Eurovizh Poptimist Postmortem

[freakytigger.livejournal.com]

Who ruled? Who wuz robbed? Who did the robbing? Will Terry stay or go? Is the Russian win down to Timbaland, rollerblades, or the bloc-vote version of Buggins' Turn? When did modern dance take over Eurovision and why won't the UK play the game? Is Sebastien Tellier in fact The Dude? Any other questions??

(I thought overall the quality was pretty high this year, though only 1 or 2 real standouts. Only 1 or 2 real stinkers too, sadly one of them won the thing.)

VIDEO CLUB: Part "I can't decide whether these work or not"

[alexmacpherson.livejournal.com]

You know when you hear a song, and you know you basically like it, but you can't tell if there's something actually wrong about it which you can't put your finger on which is going to stop you coming back to it, or if it's a grower which you'll totally unthaw to in time? I'm like that with these two songs:

Michelle Williams - We Break The Dawn

I love the bass hit in the chorus, the tune's killer, I think Michelle herself is pretty good on it...it's obviously being sold as her ABANDONMENT OF GOSPEL but there's totally some spiritual uplift going on when she sings "We're holding time in our hands"...hmm.

Jesse McCartney - Leavin'

Um, who was Jesse McCartney anyway? I gather he was...some kind of really uncool teenpop type, then he co-wrote 'Bleeding Love', and now he's got The-Dream and Tricky Stewart on board and is positioning himself as a grown-up sexxxy r&b Chris Brown type? His album's pretty good - as in, the songs and production are really fucking stellar, and I know what's slightly off about it, but I don't know whether this will resolve itself. His voice is...so 90s! It's such a boy-band voice, that slight hint of trying-too-hard hysteria, and I don't have anything against it (like, Backstreet Boys? TOP obv) but it just doesn't seem to have a place in 2008? Because it sound skind of ersatz, Disneyfied in a bad way, compared to singers like Chris Brown, who are making equally catchy, poppy tracks themselves. This might be a minor quibble though. Also he looks like 11 in the video.

YOUR THOUGHTS PLEASE.

(NB: I was going to post the new N*E*R*D video but it's SO FUCKING AWFUL that I don't want to take any responsibility for anyone's adverse reactions to it. God, Pharrell, just fuck off.)