KG: I thought that the gloriously synthetic string section could have been better utilized by the introduction of a key change, but one can’t have it all.

9. GWEN STEFANI - Rich Girl
EO: 8, AG: 8, KG: 4, AP: 8, MJ: 2, SN: 5, JP: 10. MA: 7. ADJUSTED SCORE: 7

AG: The rest of No Doubt would like to announce they are available for weddings, birthdays, bar mitzvahs etc...
MJ: I'll never forgive her for not releasing "The Real Thing" as a single.

10. MILK INC. - Blind
EO: 8, AG: 10, IM: 7, KG: 6, AP: 7, MJ: 6, SN: 3, MA: 8. ADJUSTED SCORE: 7

MA: How reassuring to learn that over in the Benelux nations, a candle still burns for Ye Olde Euro-Trance. As such, this is a perfectly adequate example, which wouldn't have disgraced the pen of a Paul Van Dyk or an Ian Van Dahl.
EO: Gorgeous and pumping but ever so slightly dead inside, kind of like a kiss-off from a sexy newsreader.
AG: It's the perfect song to get into a car listening to, drive through some dark tunnels, enjoy the Mr T reference, weave through tunnels harassing old people who are driving too slow, and then arrive in time to see your honey winking at you at the club door. In other words - top of the pops.
IM: Coldly dismissive on the surface, possibly fighting back tears beneath, and much better for it. More of those incrementally propulsive synth treatments I love, more interesting lyrics and delivery than this sort of song normally gets, and I know this is the radio edit, but it’s nice to see them get their business done in under four minutes.
MA: "I'm just a mammary!", the singer declares movingly, accompanied by NOT one but TWO epic breakdowns in the course of the four minutes (now there's value for you), along with a sound effect which sounds rather like the faulty ignition engine on a 1970s Vauxhall Viva.
KG: My first reaction was ‘Ow! It hurts my brain! Make it stop!’. But then it made me dance around the kitchen, and we all like soft-core vocal trance now and then.
AP: Strays not one inch from the established Milk Inc. hit formula but then, does their core fanbase expect any different? Their fifteenth Top 10 hit over here, leaping over Britney’s 14, I’m not sure whether that is a case of pop justice or injustice.
SN: Not really a song that grabs your love and attention, is it? Mind you, if you're the sort to flail around to this while using chemicals that erode your frontal lobe, I expect that doesn't really matter.

Phew. How exhaustive. Belgium scores 51 points thanks to the most divided lot of comments ever, and Laura Lynn is the clear favourite of the round, and as such she gets posted. Eventually I will get around to updating the leaderboard and bringing all the old results forward...

Well done, Laura Lynn.

Dimension-X - Why'd I Have To Fall In Love With U?

2005-05-20T07:45:00.000-07:00

I've been gone for a long time. Out of the loop, not attuned to the ebb and flow of the Europop. I do know that for all its unity in landmass, Europe is regionalised. Sometimes songs don't seep northward or eastward from where they've already been hits.

This has, perhaps, been out for a month or three, but distressingly, it only seems to have made a splash in Greece, Macedonia and Cyprus - and some airplay in Lebanon. I'm reminded, of course, of a little Greek song from a while back, you may remember it - Travel Girl. Not that this sounds like that - the reference points I'm getting here are David Guetta, How Did You Know (77 Strings) and a bit of I Like It by Narcotic Thrust.

The song itself has an interesting history. It's a cover of a 1980 song by Matthew Fisher, who played in Procul Harum. I'd class it as being an obscurity, but evidently, was an absolute cult classic in Greece through the 80s, even seeing a single release as late as 1996. No doubt there's a fascinating story to be told as to why this song was so popular there, but I'm not anywhere near knowledgable enough to tell it.

Evidently, Dimension-X, a Greek dance project enlisted TF, the singer, from one of those reality TV shows. It's often a tough ask, singing a directed song like this in a genre that's communal and (according to detractors) impersonal like dance. But aside from the groove itself - impeccable, this really does sound more like a French house track, though not of the frenzied kind that tends to cross over and across borders - there's something very believable about it. TF does a good enough job riding along the disco pulse, adding the right amount of emotion to the pained lines of the chorus without going overboard.

Personality may be minimal, but amid the throb, such can go above and beyond the hook, detracting from it. Depending on the frame of mind I listen to this in, sometimes I can't even hear the vocals, the next listen, it's like they're all I can hear and the anguish - all concocted, mind - is deafening. Some note progressions are just inherently sad, and dressing them up in going-out clothes can't hide the resignment, resentment and regret, all as much cornerstones of amazing pop as beats and bass and hooks.

Basically, a perfect cover. I love it, and you can too.

Boring Introductory Post

2005-05-17T16:59:00.000-07:00

Hello, hello. Welcome to Umlauts, a weblog about pop music, mostly of the European variety. Umlauts is, by and large, the official successor to Enthusiastic but Mediocre, a decently-read and surprisingly-appreciated pop blog that ran from November 2003 to December 2004, hosting the odd MP3 here and there before being unceremoniously flattened by its impetuous creator.

With other regular (and perhaps irregular) contributors on board, some of whom know about the songs being discussed, Umlauts hopes to retain the charming "people at a schmick dinner party listening to Dragostea Din Tei" of EBM's better moments. Honest, occasionally excitable commentary without any taint of professionalism.

And yes, there will be MP3s.