Tim and Tom's Europop Blog
“It’s a terrible, terrible song.”
Tim: Tom’s busy this week, so there’s no-one to stop me bring you this. It’s a terrible, terrible song, so why am I featuring it, you ask? Well, have a listen.
Tim: Basically, because I’ve had that one 3½-second chorus line going round, round, round and round in my head for the best part of the last two weeks, and I’ve decided that enough is enough. If I can’t be happy, I want EVERYBODY to share in my misery. YOU’RE WELCOME.
“Still love this”
Tim: Recently at work someone said something that came out in a slightly more offensive manner than he’d planned; anyway, it made me think of this glorious one-hit wonder from 2008.
Tom: That’s a heck of a sentence there, Tim.
Tim: There’s a proper video that’s got nobility and cheerleaders and a plot with a ghost and stuff in it, but it’s not available outside America, so well done for that everyone. It’s a marvellous song, though, wherever you happen to be, with it’s lovely mesh of synthpop and indie rock that appeared with them and Metro Station but disappointingly didn’t hang around for long.
Tom: And it’s actually one that I downloaded, although for the life of me I don’t know why: years later, it just seems to grate on me.
Tim: WHAAAAAT? We have a tune that kicks off hard right from the start, a message we can all get behind with an oddly-appropriate somewhat whiny vocal, and a hook that’s as memorable and catchy as all the best are. Six years on, I still love this song.
Tom: That “one, two, three” into the chorus is pretty good, I suppose? It’s moderately catchy? It all just seems a bit vaguely embarrassing, though, like a part of my student life that I don’t want to remember.
Tim: I say one-hit wonder; a new track Origami got plonked on YouTube at the beginning of the month, and it’s not bad. It’s not a patch on this, though.
“The video is certainly a thing.”
Tom: “Donkeyboy never disappoint”, writes an anonymous reader.
Tom: To be fair, beyond the fact that Joe McElderry covered one of their songs, I don’t know anything about Donkeyboy, so disappointing me’d be difficult.
Tim: I pretty much can confirm what our reader says – their releases are considerably more killer than filler, and this just serves to further demonstrate that.
Tom: The song’s catchy, I suppose, and the video is… well, the video is certainly a thing.
Tim: Yeah – Attack of the Giant Unstoppable Spraypaints isn’t a film I thought I’d be watching today. The music, though, I think is great, and very enjoyable.
Tom: I can’t pick out anything objectively bad about this song; I’d even say it’s a single rather than an album track. But equally, I can’t see it reaching the top of the charts — it’s one for folks who like this sort of gently calming, uplifting, pop.
Tim: Hello!
“More than makes up for last week’s awful ukelele.”
Tim: Last Saturday I moaned about a track on the work playlist that made me grumpy. This week, let’s have a track from it that everybody can entirely agree is fully brilliant.
Tom: Oh, man, I have so many good memories of this song.
Tim: Because for all that I love europop and key changes and that – man, this is just wonderful. So what if the chorus doesn’t make much sense? And so what if it probably doesn’t need those last couple of chorus lines at the end? Because just everything else.
Tom: It’s difficult for me to give any kind of unbiased view of this track, because I have so much associated with it. But what stands out for me is that… you know, I don’t have the musical knowledge to explain what it is, but whatever key change happens during that middle eight. That. More of that, please.
Tim: The melody and the instruments, the earnest singing, the everything – it’s just fantastic, and more than makes up for last week’s awful ukelele.
Tim: I was having trouble thinking of a song to write about for today. Fortunately, I have a break glass for emergency bag of Eurovision delights to delve into for precisely this situation. Out of it today? This wonder, from Latvia in 2008.
Tom: Oh dear. This was a year or two post-Lordi, wasn’t it?
Tim: There are so many things to love about this, especially if you put the shonky vocals aside and dodgy mixing aside. Not least is the idea there’s the idea that pirates are indomitable as long as Peter Pan isn’t around, and while we’ve probably seen stranger stagings, none spring to mind right now. This is Eurovision novelty at it’s finest, and they didn’t go unrewarded, just finishing in the top half of the table.
Tom: I’m still astonished by that: I assumed they’d crash to the bottom as being a poor novelty act. But no: well done them.
Tim: Musically (if we can be serious about the music) that dodgy mixing really is a shame – you can barely make it out here, but in the studio version there’s a whole load ho-hi-ho-hi-haying going on throughout the middle eight, and a great harmony line after the middle eight, really going out for the hi-hi-ho-o-o-o-o and all we can be-e-e-e-e.
Tom: That’s one of the most ridiculous things you’ve ever written.
Tim: Probably, yes, but I love this, I really do. Even if it’s not exactly something I can point at when I say ‘look, other countries take it seriously!’
“I’m annoyed I ever really forgot about it.”
Tim: Mika’s not up to much musically right now, what with being a coach on The Voice Australia (yep, the logic escapes me too) —
Tom: I’ll just assume it’s an exchange program with Kylie.
Tim: Not entirely inconceivable, I suppose — but I heard this in the pub the other day and was reminded of how brilliant it is.
Tom: Oh dear. Really?
Tim: And there we go – you’re welcome.
Tom: Gah, thanks. For some reason this grates on me: too shouty, just… too much. It didn’t the first time I heard it, but much like a lot of Mika’s tracks, after a while I just start to get a bit tired.
Tim: What? See, I was going to leave it at that, but now I want to say more about it – it has a great two-part chorus, with two great hooks and few other memorable ones stuck in for good measure, Mika’s voice going up and down playing to the idea of doing whatever the hell like because WE ARE GOLDEN – but overall it’s a fairly flawless track, and to be honest I’m annoyed I ever really forgot about it. Basically, you’re wrong: IT’S JUST THAT GOOD.
“A not-quite-as-amazing Amazing.”
Tom: I realise that this comes from someone with one of the most generic names possible, but: Mohamed Ali? Really?
Tim: ‘Fraid so. But, remember Niko, whose entry to Latvia’s Eurovision selection contest Here I Am Again was very similar to a Swedish contestant from the year before? Well I heard this recently, which was Denmark’s runner-up last year. Before you listen to it, though, remind yourself of Danny Saucedo’s amazing Amazing, from Melodifestivalen 2012.
Tim: This is, basically, a not-quite-as-amazing Amazing.
Tom: I thought, initially, that you meant it’d be the same song — and it’s not, but I see where the comparison comes from.
Tim: Right – the above comparison is a little unfair, because the melody is its own, but still: male vocalist, toned-down piano, strings and drum instrumentation behind the verses, a hopefully anthemic line to a suddenly EDM chorus, and genre-shifting breakdown with fancy staging. Hell, even the monochrome outfits pretty much match.
Tom: Yep, you’re right there. It’s certainly a different song, but drawn along the same lines.
Tim: I said not quite as amazing, because it isn’t: partly because it’s missing the incredible clothing lights (though I suppose the flames sort of make up for it) but what’s it’s really missing is the big “oh-oh-ohhhh” line that the other had.
Tom: It’s missing a Big Anthemic Moment. Which is a shame.
Tim: On its own, it’s not a bad song; it’s just, well, when it struck me, I can’t avoid that comparison, which, yeah, is a shame.
“Barnstormer.”
Tom: We’ve covered a couple of tracks from their latest album before, but not this one — it’s the title track, and it’s a barnstormer.
(There’s also the full music video here, with two warnings: one, that it’s part of a concept video, and two, that’s it’s rather splatter-gory.)
Tim: Hmm. You say spatter-heavy, I say typical episode of Hannibal or The Following. Though has Elton ever done a video where he doesn’t play the piano?
Tom: Some critics derided this track as ‘cheesy’, which is probably fair when compared to other tracks from a punkish-rock band like Fall Out Boy.
Tim: Yes, but every heavy band typically puts a couple of more radio-friendly tracks in each album – we’ve featured a couple before. Keeps them accessible to everyone; an excellent idea, I reckon.
Tom: I mean, that’s a glorious key change, and Elton John’s happily singing along with it — yep, it’s pretty cheesy. But you know what? It’s also pretty damn good.
Tim: It really is. And that video’s pretty special too.
“It’s just such a happy track.”
Tim: I woke up early this morning, and after a while my mind wondered to what song we could write about today, and then my alarm went off, and a massive smile appeared on my face. Because it’s this song. This wonderful, wonderful song.
Tom: Let’s see, it was 1998 when this came out. I’ve got a particular memory associated with this: Ingoldmells, of all places, on a double-decker bus with some friends. I think someone was throwing paper airplanes out of the slightly-open rear window.
Tim: That’s, er, yes, quite a particular memory. I myself offer a different story: I can’t remember now who it was, but a while back someone mentioned that this was their pick-me-up track, their go-to track for when they’re feeling a bit low, and I didn’t think much at the time, and then a while ago I was in need of a track like that, and I remembered it, and WOW. Because it’s just such a happy track.
Tom: Apart from that middle-eight: I don’t know why, but it never really worked for me. But yes, it’s a classic for good reason.
Tim: Oh, multiple reasons. The lyrics: not only is life a wonderful flower, but “we live in a free world”, and just “carry on smiling, and the world will smile with you”. The music: that lovely flowing intro, the strings underneath. The background chanting at the end. Even the video, with the flower dye (God, I’d love it if that were a real thing). I just find it near impossible to listen to without smiling; if I do find myself not smiling, well, I listen to it again. And again. And again, for good measure.
Tom: And if you get bored? The US version, which has different lyrics, different instrumentation, a different key and — crucially — a fixed middle eight. It’s not better, mind: it’s just different.
Tim: Oh. Oh, my. I don’t…oh. Huh.
“River Song?”
Tim: In 2008, Melodifestivalen celebrated its fiftieth birthday; sensing an clear opportunity for a cash-in, two weeks ago SVT released a ‘Best of’ compilation with 5 hours of tracks, and GOSH IT’S BRILLIANT.
Tom: Hold on, two weeks ago? That took a while. But that said, I’ve got to respect a five-hour schlager compilation.
Tim: Some of it, admittedly, stands up now as utter tripe, such as this, 1965’s victor. On the other hand, most of it’s like this, which took 6th place in 2009.
Tom: River Song?
Tim: I see where you’re coming from, but no – Sarah Dawn Finer, better known to a lot of non-Swedes recently as the person behind Lynda Woodruff. But she started out in music, and what a prime example of music this is.
There are a lot of good things that can be said about this, even before we get to the music: the way starts by pretending to be the god that makes the sun come up, the wind machine dialled up as high as it’ll go, and then some, the way she winks to the camera, the zombies that close in on the camera as she moves over, with a determined look on her face, to the highlight of the staging: that INCREDIBLE plinth, in case we hadn’t got enough of the deity idea already.
Tom: That is a hell of a bit of staging. And as for the music?
Tim: Oh yes, and it’s about as good a “pick yourself up and get going” power ballad as you’re going to find anywhere.
Tom: I’m not quite sure about that odd ticking noise in the first verse, and I’m sure there’s a vibraslap cameo in there somewhere. I’m also not quite sure whether it’s actually a decent song, but it’s certainly putting the effort in.
Tim: Basically, what an excellent entry it was.