Ah, Ibiza. The sun, the sea, the sand, the sexually transmitted infections.
Tim: Bored of winter? In that case, close your eyes, lie back, listen to this and be whisked off to a beach on Ibiza.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iTtVHeabvvA
Tom: Ah, Ibiza. The sun, the sea, the sand, the sexually transmitted infections.
Tim: A 1996 track, redone to sound like the summer of 2003 and released in the winter of 2010, it does go on a bit without really doing anything.
Tom: It’s pleasant enough, I suppose, but it’s very much “early night in a nearly-empty club”. Floor-filler it ain’t.
Tim: Well, for that we have the source material to blame – but I like it. It’s very peaceful, it’s very relaxing, and even if you don’t like that there’s a slightly (very slightly) heavier remix for you instead (which entirely fails to kick in at 1:33).
Tom: That 1:33 moment might be the worst stall I’ve ever heard. Mind you, it’s very difficult to count as ‘heavy’ at that plodding BPM.
Tim: But I think that’s all it’s meant for – it’s never going to get anyone raving, but it will fit nicely on a few chill out compilations.
Tom: I’ve never really liked or understood ‘chillout’ dance. That’s what other genres of music are for, surely?
Tom: All right, Tim, hold on. Let’s leave the key changes and schlager aside for a moment – it’s time for us to attempt a track that, as two middle-class white guys, we are utterly unqualified to review.
Tom: Let’s be honest: this is Guns N’ Roses ‘Welcome to the Jungle’ reinterpreted for 21st century kids.
Tim: Don’t like it.
Tom: Thought that might be the reaction. Still, there’s clearly an audience for this if he’s on the fourth single, and it’s pretty listenable. He’s milking the album a bit, though; this is the fourth single from “Alive ‘Til I’m Dead”, at which point you can probably justifiably claim he’s just stalling before getting some new material out.
Tim: Which’ll probably be rubbish.
Tom: “Welcome to Hackney / A place where I think somebody’s been playing Jumanji”. I’ll be honest: a kitschy Robin Williams film is not a reference I expected to hear at the start of this.
Tim: It’s rubbish.
Tom: I don’t think you can claim the video glamorises anything.
Tim: Or that the video’s good. Or that the song’s good.
Tom: Right. Mental note. Don’t suggest any more grime tracks to Tim.
Tom: I shouldn’t like My Chemical Romance, but I do. The overblown videos, the concept albums, the teenage demographic… I should be rolling my eyes and trying to get the damn kids off my lawn. But, inconveniently, they keep producing bloody good music.
Tom: This is the second single off Danger Days: The True Lives of the Fabulous Killjoys, the second concept album. If you actually care about the concept, Wikipedia (of course) has a decent write-up.
Tim: I don’t normally like concept albums – they only really work if all the songs are quite good, or at least listenable, and often they’re not. Fortunately, though, My Chemical Romance don’t seem to have a problem making this so. Hurrah! This track in particular, I like a lot – it’s not quite Famous Last Words good, but it’s on a par with Welcome to the Black Parade, the song that first got me into them.
Tom: The video is, of course, part of the whole mythos they’ve invented. The plot will almost certainly never attain any kind of coherency.
Tim: No, but then it’s not really meant to – just needs to fit in with the rest. And actually, I love it. I am slightly wondering how the next video will work, though, given that they’ve killed off the lead singer.
Tom: With laser gun battles and Stormtrooper-quality aiming in this one? A resurrection’s almost certainly on the cards.
Talk about your rousing choruses, though. They’ll play arena shows, and everyone there will be chanting this chorus along with them. It’s not catchy, tinny Europop, but it doesn’t have to be: this is music that teenagers are going to listen to in their bedrooms while they write bad poetry and pine over unrequited love. If you don’t feel your fists clench a little on the final chorus, you have no soul.
Tim: Here’s a kid that looks about fourteen, which is probably because he is about fourteen.
Tom: He sounds about twelve.
Tim: Anyway, possibly due to recent playground bullying he has discovered that boys shouldn’t cry, and has decided to write a song about that.
Tom: Oh no.
Tom: I know we’ve established that I’m getting old, but I’m officially classifying this under the “get off my lawn” department. It’s like a teenager whining about how they’ll never love anyone again after a breakup. Yes you will, billions of people have done it before you, get over it.
Tim: Musically, it isn’t bad. It’s a bit dull to start with, and I got a bit bored and moved onto other things, but a couple of minutes later I realised that was I was vaguely listening to was actually alright, so I decided to be charitable and give it a second chance. And yes, it’s still a bit boring at the start, but it does pick up eventually into something quite good, and that I wouldn’t mind listening to a few times.
Tom: It’s a bit bizarre, isn’t it? A harmonica and a flat cap almost make up for the fact he’s still going through puberty. If it wasn’t for the lyrics, I’d really like the last minute of this. Only the last minute of it, though.
Tim: It really ought to go without saying, though, that taking two minutes to make a three minute song sound decent is Just Not On. Sorry, Ulrich, but you’ll need to do better next time if you want to pass your music whatever-the-Swedish-version-of-GCSE-is.
Tom: Some Finnish electronic Europop for you now, Mr. Jeffries, suggested by reader Laura.
Tom: Hyökyaalto means ‘tsunami’, and he’s using that as a metaphor for love.
It’s a very listenable track, if not all that catchy. That “woah-oh-oh” breakdown before the chorus is great, and I’m always a fan of unnecessary double handclaps. It’s almost a bit U2-ish – add The Edge doing some electric guitar over the top and I think you’re basically there.
Tim: The intro got me nodding approvingly, and that feeling continued throughout, really. I slightly wish they’d done a bit more with the higher-pitched woah-oh-oh from the intro, through. The first time I heard it I did think it went on a bit after the bridge; the second time I also felt that, but didn’t mind at all.
Tom: Translated into English, I reckon this could be a hit over here.
There’s a curious disconnect between the video and the audio: in the video, his mouth putting so much energy and emphasis into every word, while the version of him in the studio seems to be singing quite calmly.
Tim: Sure, but if you put that amount of energy into a normal recording studio he’s going to end up knocking through the walls with his arms.
Tom: Not sure about the cuddle-party during the bridge, though.
Tim: Yeah – doesn’t really fit with the whole love idea.
Tom: It’s Christmas Day, and it’s a Saturday – which one of the many options do we choose for our Saturday Flashback? Well, really, there’s only one choice.
Tom: When he released this one back in 2006, it didn’t have the fancy video. That was added much later. He wasn’t a big international star then; he was a Swedish dance music producer who’d just released a slightly-novelty record about the internet. The only folks paying attention in Britain were people who lived on the internet. People like me.
Tim: How times change – fast forward two years and he’s got three top twenty singles under his belt and Scott Mills championing his track to be Christmas number one. (Needless to say, it didn’t quite take off Rage Against the Machine style, although a chart peak of 35 is perfectly respectable.)
Tom: So, here’s a little known fact for you: I was the first British person ever to interview Basshunter. November 2006 on University Radio York. There were no listeners, and I wasn’t a competent interviewer. (Drinking game: take a shot every time I unnecessarily say ‘mm-hm’.)
Tom: I’m going to open this with a simple question, Tim: great key change, or greatest key change?
Tim: I think greatest, purely for the fact that it makes initially regretful girls incredibly happy that they gave themselves willingly to these appalling* stereotypes of men.
* Although sadly not entirely inaccurate.
Tom: Is that John McEnroe? Yes it is. Is that Jessica Alba? Yes it is.
Tim: And is that Serena off Gossip Girl? Yes it is.
Tom: By the time this appears on Europlop!, of course, everyone on the internet will already be singing along to this. There will be two hundred cover versions, thirty badly hashed together parody replies, and at least one version redone shot-for-shot using kittens.
Tim: And if the person who chooses to make the kitten video leaks an unfinished copy with only half the shots replaced we can all scream ‘YAY bestiality!’
Tom: Er… quite. Anyway. The Lonely Island have been a proper band for ages, not just ‘those guys off Saturday Night Live’ (and before that, ‘those guys off the internet’). One full album featuring a dozen guests; another on the way; and performances on MTV and the late night shows.
And here’s the thing: the music’s actually good. Well produced, catchy, and funny at the same time; I think, in the history of music, perhaps only Weird Al has managed that before them.
Tim: Now then Thomas, let me ask you – do you ever get lonely playing with your toys?
Tom: No, but some people say I look like me dad.
Tim: Ooh, you do a bit. But anyway, at least you got where I was coming from before revealing any unfortunate hobbies. Sadly, though, B*Witched haven’t got back together, but half of them have joined up and formed a slightly smaller girl group.
Tim: So, if their debut single is anything to go by, they’ve ditched the cheeky innuendo and have made it their mission to put out songs with good choruses and slightly tiresome verses.
Tom: But… cheeky innuendo is all they had.
Tim: Is it a fairly decent single, aiming to be liked by the people who liked Bad Romance and suchlike? Yes, and yes. Will they last? Almost certainly not, because there is next to nothing unique about them.
Tom: I know this is a slightly cruel thing to say, and I apologise, but from a distance the one in the black wig looks like Noel Fielding in drag. You know, him out of the Mighty Boosh.
Tim: Ouch. You’d better not say that too loud, mind – if you’re not careful she’ll huff, she’ll puff, she’ll huff and puff and blow you away.
Tim: Chances are, you’ve heard that the third Chronicles of Narnia film, The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, has just been released.
Tom: The third? I missed the second entirely. Anyway, if this has spawned anything half as good as Lazy Sunday, I’ll be happy.
Tim: Well, this song is from the soundtrack. Sort of. It’s slightly odd: the official recording artist is Carrie Underwood, who put together a not altogether bad version, but alongside that various other acts from around the world have recorded their own versions, presumably for the noble cause that is selling more copies of the soundtrack. These acts include Sweden’s E.M.D. (who actually managed to perform a very good live version, if a little shaky on the vocals), Britain’s Joe McElderry (who decided that one song wasn’t enough for him and did a somewhat better second one as well, especially if you quite liked the weird auto-tune fake backing singers effect on Ambitions) and Germany’s Victoria S (who, appropriately for the season, decided to dress up as a Christmas tree decoration).
Tom: Five versions of the same song? That’s a challenge even for me. Particularly with a song like that.
Tim: Yes – by and large, unfortunately, it’s not all that great. Somehow all of these separate groups/singers have taken what could (and indeed should) be a very emotional song, and seemingly stripped it of almost all feeling whatsoever.
Tom: Well, it’s a kids’ movie song. It’s not going to make adults that emotional. Apart from the ending of An American Tail. That can floor anyone and it is PERFECTLY ACCEPTABLE to cry at it, okay?
Tim: Um, yes. Yes Tom. But even if this is a kids; movie, when the lyrics are ‘We could be the kings and queens, of anything if we believe’, I want to be made to run to the kitchen, grab some tin foil, and make myself a crown.
Tom: You don’t need a song to do that, Tim.
Tim: Anyway, Sonohra, an Italian duo, did better than most.
Tim: What is it about this one that I like? I don’t know. Their voices work well on it, which helps – it seems to work better for me in a lower register – and the instrumentation’s quite a bit louder and especially noticeable in the re-entry after the bridge, which helps create a song you can properly nod your head to. Most of all, though, they actually seem to be enjoying themselves a bit, which always comes in handy.
Tom: It’s the rocky-bit during the first half of the chorus – the ‘kings and queens’ bit – that stands out for me. The rest is generic movie-soundtrack rubbish, and sadly one awesome bit of melody isn’t enough to save the whole song for me.
Tim: Hmm, fair point, I suppose, but I like it.
Tom: And I’ve just realised why I like it – it’s almost exactly the same as the good bit from Robyn’s Call Your Girlfriend. “The only way her heart will mend”, and all that. It’s a sudden descending major-key bit that stands out. At this point, I which I knew more about music theory.
Tim: Ooh, it is and all, isn’t it? Anyway, sod this – you’re right, I don’t need a song. Now where did I put the Pritt Stick? And has anyone got a throne I can borrow?
Tom: So, she’s releasing a track with the same name as Take That’s latest single. That’s a brilliant idea, well done Cheryl.
Tim: And unlike Take That’s, it’s not good. It’s not terrible, but it just kind of… washes over you.
Tom: “Turn the lights out / in the lighthouse”? You’re a menace to shipping, Cole. I’ll ruin this song forever now for you, Tim, by saying that judging by the title, this should really have been a song about her menstrual cycle.
Tim: I don’t know how to respond to that.
Tom: It’s better than the damned ‘alouette’ refrain from the last one, I suppose; it’s at least musical.
Tim: It couldn’t really be worse than that, though. Unless it really was about her period.
Tom: How many times does she blow that damned candle out in the video?
Tim: Maybe it’s one of those magic relighting candles you get on birthday cakes.
