“If you liked Oui Mais Non, it’s very much in the same vein.”
Tom: This one’s sent in by Europlop reader Alex, who writes: “Basically if you liked Oui Mais Non, it’s very much in the same vein.” Now, we did like that track, although we did complain that it went on a bit.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vVIM4vuVbbk
Tom: Well, the new one is an improvement, I reckon. It doesn’t go on too long, although I reckon it could still do with a couple of adjustments: first of all, lose the odd talky bridge; second, add a bit more… er… ‘oomph’ on that last chorus.
Tim: I like it a lot, and it seemed to get even better on successive listens. But yeah, a bit of oomph wouldn’t have hurt.
Tom: As for the video: I don’t think there’s much I can say other than it’s ‘arty’. CGI jewel-encrusted camels are something even 50 Cent hasn’t thought of, though.
Tim: And a mysterious bloke who looks a little bit like Ewan McGregor did as Obi-Wan Kenobi. Do Jedi ride camels regularly?
Tom: Only when they’re forced to. Forced! Like, the Force in… oh, suit yourself.
Tim: Movetron is a rather pleasant-sounding Finnish group have been going, on and off, for quite some time (as in started in 1994), but things have been a bit quiet recently. Now, fortunately, they’ve resurfaced with this.
Tim: Fortunate, yes?
Tom: That’s got a bit of Ace of Base about it, and that’s a good thing.
Tim: I have absolutely no idea what any of the words mean, nor even the title, as the entire internet seems to draw a blank, but that just means there’s more room to enjoy the music.
Tom: As a regular “track to listen to”, it probably wouldn’t get me playing it often – but by the time the post-bridge chorus came along, I was rather enjoying it and I reckon it’d fit rather well on a dance floor.
Tim: This is happy, dancy, energetic music that I could jump up and down in a club to for a considerable amount of time if this was left on repeat, and I probably wouldn’t even notice.
THAT, I’ve just decided, is what a good club track should be about – getting you dancing, and keeping you dancing, and by that definition this is a good club track. I demand more of this sort of thing, and so I say to you, Movetron people: please don’t go away for another two years again.
Tim: Eleven months ago we reviewed the 2010 Iceland Pride track and somewhat liked it; a little under ten months ago we reviewed a Hera Björk track and loved it more than anything else in the world. Now, we combine the two, with this year’s Iceland Pride track, sung by the delightful Ms Björk.
Tom: Well, this has got to be good.
Tim: You’d think, wouldn’t you?
Tom: Oh.
Tim: Let’s not mince words: it’s disappointing. Right from the start with the autotune on her voice, it’s very disappointing indeed.
Tom: Who’s this Haffi Haff bloke? Because he appears to have dragged Hera down to his level.
Tim: No one particularly special – had a few tunes out that aren’t really worth linking to – but yeah. I wasn’t expecting another Because You Can, of course I wasn’t, and I accept it has to have a proper clubby sound to it, but it’s just so generic.
Tom: Not even an operatic bridge? Really? This could be anyone singing.
Tim: It’s a shame – she has such a fantastic and capable voice, and it’s wasted on this Rihanna/Britney/Beyoncé/J-Lo/anyone soundalike.
Tim: The third and final Flashback for the time being coming from French radio, this cover of a 1999 track by pretty-much-one hit wonder Miranda came out last September.
Tom: I’d completely forgotten this song! This was on the radio when I was about 15, I think. I liked it back then.
Tim: In case you didn’t get it from the video, the general message here is: let’s go to the beach and have a party.
Tom: “La Playa”. Got it.
Tim: It has an infectious hook, a pleasant summer feel to it and gentle product placement in the video.
Tom: As well as the typical “let’s see how close can we get to showing nudity before the TV channels won’t show us any more”.
Tim: Well, naturally. It is, basically, entirely generic. In a good way, though, because this sort of tune is nice: it’s happy, upbeat, and if you complain about it you can sod off and be miserable elsewhere, thank you very much.
Tom: The bits that aren’t the chorus are really terrible, and that rising-siren sample in the background really annoys me. Right, I’ll sod off elsewhere.
Tim: Good, because you’re wrong. Though, if you want to hear the original again, it’s here, with a fairly heated multilingual argument about whose version is better in the comments and with some vastly less attractive models in the video, so you probably wouldn’t like it.
Tim: ‘Saturday Night’ was the first single I ever bought.
Tom: It was very nearly the first single I bought, before I decided that actually I’d rather spend the money on something else instead. (The actual first single? The Children in Need version of ‘Perfect Day’. No regrets.)
Tim: I needed it for a school dance competition, you see (which I totally won), and the single came with six remixes attached to it, of which the Extended Nite Mix was by far and away the best. It prompted my granddad to express amazement at how much you get on CDs these [those] days.
Tom: The “cassingle” had the same remixes. I remember it well. I also remember being somewhat confused by the concept of including the same song six times on one cassette. I was new to this whole ‘pop music’ thing.
Tim: I have no idea why I remember that, from seventeen years ago, in such detail.
Tom: And the strange thing is, I remember my nearly-buying-it in detail too. Formative years, and all that.
Tim: Um, where were we? Oh, right, her new song.
Tim: Well, first things first* – ‘ba ba-ba ba’ is no ‘dee-dee da-na na’.
* Why do people say that? What else would be first?
Tom: Well, no.
Tim: But anyway, it’s repetitive, lyrically brain-numbing, not particularly exciting – basically, everything that makes up a shit track.
Tom: After this many years, you think she’d come out with something better.
Tim: But, it’s not shit, though.
Tom: What? I don’t trust your judgement. You’re still on the codeine.
Tim: Nah, finished that a while back. But anyway, when did you ever trust my judgement?
Tim: Quiet for five years, and then a few weeks ago this came along. It’s only just here because I wanted to see how well it would do first, and, well, I’ll just say it hasn’t charted YET. Anywhere.
Tom: That’s… not all that shocking.
Tim: Yep. Disappointing, yes, but surprising, really not. It lacks a catchy chorus, and really anything hugely memorable. And while there’s a sort of energy there, it’s really nothing out of the ordinary – just seems to be going through the motions a bit. (Feel free to insert a ‘that’s what she said’ here, by the way.)
Tom: Everything just seems to run together. There’s no… well, for want of a better term, there’s no “ooh-aah” moment in there – either a Gina G one or a DJ Otzi one.
Tim: DJ Otzi workplace anecdote: someone put the original version of ‘Hey Baby’ on, and I commented that the DJ Otzi version is so much better (obviously). She didn’t believe me, so put it on my iPod and took it in the next day to play it. She still didn’t believe me. And I was sad.
Back to what we’re meant to be doing, though, and on a second listen I think the chorus is actually OK. Can’t remember the verses, but the chorus will do for me.
Tom: …I can’t remember it at all. DJ Otzi is now filling my head. It’s like I’m 16 again and back at the funfair that visited Nottingham – where every other stall and ride seemed to be blasting this out of their speakers. It’s a bit better than Gina G.
Tim: Released as an EP a couple of years back, this song has been fiddled around with and as of yesterday has a video and, according to their Twitter babblings, a re-release date of August. And, well, it’s AMAZING. And you would be wrong to disagree. But I have a feeling you will, somewhat strongly.
Tom: All right, I’ll brace myself.
Tim: So before you listen, please do two things for me:
Tim: OH MY GOD I LOVE IT SO MUCH. The adults are gone, the kids are a bit nervous but then they’re in a world where they can do what they want, and play nicely, and vandalise a car or two. It’s everything we wanted to do when we were kids but weren’t allowed. It’s PROPER.
Tom: And all it took was six billion people to be exterminated. Well, that might not be true: they might have been snatched away from their families and sent to some kind of duplicate Earth filled with inexplicable monsters, but either way that’s a pretty bleak thought.
Tim: EVERYTHING WE WANTED TO DO. They ‘seize a chance, follow a dream’. Because ‘there are wonders we haven’t seen yet.’ This whole video, it’s, well if I was in a cynical mood, I’d probably be all—no, you know what? This would pull me right out of that mood. Example? I translated the note she was writing to her parents, and I actually went ‘ahhhh’. Here.
Tom: And you’ll keep doing that right until one of them gets a cut and dies of gangrene.
Tim: Well, aren’t we the optimist today? Also, and this will come as no shock to you whatsoever, I want Pom-Pom in my life. Now. Main question, I suppose, is would I like it if I hadn’t sen the video? And, well, I don’t care, because I have seen the video, and I have SUCH A HUGE GRIN on my face right now, and whatever you think, just remember: The W.O.R.L.D. is full of M.A.G.I.C.
Tom: Here’s the thing: I went back and listened to the track again, on its own, without the video, without the kids’ voices. And then I got it. Then I got the huge grin. It doesn’t need the video. It’s an amazing, almost OMD-like bit of music – and from me, that’s a very high compliment – and I love it.
Tim: MAGIC.
Tom: When I’m not being distracted by the possible extermination of six billion people and the inevitable death of the children, I think it’s lovely.
Tim: Yes, the same Hanna Stockzell we featured yesterday.
Tom: Wait a minute. Hanna Stockzell! Otherwise known as one half of Smile.dk, which I know from my DDR-playing childhood.
Tim: Yeah – did I not mention that? Oh well, you’ve figured it out on your own. Good work.
Tom: No wonder her tracks sound familiar to me!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XMcgx7TIRT8
Tom: Oh, that will do nicely. I may have to try and find the album. When I was at university, I used music like this as a way to make me work: the low-attention-span part of my brain was busy going “ooh, shiny”, so the rest of my brain could get in flow and actually make things. To this day, listening to this gives me a vague feeling that I should be productive. A weird association, I’ll grant you, but it works.
Tim: I must say I somewhat dislike the massive autotune, though after a while I actually get used to it when it sounds like Still Alive.
Tom: I’m so used to it as an effect that I didn’t even notice – it just sounded normal to me.
Tim: Well, I do however love the rest. The energy, the sheer and unashamed pop-ness of it, the instrumental bits that follow the choruses. Hell, it really is like a modern-day Alice Deejay. BRILLIANT.
Tom: You keep using that analogy—
Tim: I do, don’t I? Hmm.
Tom: I’m not sure it holds; Alice Deejay was about dance music – upbeat, European dance, sure, but not bubblegum pop like this. It’s not really a major quibble, though; I still bloody love the song.
Tim: Well, once you’ve seen the song title you don’t really need to hear the song to know what it’s like. Nevertheless, you need to hear this. Your life will not be complete until you have done so.
Tom: It’s as if J-Pop made it over to Sweden. It sounds like the bubblegum Europop groups early in the 2000s – Joga and all that lot. This needs a cutesy dance routine, and some Dance Dance Revolution steps set to it.
Tim: Yes, it does. And a wind machine or twenty. Basically: WHY WASN’T THIS IN THIS YEAR’S EUROVISION SONG CONTEST? IT’S MILES BETTER THAN THAT (previously great but now) CRAPPY ‘POPULAR’ BOLLOCKS.
Tom: Yep, agreed. More like this, please.
Tim: She’s like this decade’s Alice Deejay, but EVEN BETTER. Right from the start it’s just fantastic, and amazing, and wonderful, and there really aren’t enough superlatives in the world to describe this.
Tom: Whoa, hang on. Better than Will I Ever? I mean, she’s good, and that key change is bloody excellent, but do you th—
Tim: ‘I love bubblegum. I love to dance.’ YES. YOU AND ME ARE SOULMATES, HANNA.
Tom: “I love emotions / I love to move / Do you want my love / I want it with you”?
Tim: Brought to Europlop’s attention by a French radio station as I was visiting my sister, this came out in January of this year.
Tom: Today’s “applying logic to a music video” moment – how is he touching those incandescent light bulbs without hurting his hand?
Tim: Oh, stop being finicky. And is he touching them? Looked more like cupping to me, and just long enough for it to almost but not quite hurt. The lyrics, meanwhile, go on about how despite how we all have different flags and countries and parents and tastes and all that, we all live under the same sun so we should all be nice to each other. Sounds like a load of hippy crap to me, but the French people apparently liked it so I guess that sort of proves his point.
Tom: At least it’s not a generic love song. I was about to complain about it being musically generic, but it seems happy and friendly enough that I don’t really mind.
Tim: Yeah – I quite enjoy the music, or at least I’m fairly sure I do – it’s inoffensive, chirpy and largely relaxing.
Tom: It’s absolutely designed to hit all the typical emotional happy-pop notes.
