Monday, April 28, 2008
Imagine the perfect girlband, a cross perhaps between the Supremes and Girls Aloud. Well, we'll have to keep dreaming for that, but here's a solo artist who fits the bill in every way apart from only being one person. Perhaps she can draft in some backing dancers and the greatest girlgroup of the 00s may be in the making. I may be over-selling Janelle a little bit there, as most of her songs other than this one are dull r'n'b, but I do think she's got great potential - not just fab music but very cool style and a distinctive persona. She's got what it takes to be a star, and I could imagine it all coming together for her - it'll be quite a waste if not. This track was a single in 2007, and has a great robotty remix you can hear on her MySpace.
# posted by Jessica : 7:01 pm
Tuesday, April 22, 2008
I don't know where I got this song from, but I found it on my mp3 player last night and became instantly obsessed. The song itself (which has a female singer, not apparent in this photo) is really great, early 90s dance-pop with a blissful yet melancholy summery feel, but it's the metaphor-filled lyrics that I love most, especially the opening line "Sometimes days seem to move just like a big fat man". They're from New Zealand, so now I've posted 2 acts from NZ in a month, after never having posted one before. The cruise control metaphor will certainly appeal to Crystal, of the newly-reopened
Love Pavilion. The
video takes it a bit far though, simply being the band in a car! This single was released in 1991, but it wasn't until 1994 they had their biggest success, a song called
George, which is rockier and explains how Headless Chickens came to be a major inspiration for Garbage.
# posted by Jessica : 2:26 pm
Sunday, April 20, 2008
I really don't know why I've never posted this song before - it's fantastic, and in fact I'd kind of forgotten about it. It's certainly the stand-out track of the group's output so far, but that's not to say their other songs aren't good, this is just such an obvious favourite for me. If you like happy twee pop groups like I'm From Barcelona, Pipettes and Tilly & the Wall, then you must download it, but if on the other hand you find such things too sickly sweet, then a) what are you doing here? and b) go away! Well actually, maybe that's bad advice - how will these people ever escape the dark side if they don't give this music a chance? Just give in to the happiness, you can do it! Listen out particularly for the fun lyrics and the super-uplifting ending.
# posted by Jessica : 5:03 pm
Saturday, April 19, 2008
I'm SO excited that September has shot straight into the top 10 on the release of her new UK single Cry For You. Of course we Scandipop fans have known of the song for years, as she's actually released another (her 3rd) album since the one on which Cry For You first appeared. I thought I'd post one of the songs from it, mainly to let those who are just hearing of September know that she has a 3-album back-catalogue of brilliance, but also because I haven't mentioned much how great her latest Swedish album is. It's hard to pick a favourite track, but I chose this one because it really reminds me of Margaret Bergeer, whose songs such as Robot Song, Samantha and Will You Remember Me Tomorrow were huge hits with the readers of my blogs when I was raving about them about 18 months ago.
# posted by Jessica : 3:44 pm
Friday, April 18, 2008
I'm having real trouble with Muxtape right now, so I've uploaded on ye olde Shareserver instead - if you're American you can download it legally on Amazon. It's been a few months since the last time (with Sam Sparro) I found a song by an unknown artist which I knew had the potential to be a huge hit, and at last it's happened again with this track by strangely-named US dance diva Lady GaGa. Just Dance is a crossbreed of Umbrella and Don'cha, with a huge addition of cheery poptasticness. Its title couldn't be more fitting, and it could easily be categorised alongside such r'n'b dance-pop classics as AM To PM by Christian Milian and Play by J-Lo. There's something very exciting and uplifting about this song, and since it's produced by Akon, it'll presumably get enough attention to become as huge as it deserves. I think a lot of dancing to this song will be occuring over the coming summer - I can't wait!
# posted by Jessica : 12:34 pm
Wednesday, April 16, 2008
I just love to walk around town listening to this song, it seems absolutely appropriate for the place I live. It's so jolly, but be warned if your ears aren't fond of high-pitched singing! I also love the bit where she talks about going to Tivoli in Copenhagen, cos I've been there (it was great). In fact all the lyrics are brilliant. This song's actually available as a free download on Steso Songs' MySpace. I was surprised to see it was the first song on there as it's been around for years, but its greatness certainly warrants that position. Download it now and brighten up your life!
# posted by Jessica : 7:29 pm
Sunday, April 13, 2008
If you like Feist's lovely cover of One Evening, then you should definitely give a listen to this similar and similarly ace track by New Zealand electro-popstar Ladyhawke. I've had the simple yet catchy chorus in my head all week. It's cute and girly in a very cool way. As a bonus treat, I've also uploaded the more dancey track she's done with Australian duo PNAU. It's called Embrace and I'd describe it as a disco-pop version of The Knife - a very good prospect, I think you'll agree! I could imagine it being a hit here in the UK, actually. I don't think I've ever posted anything by a New Zealand artist before, it's quite exciting.
# posted by Jessica : 5:41 pm
Saturday, April 12, 2008
I hate to be negative about a band who are helping us to infiltrate the indie world with poptasticness, but I do think I would be much more a fan of The Ting Tings if they were re-releasing the great songs from their days as Dear Eskiimo. I bought their EP, but I haven't even been half-tempted to buy anything by The Ting Tings. The clown in the Patience
video was pretty disturbing, though. All of the songs on the EP are great, so I've uploaded them all for you as a special treat - enjoy!
# posted by Jessica : 2:48 pm
Wednesday, April 09, 2008
Gotye (aka Belgian-born Aussie Wouter DeBacker) was
voted by Australian/NZ bloggers their favourite local act of 2007, but I listened to the songs on his MySpace and was utterly bored... until I heard this one, a complete contrast in style to the rest. While they are mid-tempo somewhat spooky indie-electro, this is upbeat, really fun and convincing Motown-style pop - think Jamie Lidell or Gnarls Barkley, but only their best songs. It actually samples the drums from Be My Baby by the Ronettes. Apparently this song was a small hit in 2006 in Australia, so I hope its fans weren't too disappointed by Gotye's other work. Pop traditionalists will be pleased to see this song is exactly 3 minutes long, making me think it was the attempt of an otherwise serious act to show off how easy it is to make a good pop song, so it's a little unfortunate if that is the case that he succeeded, although I'm sure he did not really make something so intricately catchy as this with ease.
# posted by Jessica : 12:34 pm
